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Managing Duplicate Virtual Machines

Updated

Duplicate virtual machines occur when duplicate client names appear in the Client Computers list (for example, client_name and client_name_1). A merge operation can be used to eliminate these duplicates.

Consider the following circumstances:

  • UUID Changes: If a virtual machine's UUID changes, it will result in previous backup jobs being converted to full backups. This happens because the new UUID creates a new VM GUID.

  • Automatic Merging: During the automatic merge of duplicate clients, backup jobs may be affected, particularly regarding retention policies.

  • Data Aging: If you have cycle retention settings in place, previous backup jobs will be aged out. This will impact data aging according to the retention settings defined at the storage policy level.

The following situations may lead to the creation of duplicate virtual machine clients with a numeric suffix (e.g., client_name_1) in the Client Computers list:

  • A VM is restored out of place and then backed up again while the source VM still exists.
  • A short hostname is used to identify a virtual machine instead of a fully qualified domain name.

Procedure

The following procedures can be used to merge virtualization clients that use Indexing Version 1 or Indexing Version 2.

VM Clients Coming from the Same Hypervisor Client Backupset Cannot Be Merged with Indexing Version 2 (VM-Centric)

In this scenario, there can only be one VM backupset under the VM client for a Hypervisor client's backupset, which means VM clients cannot be merged.

If duplicate VM clients cannot be merged, the backup history for the original VM client includes older jobs, while the backup history for the duplicate VM client (e.g., client_name_1) contains newer jobs.

To manually merge VM clients that cannot be merged automatically, follow these steps:

  1. Wait until the jobs for the original VM client have been pruned as part of data aging.

  2. Delete the original VM client.

  3. Rename the newer VM client by removing the '_1' from the client name.

After completing these steps, subsequent backup jobs will be associated with the newer VM client.

Delete Deconfigured Clients That Have No Protected Data

To delete deconfigured clients that have no protected data, follow these steps:

  1. Set the Parameter:

    1. Navigate to CommCell Console > Storage tab > Media Management > Data Aging.

    2. Set the Delete deconfigured clients that have no protected data parameter to "1".

    Definition: During a data aging job, clients that meet the following criteria will be deleted 30 days after they were created:

    • The client is deconfigured.
    • The backup data is deleted.
    • The software was uninstalled on the client.

    Additional Criteria for Discovered Virtual Machines:

    • The VM must be deleted in the management interface for the hypervisor (e.g., VMware vCenter).

    • Setting the value to 1 will delete the clients that meet these criteria.

      Note

      This is global parameter and will affect other agents.

For more information, see Media Management Configuration: Data Aging.

Ignore Cycle Retention on Deconfigured Clients

To ignore cycle retention for deconfigured clients, follow these steps:

  1. Set the Parameter:

    1. Navigate to CommCell Console > Storage tab > Media Management > Data Aging.

    2. Set the Ignore cycles retention on deconfigured clients parameter to "1".

    Definition: This parameter specifies whether to ignore the defined retention cycle rules for data associated with deconfigured clients, agents, and instances.

    Default Values:

    • New CommCell Environments (Service Pack 13 and later): Default value is 1. This means that only days are used to retain data on deconfigured clients and instances, leading to eventual pruning of all data.

    • Existing CommCell Environments: Default value is 0, which honors the cycle retention configured on the copy.

    When the parameter is set to 1, retention is based solely on the number of days, disregarding cycle retention rules.

    Note

    • The OnePass feature ignores the Ignore Cycles Retention on De-Configured Clients parameter.

    • This is global parameter and will affect other agents.

For more information, see Media Management Configuration: Data Aging.

Merging Duplicate Clients

You can use an interactive report or run the QS_SetVMClient script to merge duplicate VM clients.

Duplicate clients are merged using the following criteria:

  • If both clients have a Commvault agent installed, then the command fails.

  • You cannot merge clients for VMs that are included in subclients under the same parent backup set.

You cannot merge a client for a discovered VM with a virtualization client if:

  • One of the clients has a Commvault agent installed, then the backup history is merged into the client that has the Commvault agent.

  • One of the clients has a numeric suffix in the client name (such as ‘_1’), then the backup history is merged into the client that does not have a numeric suffix in its name.

  • Neither client has a Commvault agent installed or a numeric suffix in the client name, then the backup history is merged into the client that has the most recent backup.

  • Both clients have a numeric suffix in the client name and do not have a Commvault agent installed, then the backup history is merged into the client that has the most recent backup.

  • Both VM clients are associated with virtualization clients that use Indexing Version 2, the merged client has an additional backup set that is named backupset_name_merged, which includes jobs from the client that was incorporated into the merged client.

Merge Duplicate VM Clients Interactive Report

You can download the Merge Duplicate VM Clients app from the Commvault Store. The app includes an interactive report that displays duplicate clients (so that you can select clients to merge) and a workflow that performs the merge operation.

QS_SetVMClient Script

The QS_SetVMClient script merges backup history for duplicate virtual machine clients, and then deletes the duplicate virtual machine client. All subsequent jobs are associated with the merged client. The script is available in the Base directory for Commvault software.

Perform the following steps to merge duplicate clients. Run the script for each set of duplicate clients.

  1. If you are not logged on to the CommServe computer, run the qlogin command.

  2. On the command line, go to the software installation path, log on to the CommServe machine, and then run the following script:

    qoperation execscript -sn QS_SetVMClient -si 'client name_1' -si 'client name'

  3. To log off the CommServe computer, run the qlogout command.

  4. Run an incremental backup and confirm that the virtual machines are shown correctly in the Virtual Machine Status tab