About Snapshot Manager replication
Snapshot Manager for Data Center can replicate the storage array snapshots, to leverage the replication capabilities of storage array vendors to provide robust data protection. As a part of replication, Snapshot Manager for Data Center discovers the replication infrastructure and the replication topology that already exists and configured on the storage array. Using NetBackup, you can now replicate the snapshots to a specific replication destination (target) of your choice or you can let NetBackup identify the destination for replicating the snapshots.
Snapshots represent a point-in-time of primary storage data as captured by the storage array. The Snapshot Manager then communicates with storage array to replicate the snapshot from the primary volume to other volumes configured for replication on the storage array. The snapshot can be replicated to multiple volumes within the same storage array or cluster. The snapshots can also be replicated to volumes on other storage arrays or clusters of the same type as the source array.
The replication feature offers a single NetBackup interface for end-to-end data protection management for the following tasks:
Unified policy management.
Use the NetBackup console as the one, centralized backup infrastructure to manage the entire lifecycle of all data.
Snapshot copy management.
Use NetBackup to manage the entire lifecycle of the snapshot. Replication uses storage array plug-ins on the Snapshot Manager to perform operations on the assets (volumes, LUNs) residing on the storage array. NetBackup can initiate operations to move, expire, or delete images from the storage array.
The instruction to perform the initial snapshot comes from an operation in a NetBackup Storage Lifecycle Policy (SLP). You can create a single SLP that instructs NetBackup to create the initial snapshot, to replicate the snapshot to several locations, and to indicate a different retention period for each of the replications. Additional instructions (or operations) can be included in the SLP that create a backup from the snapshot, index the snapshot, and more.
Snapshot copy monitoring.
Use NetBackup activity monitor to view each snapshot copy at storage array location.
Restore.
Recovery is available from any storage device in the environment that is defined to NetBackup. This includes recovery from the primary copy (initial snapshot) or any replicated snapshot on the storage array or from any NetBackup created copy residing on de-duped storage.