Enabling recovery test mode for Asynchronous Policy Based FlashSystem Replication

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About this task

Asynchronous Policy Based Replication sessions now support the ability to put the replication into a Recovery Test Mode. By putting the replication into this mode, you can attach host systems directly to the volumes in the replication target Volume Group in order to test the procedures that would be run in the event of an actual disaster.
Important: When replication is put in the recovery test mode, data will continue to be replicated to the target to avoid long resynchronization times when the recovery test is complete, however, consistency groups will stop forming. If a disaster occurs during the recovery test, the targets can be recovered to a Snapshot the session created at the start of the test, or to a diverged copy of the data, meaning any data written to the targets during the test will remain on the target volumes.

Procedure

  1. When the session is in the Prepared state, issue the Start Recovery Test command.
    Note: Prior to starting the recover test on the hardware, the session will automatically create a Snapshot of the volumes in the target Volume Group. This snapshot can be seen from the FlashSystem GUI/CLI as well as in the Copy Services Manager console logs.
  2. Session will go into a Warning status with the state of Recovery Test Mode.
    Note: While in the Recovery Test Mode, the Progress displayed for the session will show an increasing time for Data Exposure. Data Exposure is calculated as the current time minus the time the Snapshot was taken prior to entering the Recovery Test Mode.
  3. Attach hosts to the volumes in the Volume Group on the target storage system and perform any required recovery test actions.
  4. In the event of a disaster while the session is in the Recovery Test Mode, the session will go into a Suspended state and a Failover command will become available.
    Note: If you issue the Failover command while the session was in a Recovery Test Mode, the session will automatically attempt to restore the targets from the Snapshot that was created prior to enabling the recovery test mode. This will restore the targets to an older point in time of the data. If the hardware does not support restoring a Snapshot to volumes in a Volume Group with an active Asynchronous replication policy, then the Failover command will make the targets writeable but the data will be considered a diverged copy of the data containing any i/o written during the recovery test. To restore from the Snapshot, remove the Asynchronous replication policy and then Restore the Snapshot to the target Volume Group volumes.
  5. When the test is complete, issue the Stop Recovery Test command.
    Note: The session will automatically delete the Snapshot created at the start of the recovery test.