Detailed System Requirements
Abstract
This document details the backup and restores requirements for file systems for IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management 2.3.0
Content
- The product now known as IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management was named IBM Storage Copy Data Management in levels earlier than 2.2.26. To learn more about the brand change, see IBM Storage CDM and Sentinel brand change to IBM Storage Defender CDM and Sentinel.
- The product now known as IBM Storage Copy Data Management was named IBM Spectrum Copy Data Management in levels earlier than 2.2.20. To learn more about the brand change, see IBM Spectrum Protect brand change to IBM Storage Protect.
This document is divided into linked sections for ease of navigation. Use the following links to jump to the section of the document that you require:
- General
- Configuration
- Software
- Connectivity
- Authentication and privileges
- Restore and revert
- Sample Configuration
- IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management installs an agent on application servers when they are registered. Some anti-virus software might flag or attempt to remove the agent software. If you run anti-malware software application servers, exclude the installation path of the IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent.
For Linux-based file system and Application servers, you must install the psmisc package. For example, it is required so that the cancellation or cleanup of restore jobs function correctly. If this package is not installed, restore jobs might fail. Installation of psmisc package can be done on RHEL OS using below command. Please identify equivalent command for your OS platform
yum localinstall psmisc*.rpmFor Microsoft Windows-based systems, such as Microsoft SQL Server, the agent installation directory must be excluded for any anti-virus scans. Add this path to the exclusion list for all anti-virus software that is installed on the application server:
"C:\Program Files\IBM\IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management"For Linux-based and AIX-based systems, the agent installation directory must be excluded for any anti-virus software scans. Add this path to the exclusion list for all anti-virus software that is installed on the application server. For Oracle, InterSystems Caché, IRIS and SAP HANA:
/tmp/cdm_guestapps_<username>Where <username> is the username of the account used to register the application server in IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management.
- IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management support for third-party operating systems, applications, services, and the hardware depends on their respective vendors. If a third-party product and product's version moves into extended support, self-service support or end-of-life, IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management supports that product and product's version at the same level as the vendor. See also IBM Support General Guidelines and Limitations - IBM support for software on unsupported operating systems
Supported platforms and configurations
| Operating System* | ||
|---|---|---|
| ||
| Supported filesystem types | ||
| ||
| Server types of | Storage Systems | Storage Configuration |
| Physical [4] |
|
|
Notes:
- Windows Remote Shell (WinRM) must be enabled.
- For supported VMware vSphere versions, see in System requirements: IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management 2.3.0.
Select the Physical provider type when you register the provider in IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management. All data and log files for an instance should be backed by either an iSCSI, FC or in case of PowerFlex' proprietary SDC protocol disk.
Note: NetApp ONTAP Storage Systems are not supported
- Applications registered as Physical on CDM are only supported.
- On AIX only Fiber Channel is supported for file system backup and restore.
- On IBM Systems Storage, condense is run during maintenance jobs.
For Dell PowerMax Storage:
Ensure all the relevant volumes of the File System for that given instance are part of single Storage Group.
IBM Storage Copy Data Management supports one parent storage group, and it can contain different child storage group for different file systems.
For Instant Restore, Host on Dell PowerMax array must have at least one Masking View created for itself, even if the host is a part of a hostgroup having active Masking View.
For remote replication, please create and map the host to the remote array as well and have at least one Masking View created using it. The port group used in the Masking View created will be used by the CDM restore job while creating Masking View to map the restored volumes to the host on the remote array.
- JFS2 filesystem is only tested and supported for IBM FlashSystem as a storage provider.
- RHEL 10, SUSE 16 and SUSE 15 SP07 are currently not supported by Dell PowerFlex SDC driver for version 4.8.x.
