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DR failover checks - Guest OS

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Overview

Are the VMs in your environment DR ready? Find out this and more as Druva Phoenix automates this process for you with the Failover checks - Guest OS capability. When the VMs are being backed up, the Failover checks - Guest OS kick into action and provide the status; if the VMs have successfully cleared the checks and are DR ready or not. With these checks in place, you can prepare a robust DR strategy and avoid any failures during failover. It further helps avoid sending requests to the cloud that are bound to fail and help reduce failed requests to the cloud, and your cloud spending too!

The status of the Failover checks - Guest OS is available through the Virtual Machines page.  The following diagram illustrates the capability. 

DR prerequisite check.png

Assign credentials

To use the Failover checks - Guest OS capability, ensure that the credentials you assign to virtual machines meet the following requirements:

Windows virtual machines

  • The account must have local administrative permissions.
  • For a Windows domain user, the credentials must be entered in the following format <UserName>@<DomainName> and <password>.
  • UAC must be disabled on the virtual machine. See disabling UAC on Windows server for more information.

Linux virtual machines

  • A non-root user must have sudo rights and must have the NOPASSWD: ALL tag enabled in the sudoers file. Edit the sudoers file and ensure that the non-root user has the following entry at the end:
  • Additionally, TTY must be disabled in the sudoers file either globally for all users (root and non-root users) or for a single sudo user.

Defaults requiretty with

Defaults !requiretty

To disable TTY for a specific user or group, suffix Defaults with the user or group:
Defaults:myuser !requiretty

  • Login to the Linux machine using the user account that needs to be tested.

  • Execute the sudo -l command. If the user has sudo privileges and the NOPASSWD: ALL tag has been enabled in the sudoers file, the command will generate the following output without prompting for a password.
    Sudo privilege with nopassword.png
    If the user does not have sudo privileges or does not have the NOPASSWD: ALL tag enabled in the sudoers file, the command will generate the following output and will prompt for a password.
    No sudo privilege.png

  • The directory /home/{username} must exist, and the non-root user must have read, write, and execute (RWX) permissions over this directory.

While a VM backup is in progress, the prerequisite checks use the working directory /home/{username}/Druva/Phoenix/Preflight for non-root users and the directory /home/{PreflightBinaryName}/Druva/Phoenix/Preflight for root users. Once the prerequisite checks are complete, Phoenix deletes the directories that it created under /home/{username} for non-root users or /home/{PreflightBinaryName} for root users. 

Assigning credentials to virtual machines

Assign credentials from the VMware page

To assign credentials to a virtual machine, perform the following tasks:

  1. In the organization that contains your virtual machine, navigate to Protect > VMware.
  2. In the navigation pane on the left, under vCenter/ESXi host, select the vCenter server or ESXi host that hosts the virtual machine.
  3. On the All Virtual Machines page, select the virtual machine that needs to be configured for DR, and click Manage Credentials.
  4. Click Add Credential to create a new credential, or select an existing credential. Click Assign. See Manage credentials for VMware servers for details.   

    Note: Ensure that the backup proxy is version 4.8.11 or higher. For more information on upgrading the backup proxy, see Upgrade backup proxy.

Assign credentials from the Disaster Recovery page
  1. Log in to the Phoenix Management Console.
  2. On the menu bar, click the dropdown next to All Organizations, and select the required Organization from the drop-down list.
  3. On the menu bar, click Disaster Recovery.
  4. In the left pane, click the dropdown under DR PLAN and select the DR plan that has the VMs that need to be assigned credentials. Alternatively, you can also click the DR plan from the DR Plans page.
  5. In the left pane click Virtual Machines under the selected DR plan. 
  6. From the list of virtual machines, select one or more virtual machines that need to be assigned credentials, or whose credentials need to be updated, click more options, and then click Update Credentials.
  7. In the Update Credentials dialog box, select pre-existing credentials, or click New Credentials to create a new set of credentials. Provide the following information in the Add Credentials dialog box if you choose to create a new set of credentials:
    1. Label: Enter a label that uniquely identifies the credential in the Credential Store.
    2. Username: Enter a username. If the user is a Windows user and is part of a domain, enter the username in the format  <UserName>@<DomainName>
    3. Password: Enter the password.
    4. Confirm Password: Re-enter the password.
  8. Click Save.

