Windows operating systemsLinux operating systemsAIX operating systems

Starting a web user interface session for file-restore operations

The IBM Spectrum® Protect backup-archive client provides a web user interface component, which can be started and managed independently of web browser software. After you install and configure the web user interface on your workstation, you can use the web user interface for file-restore operations. You can restore files on behalf of a user without accessing the web user interface virtual machine. The web user interface supports only client-to-server communications that use the Transport Layer Security (TLS) or Secure Sockets Layers (SSL) protocols.

Before you begin

To determine which web browsers are supported, see the software requirements topic for your operating system.

To run the web user interface from Mozilla Firefox browsers, the option for Enable JavaScript must be enabled. This option is enabled by default.

Procedure

  1. Run the dsmc query session command to validate that the TLS or SSL protocol is used. Review the output to find the security information, which is similar to the following example,
    SSL Information.........: TLSv1.2 TLS_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA
    Important: If security information is not available, you are connecting to a pre-security server and a web user interface session for file-restore operations cannot be used with a pre-security server.
  2. Start the client acceptor by taking the appropriate actions for your operating system:
    • AIX operating systemsRun the dsmcad command from a command line.
    • Linux operating systemsIf using the init.d-based Linux distribution, enter the command /etc/init.d/dsmcad start; from a command line.

      If your Linux distribution uses systemd to manage services, start the service using the systemctl start dsmcad command from a command line. For more information, see Setting the client scheduler process to run as a background task and start automatically at startup

    • Windows operating systemsUse the dsmcutil command to create a dsmcad and dsmagent service from a command line. For more information, see the INSTall CAD and INSTall REMOTEAgent commands in Dsmcutil commands: Required options and examples. Issue the following command:
      dsmcutil start /name:client acceptor daemon service name
      where client acceptor daemon service name is the name of the client acceptor daemon (CAD) service.
  3. Enter the following IBM Spectrum Protect server commands using dsmadmc to register an administrator to access the client data, and perform the file-restore operations on behalf of the node:
    reg admin admin ID password
    grant auth admin ID cl=node auth=access node=your node
    where admin ID is the administrator's ID, password is the administrator's password, and node is the node where file-restore operations are performed.
  4. If you registered a new node, and do not have backup data stored on the IBM Spectrum Protect server for that node, perform a backup. This backup provides you with test data that can be used for file-restore operations with the web user interface. To back up the data, take one of the following actions:
    • From the command line, run either the dsmc incremental or dsmc selective command. For more information, see:
    • In the IBM Spectrum Protect backup-archive client GUI select Backup.
  5. To start the File Restore user interface, in a supported web browser, enter the following URL:
    https://hostname:9081/bagui/
    where hostname specifies the address of the virtual machine that hosts the File Restore user interface.
  6. In the login window, enter the administrator ID and password (as specified in step 3), and click Sign In.