cloning an HPUX system

[Robert Griffin]

The backup/restore for the root volume group in HPUX seems to be straight forward and I have found much documentation on it. My question is: how do I backup/restore the non root volume groups. My ultimate goal is two fold: 1)clone an N class system and 2)provide a disaster recovery plan for same. This is a very simple process in AIX, but I haven't been able to find any detailed instructions for doing it yet in HPUX. The systems (both clonee and cloner) are Nclass servers with mirrored HP Sure Store E Disk System FC10's.

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

Use make_recovery for root volume group and any backup tools available (ex. OmniBack, fbackup, cpio, tar for any other vgs.

[James R. Ferguson]

Robert:

Check out:

http://www.software.hp.com/products/IUX/index.html

There is a wealth of information on the ignite product here.

...JRF...

[Anthony deRito]

My hat goes off to IBM IF this is a "very simple process".

Recreate root volume group with Ignite/UX which is a free tool for HP. Use print_manifest tool that comes with Ignite/UX to get an idea of what other volume groups you need to reproduce. Use vgexport and vgimport to recreate volume groups. Use backup software to restore filesystems. Lots of other stuff in between but did'nt want to bore you if you already have info.

Tony

[Robert Griffin]

AIX cloning is simple. I have only 2 volume groups with AIX....I run mksysb for the root vg and a savevg for the other vg. Boot from an installation CD and follow the menu. It works equally well with disimiliar hardware...

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

Vg inport/export is not working with tapes.

[Robert Griffin]

The vgexport and vgimport are ran to and from tape I'll assume?

[John Palmer · Accepted solution]

LVM for HP-UX is very similar to AIX (apart from the commands having different names). Essentially, make_recovery is the equivalent of mksysb but gives you a bootable recovery tape,

I don't know of an equivalent of 'savevg' which appears to be a wrap around for running 'backup' for every filesystem in a volume group. You would have to have a strategy for recreating volume groups, logical volumes and filesystems (I maintain scripts in a /disaster directory) and then recovering non-root data using whatever utility you used to back it up. HP like fbackup/frecover but many others are available. dump (for HFS filesystems) and vxdump (for VXFS equivalent to AIX JFS filesystems) are the HP equivalent of AIX's backup utility.

Regards,

John

[John Palmer]

vgexport is equivalent to AIX's exportvg and vgimport to importvg.

Regards,

John

[Robert Griffin]

The cool thing about using savevg in AIX is that it builds the vg for me....I don't have to remember any of it's details.

So what you are telling me John is that HPUX forces me to manually recreate the non root vg's whether I'm cloning or doing a system restore....that's kinda scary.

[Alan Riggs]

Robert, in fact the procedure on AIX is even easier than you know. sysback will create a bootable backup tape of all your volume groups. This is suitable for disaster recovery or cloning. To clone, you will wnat to interrupt the boot and specify new networking information.

On HP-UX, Ignite gives you a similar functionality. The make_recovery tape will give you a bootable image. By default this is designed to give you only the root VG. It is possible, however, to run with the -p glag, and then manually edit the file list to include non-root VG data.

A better solution, though, is to use Ignite to create a bootable tape with a golden image of your system. In fact, you can edit the image before laying it on tape and set the hostname/networking information appropriately. Please look into the documentation for the Ignite product, it will save you a great deal of work.

BTW -- for those not familiar with AIX, it actually runs an IBM micro-kernel that spawns a dynamic Unix emulation. AIX backup utilities take advantage of this to lay make bootable tapes. It also explains why kernel changes rarely require a reboot to implement in AIX. The tradeoff (well, one trade of) is that IAX encodes much information in an odm database that is more difficult to query and manipulate than the flat file structures used by architectures closer to System V specifications. Straightline performance also seems to lag slightly behind HP & Sun equivalents.

YMMV, of course.

[Robert Griffin]

Chapter 7 of the Ignite Sys Admin Guide has the information for "Using Golden System Images". I'll probably have to go to a week long class just to be trained on how to set up the config files! Why does this seem to be so difficult? Does anyone know of any better source of documentation for this procedure?

[Alan Riggs]

Don't let the config files scare you. It really is easier than it looks. If you are cloning to similar architecture/disk sizes then you really do not need to adjust too much. Just take the golden image snapshot, change network information (only for the cloning), and write it to tape.

