End-of-support-life (EOSL) for NetBackup Replication Director, replaced with NetBackup Snapshot Manager (NBSM)

Veritas plans to end-of-support-life (EOSL) NetBackup Replication Director in an upcoming release. Replication Director provided the ability to create and backup NAS and SAN Storage snapshots from replicated primary storage volumes on secondary controllers. This included Index and Backup from Replica Snapshot. This feature was available in policy types including Standard, VMware, Oracle, and NDMP policies.

Replication Director has been replaced with NetBackup Snapshot Manager (NBSM).  NBSM is an integral part of NetBackup and provides snapshot and snapshot replica (replicated snapshot) orchestration by integrating API interfaces to Arrays and Cloud Storage Tiers through a "plug-in" service that communicate to the Storage RestAPI Endpoints. 

NBSM differs from Replication Director's OST integration and allows NetBackup to make requests to NBSM using a common set of commands for discovery, creation, and retention of storage snapshots and Snapshot replicas. By abstracting these interfaces, NetBackup can leverage new and updated storage interfaces across workloads when new or updated NBSM plug-ins get introduced without changing NetBackup software. NBSM supports a wide range of Array Controller Architectures and Cloud Storage Platforms that support Storage and Storage replica protection.

Unlike Replication Director that defined Replication Policies for Storage, NBSM 'Discovers" existing Replication Policies on storage controllers and maps the volumes between the controllers. This passive approach insures that you can leverage existing storage replication policies for backup operations without modification of the existing storage replication strategies.

Replication Director Customers should transition policies that use Storage Lifecycle Policies (SLP) specified with Replication Director arguments to new SLPs that used NBSM Snapshot and Replica arguments.

For more information about NBSM, see the NetBackup Snapshot Manager for Data Center Administrator's Guide.

Support for Replication Director on older versions of NetBackup follow the published Veritas Product End of Life policy guidelines.