Clean room profiles

The clean room profiles connect the recovery groups that belong to resources in the production environment with resources and configuration that is defined in IBM Storage Defender Data Resiliency Service. The connected resources are IBM Storage FlashSystem (primary storage), IBM Storage Defender Data Protect (secondary storage), IBM Storage Protect (secondary storage), and the clean room environment. The related configuration defines how IBM Storage Defender behaves for a recovery.

For more information about understanding and implementation of a clean room, see the Blueprint available here technote 7150058.

The following image illustrates the logical connection between the different components.
Figure 1. The role of the clean room profile in IBM Storage Defender.
To ensure the successful recovery of the recovery group that is assigned to the specific clean room profile, configuration requirements must be met. The configuration of a clean room profile allows the usage of the profile for one of the following three different use cases:
  • Recovery from IBM Storage FlashSystem safeguarded snapshots.
  • Recovery from IBM Storage Defender Data Protect backup copies.
  • Recovery from both IBM Storage FlashSystem safeguarded snapshots and IBM Storage Defender Data Protect backup copies.
  • Recovery from IBM Storage Protect backup copies.
  • Recovery from both IBM Storage FlashSystem safeguarded snapshots and IBM Storage Protect backup copies.
Important: If the following requirements are not met, the recovery of the virtual machines that belong to the specific recovery group fails for clean room recoveries.

In addition to the conceptual dependencies between the clean room profile and other IBM Storage Defender components you must consider that the same clean room profile can be reused for different recovery groups. What must be considered in such a case is that the different recovery groups may have different requirements for the recovery. Especially, when you recover from IBM Storage FlashSystem, the requirements for network infrastructure, mapping of volumes, or SAN zoning may be different. Therefore, it may be beneficial to implement multiple clean room profiles with different configurations to provide you with more flexibility for the recovery scenarios that you want to implement for different recovery groups. The following image illustrates the logical connection between the different components.

Figure 2. Reuse of the same clean room profile for multiple recovery groups

Requirements for the recovery from IBM Storage FlashSystem

  • Network Infrastructure: The physical and logical network infrastructure must be implemented that connects the IBM Storage FlashSystem, the production vSphere cluster, and the clean room vSphere cluster. Depending on the usage of iSCSI or Fibre Channel (FC), the environment implies Ethernet or SAN infrastructure.
  • Network Adapter: The ESXi host systems that are used for the implementation of the clean room environment must have FC or iSCSI network adapters configured.
  • Map Volumes: The IBM Storage FlashSystem must be configured to map the ESXi hosts. Also, the following requirements must be met:
    • A host cluster in the clean room vSphere cluster must contain host definitions for every ESXi host.
    • FC or iSCSI port definitions on IBM Storage FlashSystem must match the storage adapters on the vSphere hosts.
  • SAN Zoning: The SAN zoning must be configured to connect the ESXi hosts and IBM Storage FlashSystem ports when the Fibre Channel protocol is used.

For the illustration of the required connectivity, see the following image.

Figure 3. Illustration of the physical and logical configuration for IBM Storage FlashSystem recovery.

Requirements for the recovery from IBM Storage Defender Data Protect

  • Network Infrastructure: The physical and logical Ethernet network infrastructure must be implemented that connects the IBM Storage FlashSystem, the production vSphere cluster, and the clean room vSphere cluster.
  • Data Protect Configuration: Both the production vCenter and the clean room vCenter must be registered in IBM Storage Defender Data Protect as data protection sources.
For the illustration of the required connectivity, see the following image.
Figure 4. Illustration of the physical and logical configuration for IBM Storage Defender Data Protect recovery.

Requirements for the recovery from IBM Storage Protect

  • Network Infrastructure: The physical and logical Ethernet network infrastructure must be implemented that connects the IBM Storage Protect, the production vSphere cluster, and the clean room vSphere cluster.
  • Data Protect Configuration: Both the production vCenter and the clean room vCenter must be registered in IBM Storage Protect as data protection sources.
For the illustration of the required connectivity, see the following image.
Figure 5. Illustration of the physical and logical configuration for IBM Storage Protect recovery.

Requirements for the recovery from IBM Storage FlashSystem and IBM Storage Defender Data Protect using the same clean room profile

Important: All the above requirements must be met for the recovery from both IBM Storage FlashSystem and IBM Storage Defender Data Protect.

On the Profiles page, the Clean room tab displays a table with all policy clean room profiles by Name, Clean room location, and Description. You can search existing profiles by using the search bar or create a new profile by using Create profile button. In a table row, click the overflow menu to view details, edit, or delete profile.