Accessing the Failover Checks - Guest OS statuses

From the Overview page

You can access the Failover Checks - Guest OS from the DR plan Overview page. The Failover Checks - Guest OS card on the Overview page gives you the guest OS check statuses at a glance.

Guest OS checks - from Overview page.png

From the Virtual Machines page

You can also access the Failover Checks - Guest OS from the Virtual machines page.The Failover Checks - Guest OS column on the Virtual Machines page displays the guest OS check status for all VMs that are a part of the DR plan. You can also filter the VMs by the Failover Checks - Guest OS status and the Failover Checks - Environment status.

Guest OS checks - from VM page.png

Failover Checks - Guest OS checks

Failover Checks - Guest OS.png

Field Description
X/Y
VMs with issues		 X of a total of Y VMs in the DR plan have issues with the guest OS that could cause failovers to fail.

Guest OS check status of VMs

(Circular chart)

 This is a graphical representation of the guest OS check statuses of all VMs in the DR plan. Hovering over the colored segments gives you the number of VMs with a specific issue with the guest OS check.
Status

The number of VMs with a specific Guest OS check status. Clicking the hyperlink next to the VM status takes you to the Virtual Machines page, which is now filtered to show all the VMs with the specific status. The statuses are:

  • Successful
  • Failed
  • Warnings
  • Not initiated
  • Invalid credentials
  • Missing credentials

See DR failover checks - Guest OS for more information.

Failover Checks - Guest OS statuses

The following table describes the Failover Checks - Guest OS statuses.

Status Description
Successful Failover Checks - Guest OS passed.
Not initiated Failover Checks - Guest OS could not be initiated because either:
  • Backup proxy is not able to connect to the ESXi host on port 443. 
  • The first backup job after the VMware backup proxy upgrade is not completed.
  • The Phoenix AWS proxy is on a version older than 4.8.11. See, Upgrade backup proxy in your environment.
  • The VM is not running. 
  • The VM does not have VMware Tools installed and running.
  • The Failover Checks - Guest OS check binary execution has failed or timed out.
Invalid credentials

Failover Checks - Guest OS could not be performed because either:
No credentials

Failover Checks - Guest OS could not be performed because credentials are not assigned to the VM. See, Configure virtual machines for backup. 
Error Failover Checks - Guest OS failed. See,  DR failover checks - Guest OS.
Warning

Failover Checks - Guest OS passed with warnings. We recommend fixing the warnings since they may cause the failover to fail.

Resolving DR failover checks - Guest OS

After you resolve the checks, trigger a new back job and only after all the checks are successful, the VM is DR ready. 

Linux Failover Checks - Guest OS

Check Description

Source Metadata Collection

What is verified

Verifies that all required metadata was collected from the source.

Potential errors

  1. Target OS customization error.

  2. Unable to identify partition using the parted command. 

Recommendation

  1. The is a generic Linux customization error.  Download the logs from the Job Details page.  

  2. Couldn't parse output of the parted command. On the source VM, run parted command.  If no output or incorrect output is generated, then fix the issue with parted and rerun backup.

    Sample output 

    (parted) print
    Model: VMware Virtual disk (scsi)
    Disk /dev/sda: 42.9GB
    Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
    Partition Table: msdos
    Disk Flags:
    Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
    1 1049kB 30.9GB 30.9GB primary ext4 boot
    2 30.9GB 42.9GB 12.0GB primary linux-swap(v1)
Free Space

What is verified

Verifies there is enough free storage space.

Potential errors

The source does not have enough free space on {MPOINT} ({DEVICE}). At least {SIZE} Mb needed space is required․ 

Recommendation

Provision additional free disk space as described in the message. 
Bootloader

What is verified

Verifies the source boot loader is supported.

Potential errors

Source has an unsupported version of GRUB. Please install grub-legacy or grub2 on the source and try again․

Recommendation

Ensure that grub-legacy or grub2 is installed on the source virtual machine. Else, install the grub package on the source virtual machine.

Review the GRUB installation documentation for your operating system.  For example for CentOS refer to: https://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/GrubInstallation. 
OS Support

What is verified

Verifies the source operating system is supported.

Potential errors

  1. Migrations of 32bit Linux sources to AWS are not supported.
  2. This OS is not supported. Please review our documentation for supported OS for conversion․

Recommendation

Review the system requirements. 
Cloud-init Configuration

What is verified

Checks cloud-init configuration for potential problems.

