Data protection tagging overview
To manage data protection of virtual machines, you can assign IBM Spectrum Protect™ tags to VMware inventory objects. You can assign tags to VMware objects by specifying data protection settings in the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in of the vSphere Web Client. If you do not use the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in, you can assign tags by using scripting tools such as VMware Power CLI.
If you enable tagging support to manage backups, you can manage the protection of virtual machines, such as excluding or including virtual machines in scheduled backup services, or assigning a schedule to protect virtual machines in a container. For tags that are related to schedules, the virtual machines must be in a protection set that is protected by a schedule. A protection set consists of the virtual machines in a container that is assigned the Schedule (IBM Spectrum Protect) tag.
You can also specify the retention policy for backups, set the data consistency of snapshots, specify the virtual machine disks to protect, or enable application protection with the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in.
The following VMware inventory objects are the containers that you can use to manage virtual machine backups:
- Datacenter
- Folder (Host and Cluster folders and VM and Template folders)
- Host
- Host cluster
- Resource pool
- Virtual machine
When tagging support is enabled, you can assign data protection tags to VMware containers. If you do not use the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in, you must run the set vmtags command to create data protection categories and tags in the VMware inventory.
When the vmtagdatamover option is set to yes, all tags that are assigned to a virtual machine are backed up during backup vm operations. The tags are restored when the restore vm command is run. Tags that are assigned to other inventory objects are not backed up and cannot be restored.
Representation of tags in the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in
When you specify data protection settings in the IBM Spectrum Protect window in the IBM Spectrum Protect vSphere Client plug-in, data protection tags are assigned to the inventory object.- Supported data protection tags
IBM Spectrum Protect data protection tags can be assigned to VMware inventory objects to control how virtual machine backups are managed. - Inheritance of data protection settings
IBM Spectrum Protect data protection settings, or tags, can be inherited, or passed down, from a higher-level parent inventory object in the vSphere Web Client navigator. - Tips for data protection tagging
Backup policies are determined by the data protection tag assignments on vSphere inventory objects. The performance for processing data protection tags can also be affected by the number of tags that are applied to the vSphere inventory and where the tags are applied.