Protecting NAS file servers

Product	Description
Tivoli Storage Manager server	To back up and restore NAS file server data by using the Tivoli Storage Manager server, you must have Tivoli Storage Manager Extended Edition installed. You can configure the Tivoli Storage Manager server to use the network data management protocol (NDMP) to back up and restore data as described in the following topics in this section. To protect large NetApp file systems, you can alternatively configure Tivoli Storage Manager to use NetApp SnapMirror to Tape (also known as SMTape). SnapMirror to Tape uses a block-level copy of data for backup, which is faster than a traditional NDMP full backup and can be used when NDMP full backups are impractical. For information about using SnapMirror to Tape to back up and restore data, see Backup and restore operations by using the NetApp SnapMirror to Tape feature.
Tivoli Storage Manager backup-archive client	You can configure the Tivoli Storage Manager backup-archive client to back up and restore file server data by using the Network File System (NFS) or Common Internet File System (CIFS) protocol. For information about using the backup-archive client to back up and restore data, see Back up and restore data with backup-archive clients.
Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager	You can use Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager to back up and restore file server data by using the advanced snapshot technologies of storage systems. For information about using Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager to back up and restore data, see Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager for UNIX and Linux overview or Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager for VMware overview.

NDMP requirements
To use NDMP for operations with NAS file servers, you must have Tivoli Storage Manager Extended Edition installed and your file server environment must meet certain requirements.

NDMP operations management
There are several administrator activities for NDMP operations.

Configuring Tivoli Storage Manager for NDMP operations
You can configure Tivoli Storage Manager to back up and recover data on NAS file servers by using NDMP. The configuration procedure differs depending on whether you plan to back up data from a nonclustered or clustered NAS file server.

Backing up and restoring NAS file servers using NDMP
After you configure Tivoli Storage Manager for NDMP operations, you are ready to begin using NDMP.

File-level backup and restore for NDMP operations
When you back up data by using NDMP, you can specify that the Tivoli Storage Manager server collects and stores file-level information in a table of contents (TOC).

Directory-level backup and restore operations
If you have a large NAS file system, initiating a backup at a directory level reduces backup and restore times and provides more flexibility in configuring NAS backups. By defining virtual file spaces, a file system backup can be partitioned among several NDMP backup operations and multiple tape drives. You can also use different backup schedules to back up subtrees of a file system.

Backup and restore operations by using the NetApp SnapMirror to Tape feature
You can back up large NetApp file systems by using the NetApp SnapMirror to Tape feature (also known as SMTape). Using a block-level copy of data for backup, the SnapMirror to Tape method is faster than a traditional NDMP full backup and can be used when NDMP full backups are impractical.

NDMP backup operations using Celerra file server-integrated checkpoints
When the Tivoli Storage Manager server initiates an NDMP backup operation on a Celerra data mover, the backup of a large file system might take several hours to complete. Without Celerra integrated checkpoints, any changes that occur on the file system are written to the backup image.

Replicating NAS nodes
You can replicate a NAS node that uses NDMP for backup operations. Before you configure the replication operation, review the restrictions that apply.