Getting Started with the Shared Services Platform for Multi-Tenants

Use this guide to set up a simple Data Center – Backup as a Service (BaaS) offering and perform data protection, recovery and billing operations.

The Data Center – Backup as a Service is intended to protect Virtual Machines, Physical Servers and a limited set of applications.

Step 1: Prepare Your Shared Services Environment

Your BaaS environment may range from an initial incubation trial to a planned large-scale production footprint. Based on your environment, choose one of the following configurations:

Configuration for small environments

This configuration minimize your initial costs and infrastructure requirements to get your BaaS platform running. Use this configuration, if your services platform is new and still growing as well. For more information on the requirements, see Requirements for Small Shared Services Environments.
Configuration for large environments

Use this configuration to start with a ~100TB sized environment for already established shared services platform. For more information on the requirements, see Requirements for Large Shared Services Environments.

Step 2: Download and Install the Commvault software

To download and install the trial software, follow the instructions on Downloading the Commvault Software.

As an indicator, installation on an Amazon m5a instance (4 x vCPU, 16GB RAM) takes about 35 mins to complete.

Note

You have not yet installed the SSL certificates in your CommServe, so accept any browser warnings related to unsecure communications. To correct this error, see Configuring Secured Access for Web Applications.

Step 3: Register the Software

After the installation, a default CommServe-local Commvault administrator account is automatically created.

To create a user account for your platform administrator and register the software, follow the instructions on the Trial Quick Start Guide.

Step 4: Complete the Initial Setup

Complete the following configurations:

Configure the multi-tenant environment by completing the Core Setup Wizard.
Configure notification of critical events. For more information, see Configuring Email.
Download and install the latest hotfix installation files. For more information, see Download software.
Run your first disaster recovery backup. For more information, see Performing a Disaster Recovery (DR) Backup.
When initial DR backup is complete, configure offsite locations for your disaster recovery backups. Choose one of the following options to export the metadata:
- Configure a network share location
- Configuring Automatic Uploads of Disaster Recovery (DR) Backups to Commvault Cloud Services Portal
  
  You can retain up to seven database copies for free.
- Configure a cloud library with retention of at least 14 days.

Step 5: Configure the Shared Service Solution

To set up the Infrastructure Backup as a Service (iBaaS) offering, see Virtualization for Multi-Tenants.

To configure the Endpoint Backup as a Service (eBaaS) offering, complete the Setup Wizard for the Laptop Application.

If you require support for database backups, complete the corresponding solution setup wizard.

Step 6: Complete Post Setup Configurations

After you complete your shared service configuration and run backups for a set of tenants, complete the following post setup configurations:

Register Your CommCell and the User Account on the Cloud Services Portal

When your MSP commercial agreement is completed with Commvault, you will receive an email from Commvault with an AUTH CODE to register with the Commvault Cloud. Services website. You must register your user name and other users in the IT operations team using this Auth Code.

Next, register the CommServe computer on the Cloud Services Portal. For more information, see Register a CommServe Computer on the Client Services Portal.
Optional: Install Application Agents on the Client Computers

Premium services offer the ability to perform application integrated backups by installing the Commvault software agent on the tenant’s application server.

The installation process can be performed on the server from the Command Center, or supplied to the tenant user as an installation file. For more information, see Adding Additional Commvault Software to an Existing Server.
Enable Single Sign-On Access for the Tenant Users

To provide a single sign on (SSO) access to the Command Center for a tenant organization (Admins and User), configure an Identity Provider (iDP) for the tenant (Company).

For more information, see Set Up Authentication.

Note

With Active Directory domain, you will require Layer 3 connectivity between your CommServe and the Active Directory server. At a minimum, you will require port 636 connections accepted on your AD server from the CommServe.
Onboard a Single Sign-On Tenant User

After you have configured authentication for your tenant, you must onboard each user individually as either a Tenant Administrator, User or Operator. To onboard a user, you create a Commvault account entry with the required role.
1. From the navigation pane, go to Manage > Security > Users Groups.
  
  The Users groups page appears.
2. There are three groups (roles) created per tenant:
  - <company>\Tenant Admin perform management of all company backups.
  - <company>\Tenant Users perform backup & recovery for specific hosts.
  - <company>\Tenant Operators perform management of multiple companies.
3. Click the user group name.
4. To add a user, under Users, click Add users.
5. Select External user, and provide the following details:
  - Select the company configured External provider (AD server)
  - Enter User name for the user (matching AD user name)
  - Enter Email for the user (matching AD email address)
  - User group will be pre-selected as Tenant Admin, Tenant User or Tenant Operator.
To add multiple Tenant Admins or Users, you can also perform a bulk import of users. For more information, see Performing a Bulk Import of Users.
Upgrade to the SQL Standard Edition

After you receive your permanent license and credentials to the Cloud Services portal, you can download the full Commvault Enterprise installation package from Commvault Store.

To upgrade your CommServe® embedded database perform the following steps:
1. Run a DR Backup of the CommServe. For more information, see Performing a Disaster Recovery (DR) Backup.
2. On the CommServe computer, navigate to the Commvault Enterprise DownloadPackageLocation_WinX64\ThirdParty\MSSQL\SQL_Standard_Edition directory, and then run the Setup.exe.
3. In the SQL Server Installation Center, click Maintenance, and then click Edition upgrade.
4. Click Next.
5. Click Next. (to accept the supplied Product Key)
6. Click I accept the license terms and then click Next.
7. Click Next to accept default feature selection.
Generate the usage report for each Tenant

To bill your tenants for the Backup as a Service (BaaS) consumption, you must generate a Chargeback Report. Your MSP subscription also includes a Premium Operations Reporting which provides a specialized report for Billing purposes.

You can obtain the ChargeBack Details report from the cloud services portal. For more information, see Downloading a Report from the Commvault Store.

If you want the chargeback report to include pricing details, deploy a Private metrics server on the Commcell, and then generate the report from your Web Console.

• To configure Private metrics server, see Activating Private Metrics Reporting on the Command Center.

• To start the data collection immediately, see Uploading Data for Private Metrics Reporting.

• To generate the Chargeback report for all tenants, see Viewing the Chargeback Report.

• To generate a report with pricing matching your service catalog, click the Global Price on the top-right of the report, and then set values for each of the items presented. For more information, see Settings for the Chargeback Report.

Commvault recommends scheduling and exporting the report to a CSV file, and then import into your upstream Reporting & Billing systems (if available).