The class actually is helpful, bu since you have the manual you should be able to work your way though the process. Actually, depending upon how robust your network is you might want to just install the image accross the network and forego writing the tape at all.

[Ramesh Donti]

Hi,
Ignite/UX is for taking a bootable image of the system onto a tape. It doesn't replace the backup tools like Omniback and etc.

The ideal way of creating a disaster recovery procedure for a system is.

1. Create a bootable tape using make_recovery -A option. This covers complete root volume group.

2. If non-root volume group disks are not disturbed, then just by recoverying the root volume group from bootable tape will bring back ur system into production.

3. If you have Omniback running, the best procedure is to:
take backup of non-root volume group using Omniback along with make_recovery tape and Omniback database onto a DDS-tape separately.

4. If your system crashes, recovery from the bootable tape. Recover the omniback database from the tape, if it is not part of root volume group and then go for restoring the non-root volume groups.

5. As Ignite/UX just uses tar, restoring large amount of data from Omniback is much faster/safer/easire/user friendly and save you a lot of time.

[Tim Malnati]

It's time to be devils advocate here. Ignite is the preferred way to recover root volumes, but using it for disaster recovery of your data areas is questionable. Disaster recovery should use your normal every day method for performing backups as the method to be used as the primary recovery source in the event of a disaster. Creating a make_recovery of your entire database daily is less than prudent. It is useless as a recovery medium for the main reason you perform backups; to recover a file or group of files that in some way gets corrupted or deleted during production activities (usually human error). Make_recovery was never designed to do this and does not have the capablity as far as I know. One common mistake though, many shops neglect to include their backup software in their root make_recovery tapes and end up scrambling to locate and install their third party software, hoping that it is the correct version and that they have all the necessary patches. Not a pretty sight. Cloning your machine by performing disaster recover steps to do it is a good idea and can validate your procedure, but it's of little use if you don't use the exact method you would use in the event of the real thing.

With the above in mind, what's the point of going through the drill of creating a make_recovery data tape for cloning (except for disaster recovery testing). If you have no other method, it is fine and works, but I would suggest there is probably an less painful method. Typically I just install the new drives on the old box temporarily, create the volume group(s), and the logical volumes(s), mount them and just copy the data from the source to the target drives. When this is done, you unmount them, vgexport them, disconnect the drives and install them permanently in the new box, vgimport the groups, and mount them using the orignal directory mount points from the source file system(s). If your using something like an XP256 or an EMC this is even easier where all you need do is shift the drive lun mapping instead of physically disconnecting and reconnecting the drives. There are some additional steps when it comes to cleaning up fstab, etc., but you get the idea.

[Lorenz Krey]

Hi Robert!
I have the same problems! I am normally also administrator for AIX and now have one HP Server. HP didn't have god software for backups, so you have to use freeware!! I now also have to use this freeware (IGNITE)! It is good for making backups, but I have many problems, to recover this backup!!! I have the feeling, that HP-UX is not a professional software like AIX.
I think, what you have to do is:

#vgdisplay >/vgdisplay.txt
#bdf >/bdf.txt
I think, this help you to create the other vg's and lv's manually.
IGNITE: "make-recovery -A -C -d /dev/rmt/0mn"
TEST RECOVERY!!! Many Times!!
Use may be tar, to save your nonrootvg's on an other tape. Be carfull, tar on HPUX may change your /etc/passwd and /etc/group !!

[Lorenz Krey]

Hi Robert!
I have the same problems! I am normally also administrator for AIX and now have one HP Server. HP didn't have god software for backups, so you have to use freeware!! I now also have to use this freeware (IGNITE)! It is good for making backups, but I have many problems, to recover this backup!!! I have the feeling, that HP-UX is not a professional software like AIX.
I think, what you have to do is:

#vgdisplay >/vgdisplay.txt
#bdf >/bdf.txt
I think, this help you to create the other vg's and lv's manually.
IGNITE: "make-recovery -A -C -d /dev/rmt/0mn"
TEST RECOVERY!!! Many Times!!
Use may be tar, to save your nonrootvg's on an other tape. Be carfull, tar on HPUX may change your /etc/passwd and /etc/group !!