Potential errors

  1. SSH pwauth is disabled in the cloud_init file. If you proceed, you might not be able to login to the target instance/VM․
  2. Lock password is enabled in the cloud_init file. If you proceed, you might not be able to login to the target instance/VM․

Recommendation

  1. Cloud-init is installed on the EC2 instance and it has configurations that have disabled SSH password authentication. Ensure that SSH password authentication is allowed. 
  2. Cloud-init is installed on the EC2 instance and it has configurations that can lock the account's password.  
Supported FS

What is verified

Verifies source filesystems are supported.

Potential errors

{DEVICE} has {FS_TYPE} filesystem, which is not supported.

Recommendation

One of the devices has an unsupported FS. Failover can continue if it is excluded. For failover, this means the file system might be missing from the target.  See, Configure virtual machines for backup.

Ensure that the disk to be excluded does not have following mountpoints : "/", "/usr", "/var" ,"/boot"
Selected Disks

What is verified

Verifies failover can proceed with only the selected disks.

Potential errors

  1. {MOUNT} is not one of the supported mounts.
  2. Mount {MOUNT_POINT} won't be available on the target as disk {DISK} was skipped.
  3. Mount {MOUNT_POINT} won't be available on the target as some of the PVs of the Volume Group is on skipped disks: {DISKS}.
  4. Disk {DISK} isn't used by any file system.

Recommendation

  1. An unknown/unsupported mount point was listed in selected_mounts. Make sure selected_mounts is a subset of supported_mounts returned from preflight.
  2. If the skipped volume is critical, add the skipped disk to selected_disks. Can be ignored otherwise. 
  3. If the skipped volume is critical, add the skipped disk to selected_disks. Can be ignored otherwise.
  4. Consider removing the disk from the backup and selected_disks.
LVM PVs

What is verified

Verifies LVM physical volumes are on supported storage devices.

Potential errors

Device {DEVICE} which is a PV for LVM Volume Group {VOLUME_GROUP} (mount: {MOUNT}) was not recognized as a supported device.

Recommendation

The block device which holds the volume was not recognized as a supported device. Failover can't continue if the volume is critical.

Note: Bind-mount is also not a supported device.
XEN/AWS Platform Details

What is verified

Checks if the type of XEN hypervisor can be detected (does nothing for non-XEN).

Potential errors

Could not determine if this xen-based source is an  AWS EC2 instance, as instance metadata could not be retrieved.

Recommendation

Couldn't reach the AWS metadata service to determine this is an AWS instance. The instance ID will be missing. 

Verify if network settings are correct on ec2-instance.  Verify if "http://169.254.169.254/latest/meta-data/" is reachable from the instance.

To verify, launch a temporary EC2 instance with the same configuration as the failover instance.

If the metadata URL is not reachable from the temporary EC2 instance as well, refer to the AWS documentation for more information.
DHCP Configuration

What is verified

Checks the source DHCP config for unsupported options.

Potential errors

DHCP configuration contains 'supersede'.  Target might have a broken network.

Recommendation

The EC2 instance has custom DHCP client configurations. Druva doesn't reset the configurations. This could potentially cause issues.  Verify the /etc/dhcp/dhclient.conf of the EC2 instance.
 
Required Mounts

What is verified

Verifies the required mount points were recognized.

Potential errors

/mountpoint is mandatory.

Recommendation

Ensure that the VMDK containing "/" mountpoint is not excluded from backup. 

Windows Failover Checks - Guest OS

 

Check Description
Hyper-V

What is verified

Verifies the source is not a Hyper-V host.

Potential errors

The source is running hyper-v.  Migration of hyper-v servers is not supported by Druva. Hyper-V server will not be able to run in the target cloud and the source will fail to start in the target cloud environment.

Recommendation

Hyper-V is not supported. 
OS Support

What is verified

Verifies the source operating system is supported.

Potential errors

This OS is not supported for conversion. Please review our documentation for supported OS for conversion.

Recommendation

Review the system requirements. 
PV Drivers

What is verified

Verifies the source doesn't have 'AWS PV Network Device' NICs.

Potential errors

TCP offloading must be disabled on source with driver type {DRIVER}.

Recommendation

If phase 2 system has no network, disable TCP offloading on the source.

