IBM Storage Protect requirements

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

For details on the supported versions of IBM Storage 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 Storage Protect client and server are installed. See the IBM Storage Scale FAQ in IBM Documentation.
2. Ensure that the IBM Storage Protect server and clients are configured properly for backup operations.
3. If you are using multiple IBM Storage Protect servers to protect data, ensure that the IBM Storage Protect servers are set up properly.
4. Ensure the required dsm.sys and dsm.opt configuration files are present in the IBM Storage 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 an IBM Storage 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 Storage 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 Storage 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 is used to perform the backup operation (mmbackup -N option):
   • The mmbackup command verifies that the IBM Storage 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 Storage 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 Storage Protect is aware that the various IBM Storage 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 Storage Protect documentation for recommended settings for GPFS cluster nodes setup.
7. Restoration of backed-up data must be done using IBM Storage Protect interfaces. This can be done with the client command-line interface or the IBM Storage Protect web client. The IBM Storage 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 Storage Protect server.
8. When more than one IBM Storage Protect server is referenced in the dsm.sys file, mmbackup uses all listed IBM Storage Protect servers by default. To use only a select IBM Storage Protect server or the servers that are listed in dsm.sys, use the mmbackup --tsm-servers option. When more than one IBM Storage Protect server is used for backup, the list and the order specified should remain constant. If additional IBM Storage 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 Storage 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 Storage Protect client 6.4.0.0 and later versions with client options WILDCARDSARELITERAL and QUOTESARELITERAL. Use these IBM Storage 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).