How Resiliency Platform configures disaster recovery protection for virtual machines
During the wizard configuration process, Resiliency Platform searches the complete storage stack from the virtual machines to the replicated volumes.
It also detects the complete network settings of each member of the resiliency group. If network mapping has been configured, it applies the mapping details to the network settings that need to be applied in the recovery data center after migration. The IP addresses for the virtual machines at the recovery data center are applied based on the subnet mappings. Resiliency Platform stores and uses this configuration at the time of disaster recovery operations, such as, Migrate, Recover, or Rehearse. This network customization is applicable only if DHCP is not configured for the data center.
The wizard validates the DR configuration and displays the results. For example, the wizard can display the number of virtual machines that are needed at the recovery data center to match the number of virtual machines at the production data center.
Veritas Resiliency Platform maps the resource pools and folders of VMware virtual machines in the source data center to those in the recovery data center. The resource pools or folders of the virtual machines must have the same hierarchy structure on both the data centers. If not, then root resource pool or folder is used during the disaster recovery operations. Note that the mapping is only between the same objects, that is resource pool to resource pool or folder to folder.
If you are upgrading from 2.2 or an earlier version, to version 3.0 or later, then you need to edit the resiliency group to enable the mapping of resource pools and folders. You need not make any changes to the assets in the resiliency group. Also ensure that the vCenter Server user account that is used to add the servers to Resiliency Platform has the Resource.AssignVMToPool privilege assigned.
See Prerequisites for adding VMware virtualization servers.
An example of resource pools and folder mapping:
If at the production data centre, the virtual machine is present in resource pool "parent_r/child_r", then after a disaster recovery operation, virtual machine is registered in resource pool "parent_r/child_r" at the recovery data center. If resource pool "parent_r/child_r" is not present at the recovery data center, then the virtual machine is registered in root resource pool.
Similarly, if at production data centre, the virtual machine is present in folder "parent_f/child_f", then after a disaster recovery operation, virtual machine is registered in folder "parent_f/child_f" at the recovery data center. If folder "parent_f/child_f" is not present at the recovery data center, then the virtual machine is registered in default ('vmFolder') folder.
When you configure a set of Hyper-V virtual machines in a resiliency group for DR, the Resiliency Platform saves some extra information about the virtual machines on the replicated storage. Resiliency Platform creates a folder with name "vrp" on the replicated mount point and stores additional copies of the virtual machine configuration in it. The Resiliency Platform maintains separate copies of the virtual machine configuration per data center, thus allowing you to have separate virtual machine configurations across data centers. These copies are used during the DR operations such as Migrate, Recover, Rehearsals, etc. These files are maintained by the Resiliency Platform and should not be edited or deleted.
Note:
If there are any changes to the storage stack or network settings in any of the resiliency group members, re-run the wizard so that the latest storage and network configuration is recorded and stored.
For Hyper-V virtual machines, after the current configuration is recorded and stored, Resiliency Platform copies the virtual machine configurations into a folder (.vrp) on the replicated datastore. This folder hosts data center-specific copies of the virtual machines. This allows the user to have separate configurations across the two data centers for the same virtual machines.
For VMware virtual machines, on successful completion of the operation, Resiliency Platform creates a directory in the working location of the virtual machine to save the virtual machine-related files for the recovery data center. Resiliency Platform uses these files during the DR operations such as Migrate, Recover, Rehearsal, hence these files and the directory should not be deleted or modified. This directory lets you have separate configurations across the two data centers for the same virtual machines.
When you configure virtual machine for remote recovery using Resiliency Platform Data Mover, the existing storage policy is removed and again added back to the virtual machine. This may impact a few other rules.
More Information
Managing virtual machines for remote recovery (DR) using 3rd party replication technology
Managing virtual machines for remote recovery (DR) using Resiliency Platform Data Mover
Managing virtual machines for remote recovery (DR) in Amazon Web Services
Managing virtual machines for remote recovery (DR) to Azure
Managing VMware virtual machines for remote recovery using NetBackup images