Applications that are registered as Physical for Dell PowerFlex need to follow the below steps. Since SDC setup is done as root user, binaries like drv_cfg are not accessible for non-root users, which are used in application registration.
namei -l $(readlink -f /opt/emc/scaleio/sdc/bin/drv_cfg) groups <username> groupadd powerflex usermod -aG powerflex <username> groups <username> chgrp -R powerflex /usr/bin/emc chgrp -R powerflex /usr/bin/emc/scaleio/ chmod -R g+rx /usr/bin/emc/scaleio/ chgrp -R powerflex /opt/emc/scaleio chmod -R g+rx /opt/emc/scaleio chmod g+rx $(readlink -f /opt/emc/scaleio/sdc/bin/drv_cfg) namei -l $(readlink -f /opt/emc/scaleio/sdc/bin/drv_cfg)
Windows file system considerations
For the Windows file system, the following configurations are not supported:
- Windows Failover Cluster
- Clustered Shared Volumes (CSV)
Linux file system considerations
For the Linux file system, the following configurations are not supported:
- Linux HA Cluster
- The bash and sudo packages must be installed. Sudo must be version 1.8.29 or later. Run sudo -V to check the version.
- Python version 3.x (upto 3.9) must be installed.
RHEL 8.x only: Verify the util-linux package is up to date by running:
yum update util-linuxRHEL 8.x or later: A required Perl module, Digest:MD5, is not installed by default. Install the module by running:
yum install perl-Digest-MD5Linux only: If data stays on LVM volumes, make sure that the LVM version is 2.03.02 or later. To check the LVM version and if necessary to update the package, run:
lvm version yum update lvm2
- The SSH service must be running on port 22 on the server and any firewalls must be configured to allow IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management to connect to the server by using SSH. The SFTP subsystem for SSH must also be enabled.
- The server can be registered by using a DNS name or IP address. DNS names must be resolvable by IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management.
- To mount clones or copies of data, IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management automatically maps and unmaps LUNs to the servers. Each server must be preconfigured to connect to the relevant Storage Systems at that site.
- For Fibre Channel, the appropriate zoning must be configured beforehand.
- For iSCSI, the servers must be configured beforehand to discover and log in to the targets on the storage servers.
Authentication
- The application server must be registered in IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management by using an operating system user that exists on the server (referred to as "IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent user" for the rest of this topic).
- During registration, you must provide either a password or a private SSH key that IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management uses to log in to the server.
- For password-based authentication, make sure that the password is correctly configured and that the user can log in without facing any other prompts, such as prompts to reset the password.
- For key-based authentication, verify that the public SSH key is placed in the appropriate authorized_keys file for the IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent user.
- Typically, the file is at /home/<username>/.ssh/authorized_keys
- Typically, the .ssh directory and all files under it need to have their permissions set to 600.
Privileges
The IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent user needs the following privileges:
- Privileges to run commands as root and other users by using sudo. IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management requires these privileges for various tasks such as discovering storage layouts and mounting and unmounting disks.
- The sudoers configuration must allow the IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent user to run commands without a password.
- The !requiretty setting must be set.
For examples on creating a new user with the necessary privileges, see Sample Configuration in file system requirements.
Restore Jobs
If the xfsprogs package version on the destination server is between 3.2.0 and 4.1.9, the restore process might fail when you restore a database or file system from an XFS file system. To resolve the issue, upgrade xfsprogs to version 4.2.0 or later.
Revert Jobs
File system revert jobs
When you run file system revert jobs, there are considerations that must be met for jobs to successfully complete:
- Shut down any application databases on the file system to be reverted before you run the revert operation.
- When the revert action completes, take appropriate steps to restore the applications to use the old data that is now contained on one or more file system that were reverted.
The following commands are examples for creating and configuring an operating system user that IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management use to log in to the application server. The command syntax might vary depending on your operating system type and version.
Create the user that is designated as the IBM Storage Defender Copy Data Management agent user:
useradd -m cdmagentIf you use password-based authentication, set a password:
passwd cdmagentIf you use key-based authentication, place the public key in /home/cdmagent/.ssh/authorized_keys. Or use the appropriate file depend on your sshd configuration, and verify that the correct ownership and permissions are set, such as:
chown -R cdmagent:cdmagent /home/cdmagent/.ssh chmod 700 /home/cdmagent/.ssh chmod 600 /home/cdmagent/.ssh/authorized_keysPlace the following lines at the end of your sudoers configuration file, typically /etc/sudoers. If the existing sudoers file is configured to import configuration from another directory (for example /etc/sudoers.d), you can also place the lines in a new file in that directory:
Defaults:cdmagent !requiretty cdmagent ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL
Related Information
Product Synonym
IBM Storage Defender CDM
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Document Information
Modified date:
28 April 2026
UID
ibm17267290