IBM Spectrum Protect requirements

The mmbackup command requires a IBM Spectrum Protect™ client and server environment to perform a backup operation.

For details on the supported versions of IBM Spectrum Protect, client and server installation and setup, and include and exclude lists, see the IBM® Tivoli® Storage Manager V7.1.7 documentation.

1. Ensure that the supported versions of the IBM Spectrum Protect client and server are installed. See the IBM Spectrum Scale™ FAQ in IBM Knowledge Center (www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/STXKQY/gpfsclustersfaq.html).
2. Ensure that the IBM Spectrum Protect server and clients are configured properly for backup operations.
3. If you are using multiple IBM Spectrum Protect servers to protect data, ensure that the IBM Spectrum Protect servers are set up properly.
4. Ensure the required dsm.sys and dsm.opt configuration files are present in the IBM Spectrum Protect configuration directory on each node used to run mmbackup or named in a node specification with -N.
5. If you want to include or exclude specific files or directories by using include-exclude lists, ensure that the lists are set up correctly before you invoke the mmbackup command.
   The mmbackup command uses a IBM Spectrum Protect include-exclude list for including and excluding specific files or directories. See the Tivoli documentation for information about defining an include-exclude list.

   Note: IBM Spectrum Protect interprets its include and exclude statements in a unique manner that is not precisely matched by the GPFS™ mmapplypolicy file selection language. The essential meaning of each supported include or exclude statement is followed, but the commonly used IBM Spectrum Protect idiom of excluding everything as the last statement and including selective directory or file name patterns in prior statements should not be used with GPFS and mmbackup. The exclusion pattern of "/*" is interpreted by mmapplypolicy to exclude everything, and no data is backed up.

   A very large include-exclude list can decrease backup performance. Use wildcards and eliminate unnecessary include statements to keep the list as short as possible.

6. If more than one node will be used to perform the backup operation (mmbackup -N option):
   • The mmbackup command will verify that the IBM Spectrum Protect Backup-Archive client versions and configuration are correct before executing the backup. Any nodes that are not configured correctly will be removed from the backup operation. Ensure that IBM Spectrum Protect clients are installed and at the same version on all nodes that will invoke the mmbackup command or participate in parallel backup operations.
   • Ensure that IBM Spectrum Protect is aware that the various IBM Spectrum Protect clients are all working on the same file system, not different file systems having the same name on different client machines. This is accomplished by using proxy nodes for multiple nodes in the cluster. See the IBM Spectrum Protect documentation for recommended settings for GPFS cluster nodes setup.
7. Restoration of backed-up data must be done using IBM Spectrum Protect interfaces. This can be done with the client command-line interface or the IBM Spectrum Protect web client. The IBM Spectrum Protect web client interface must be made operational if you wish to use this interface for restoring data to the file system from the IBM Spectrum Protect server.
8. When more than one IBM Spectrum Protect server is referenced in the dsm.sys file, mmbackup uses all listed IBM Spectrum Protect servers by default. To use only a select IBM Spectrum Protect server or the servers that are listed in dsm.sys, use the mmbackup --tsm-servers option. When more than one IBM Spectrum Protect server is used for backup, the list and the order specified should remain constant. If additional IBM Spectrum Protect servers are added to the backup later, add them to the end of the list that is specified with the mmbackup --tsm-servers option.
9. IBM Spectrum Protect does not support special characters in the path names and in some cases cannot back up a path name that has special characters. A limited number of special characters are supported on IBM Spectrum Protect client 6.4.0.0 and later versions with client options WILDCARDSARELITERAL and QUOTESARELITERAL. Use these IBM Spectrum Protect options with the mmbackup --noquote option if you have path names with special characters. The mmbackup command does not back up path names containing any newline, Ctrl+X, or Ctrl+Y characters. If the mmbackup command finds unsupported characters in the path name, it writes that path to a file called mmbackup.unsupported.tsmserver at the root of the mmbackup record directory (by default it is the root of the file system).