Preparing IBM Storage Protect Snapshot for Custom Applications with GPFS
If you plan to configure IBM® Storage Protect Snapshot for Custom Applications in a GPFS™ environment, some prerequisites are required before you start.
- If you want to use IBM Storage Protect Snapshot from all GPFS nodes in your environment, you must install it into a GPFS file system. You must prepare an independent file set or a GPFS file system for the installation that does not contain other application data that you want to protect. The IBM Storage Protect Snapshot repository, configuration, and binary files are then shared between all nodes of your GPFS cluster.
- Choose one GPFS management node in the cluster that runs the IBM Storage Protect Snapshot daemons.
- Choose a GPFS management node for offloading data to an IBM Storage Protect server. This can be the same node on which the daemons are running.
- Choose the GPFS management nodes that participate in offloading operations. You must include the node that is used for offloading data to the IBM Storage Protect. Ensure that the IBM Storage Protect client is set up on all nodes that you choose.
- Determine which IBM Storage Protect server or servers you are offloading backups to. Ensure that the IBM Storage Protect client is set up and configured for each of the IBM Storage Protect servers. For information about setting up IBM Storage Protect clients for cooperation with the GPFS mmbackup command, see IBM Storage Protect requirements.
- If you require different IBM Storage Protect settings for various GPFS independent file sets, plan to set up different IBM Storage Protect Snapshot instances. A single instance manages all file sets that share a set of IBM Storage Protect Snapshot and IBM Storage Protect parameters.
- Where possible, place all data to be managed by IBM Storage Protect Snapshot in independent file sets that are different from root file sets of the GPFS file system.
In an IBM Storage Protect Snapshot GPFS setup, there is no backup server. Offload operations to the IBM Storage Protect server are run at the production cluster level.
Make sure that all file systems included in a backup are mounted to the default mount point. All file sets must be linked when an offloaded backup to an IBM Storage Protect server is run. When you are unlinking file sets or linking file sets to different paths, restrictions for the mmbackup command apply. For example, files that are contained in file sets that were unlinked during an offload operation are expired on the IBM Storage Protect server.
To send backups to an IBM Storage Protect server, the GPFS mmbackup command is used. Rules and limitations that are documented in the GPFS documentation for the mmbackup command apply.