To disable TCP offloading

  1. In the Microsoft® Windows server, open the Control Panel.
  2. Select Network and Internet > Network and Sharing Center > Change Adapter Settings.
  3. Right-click on each of the private and public adapters, select Configure from the Networking menu, and click the Advanced tab. The window displays the TCP offload settings for the Citrix adapter. 
  4. Select each of the following TCP offload options, changing the value to Disabled, and click OK:
    • IPv4 Checksum Offload
    • Large Receive Offload
    • Large Send Offload
    • TCP Checksum Offload
Pending MS Windows updates

What is verified

Checks if there are pending Windows updates scheduled to happen after the Windows server reboot.

Potential errors

Source has pending Windows updates detected.

Recommendation

Druva Phoenix triggers a DR replication job (as per the replication frequency in the DR plan) even if the prerequisite checks detect pending MS Windows updates. The DR replication job completes successfully; however, DR failovers from this DR copy may take longer than usual as Druva Phoenix reboots the machines as part of the pending Windows updates. We recommend you apply the pending Windows updates and reboot your machines at the earliest opportunity so that the next DR replication job will create a DR copy that you can successfully failover from within the expected duration.
Pending MS Windows chkdsk operation on the boot disk

What is verified

Checks if there are pending chkdsk operations scheduled to happen after a Windows server reboot.

Potential errors

Source has pending chkdsk detected.

Recommendation

Druva Phoenix triggers a DR replication job (as per the replication frequency in the DR plan) even if the prerequisite checks detect scheduled chkdsk operations on the boot disk. The DR replication job completes; however, DR failovers from this DR copy may take longer than usual as Phoenix tries to bypass the pending chkdsk operation on the boot disk. We recommend you complete pending chkdsk operations at the earliest so that subsequent DR replication jobs create a DR copy you can successfully failover from within the expected duration.
Network Drivers

What is verified

Verifies there are no incompatible NIC drivers installed.

Potential errors

Citrix PV Ethernet Adapter is not supported during AWS conversion.

Recommendation

The Citrix driver installed on the source might cause problems in phase 2. Uninstall the driver.
.Net

What is verified

Checks whether the required version of .Net Framework is installed.

Potential errors

Microsoft .NET Framework v{VERSION} will be installed.

Recommendation

This is an information message. It can be ignored.
Supported FS

What is verified

Verifies source file systems are supported.

Potential errors

The source has unsupported file systems '{FS_TYPE}' (volume {VOLUME_ID}, mount point {MOUNT_POINT}). Volumes with a non-supported file system can not be transferred.

Recommendation

One of the devices has an unsupported file system . Failover can continue if it is excluded.  See, Configure virtual machines for backup. Ensure that the disk to be excluded does not have following mountpoints : "C:"
Sysprep State

What is verified

Verifies previous Sysprep run wasn't incomplete.

Potential errors

Druva has discovered that a previous Sysprep attempt did not complete properly on the source VM.

In the registry navigate to ''HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Session Manager\\'' and locate the key ''BootExecute''. Remove the line containing ''sysprepDecryptor.exe'' and reboot the source VM before migrating.

Recommendation

In the registry navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Session Manager\\ and locate the key BootExecute. Remove the line containing sysprepDecryptor.exe and reboot the source VM before migrating.
Is Domain Controller

What is verified

The source VM is a Domain Controller.

Potential errors

It appears that the source VM is a Domain Controller.

Recommendation

Domain controllers sometimes are slow to boot (might cause time outs) and are generally more prone to errors during failover.

Use larger instance-type like m4.xlarge family for running failover.
Free Space

What is verified

Verifies there is enough free storage space.

Potential errors

The source VM doesn't have sufficient space on C volume. Druva requires {TOTAL_SPACE_REQUIREMENT} MB free space on C volume.

Recommendation

Provision additional free disk space as described in the message. 
Antivirus Software

What is verified

Checks whether the source has AV/protection software installed.

Potential errors

{AV_NAME} antivirus software detected (service name: {SERVICE_NAME}). If failover fails, try whitelisting Druva software components.

Recommendation

Antivirus software blocks cli.exe or some other executable during failover. Try whitelisting the executables. 
Selected Disks

What is verified

Verifies failover can proceed with only the selected disks.

Potential errors

  1. Volume {MOUNT_POINT} won't be available on the target as disk {DISK} was skipped.
  2. Disk {DISK} isn't used by any file system.

Recommendation

Consider removing the disk from the backup and selected_disks.  See, Configure virtual machines for backup.

Ensure that the disk to be excluded does not have following mountpoints : "C:"
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