Golden image

[Eric Locsin]

Hi. I'm trying to create a DR plan to recover our Data Protector server in the fastest way possible. My plan consists of creating a Golden Image (including all data protector files) of the server using an attached DLT7000 drive. The initial testing was sucessful. I created & tested a Golden Image on a DLTIV tape using our dev server on a K580. The recovery only took 2 hours. Our last attempt at Sungard using an ignite tape and an fbackup tape took us over 6 hours. A big improvement.
The next step is to create a Golden Image from our prod server (an L2000) and use that to recover on the K580. Sungard doesn't always have an L2000 when we do DR testing but they do have K580s. So we need to test if the Golden Image will work on other class servers.
The recovery is fine up until it completes reading the archive from tape. Then I get an error message: "Cannot load OS archive ..". I can bring up a shell but I don't know what to do from there. Root is the only file system that is up. Does anyone have any ideas?

Eric

[Steven E. Protter]

Ignite creates temporary filesystems and folders under root when its building.

A common problem is the golden image file is bigger than 2 GB. To get it into the archive file, pax must be patched, but it can't be bigger then 8 GB.

pax_iux has had problems in the past reading archive files bigger than 2 GB. It can't read anything bigger than 8 GB becasue thats the limit on pax.

So, if the archive exceeds 8 GB you get the error.

The way to go here is not golden image.

use make_tape_recovery to back up the ignite image server. Save the archive itself on a second fbackup tape. Exclude the golden image file from the tape.

Recover as follows:

1) Boot of Ignite tape, lay down the os
2) Restore the golden image fbackup.

Then boot other servers off the Ignite server.

SEP

[Leif Halvarsson_2]

Hi,
Ignite is mainly intended for OS backup, not for applications (as Data Protector). Unless you create a recovery archive every night (or day), the backup is rather useless as the database changes with every backup. And, the archive can be very large, maybe too large.

I would suggest the following standard distaster recovery method (for all HP-UX servers).

- Install and configure a Ignite/SD-UX server. Install all applications, including DP in the SD-UX depot.

- Create a network recovery archive on the Ignite server for all your HP-UX servers.

- Backup DP internal database using a standalone tape drive (only used for backing up the DP database).

Distaster recovery of the DP Cell Manager:

- Restore HP-UX from the Ignite server (boot lan install).
- Do a fresh DP install from the SD-UX depot on the Ignitr/SD-UX server.
- Restore the DP database from the backup media.

This method is straith-forward, fast and reliable.

[generic_1]

If gzip is updated, you can get arouund some of the size limitations I beleive. You may want to check with HP to see of they can provide you a patch for that ;).

[Eric Locsin]

I was feeling a little defeated that this wouldn't work, especially since HP was giving me the same suggestions. But I decided to ignore the error and continue the installation by entering "exit 2". 47 minutes later, the installation completed successfully. The server is up and running. All I have left to do is install some lan drivers and update Data Protector with the lastest hot backup. All in all, I think I can recover the server within 2.5 hours.