4 Backup and Recovery of the Exalogic Control Stack

This chapter provides the steps for backing up and recovering the Exalogic Control stack. It contains the following sections:

Backing Up the Exalogic Control Stack
Restoring the Exalogic Control Stack

4.1 Backing Up the Exalogic Control Stack

The Exalogic Control stack repository contains vServer disk images, templates, and vServer configuration files for all the vServers running on the Exalogic rack. The Exalogic Control repository resides in the ExalogicRepo share in the ZFS storage appliance. ExaBR takes a ZFS snapshot of this share to back up the Exalogic Control stack.

Note:

To take non-interactive backups of the Exalogic Control Stack, enable key-based authentication for the compute nodes and storage heads using the init-ssh command. The usage of the init-ssh command is described in Section 2.3.1, "Enabling Key-Based Authentication for ExaBR." For EECS 2.0.4 racks, you must manually copy the keys to the Exalogic Control stack vServers as described in Copy SSH Keys to the Exalogic Control Stack vServers (EECS 2.0.4 Racks Only).

Oracle recommends that the components of the Exalogic Control stack and their repositories be backed up after all lifecycle operations, such as adding and removing accounts, users, and vServers.

Note:

When you back up the Exalogic Control stack, ExaBR also backs up the InfiniBand switches. When you restore the Exalogic Control stack, you must also restore the corresponding InfiniBand switch backup.

To ensure data consistency, the vServers running the Exalogic Control stack must be shut down before a backup is taken.

You can back up the Exalogic Control stack, by doing the following:

Perform the tasks described in Section 2.2, "Preparing to Use ExaBR."
Stop the components of the Exalogic Control stack by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr stop control-stack
```
Note:
Ensure that the Exalogic Control stack is not being used when you stop it.

This command stops the Proxy Controller 2, Proxy Controller 1, and Exalogic Control vServers, in that order.
Back up the Exalogic Control stack and InfiniBand switches, by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr backup control-stack [options]
```
For a complete list of options, see Section 2.4.2, "ExaBR Options."

Example:
```
./exabr backup control-stack --noprompt
```
In this example, ExaBR backs up the Exalogic Control stack and InfiniBand switches without prompting for passwords, using the --noprompt option.

This command takes a snapshot of the ExalogicRepo share as a backup for the Exalogic Control stack. This command also backs up the InfiniBand switches as described in Section 3.3.1, "Backing Up InfiniBand Switches."
Restart the components of the Exalogic Control stack, by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr start control-stack
```
This command starts the Exalogic Control, Proxy Controller 1, and Proxy Controller 2 vServers, in that order.

4.2 Restoring the Exalogic Control Stack

The Exalogic Control stack can be recovered to the point in time when the last backup was made by ExaBR. To ensure data consistency, all the Exalogic Control vServers are restored together.

To restore the Exalogic Control stack, do the following:

Caution:

Restoring the Exalogic Control stack reverts its data to the point in time when the backup was created. After you restore the Exalogic Control stack:

Any vServers that were created after the backup will not be visible in Exalogic Control.
Any vServers that were deleted after the backup will be visible in Exalogic Control, even though they do not exist.

You can clean up such vServers by following the steps described in Appendix B.

You can restore the Exalogic Control stack by doing the following:

Perform the tasks described in Section 2.2, "Preparing to Use ExaBR."
Stop the components of the Exalogic Control stack, by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr stop control-stack
```
Note:
Ensure that the Exalogic Control stack is not being used when you stop it.

This command stops the Proxy Controller 2, Proxy Controller 1, and Exalogic Control vServers, in that order.
View a list of backups by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr list control-stack
```
Example:
```
./exabr list control-stack
```
In this example, ExaBR lists the backups made for the Exalogic Control stack. Note the name of the backup you want to use to restore the Exalogic Control stack and InfiniBand switch.
Restore the Exalogic Control stack by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr restore control-stack [options]
```
For a complete list of options, see Section 2.4.2, "ExaBR Options."

Example:
```
./exabr restore control-stack -b exabr_201309041714_control 
```
In this example, ExaBR restores the control stack from the backup called exabr_201309041714_control using the -b option.

Running this command does the following:
1. Clones the snapshot of the ExalogicRepo share taken by ExaBR during the control stack back up.
2. Identifies the Exalogic Control vServers in the snapshot.
3. Restores the Exalogic Control vServers data from the clone to the Oracle VM server repository.
4. Deletes the clone.
Note:
Restoration of the Exalogic Control stack can take at least one hour.
Wait until the restoration of the Exalogic Control stack is complete.
Restore each InfiniBand switch as described in Section 3.3.2, "Recovering InfiniBand Switches." Ensure that you restore the InfiniBand switch from the same backup you used to restore the Exalogic Control stack. In this example, the InfiniBand switch is restored from the backup directory 201309041714.

Note:
To ensure data consistency, you must restore the InfiniBand switches when restoring the Exalogic Control stack. You must restore the switch from the backup of the switch that was taken when backing up the Exalogic Control stack.
Restoring the Exalogic Control stack reverts its data to the point in time when the backup was created. After you restore the Exalogic Control stack:
- Any vServers that were created after the backup will not be visible in Exalogic Control.
- Any vServers that were deleted after the backup will be visible in Exalogic Control, even though they do not exist.
You can clean up such vServers, by following the steps described in Appendix B, "Removing Orphan and Ghost vServers After Restoring the Exalogic Control Stack."
Restart the components of the Exalogic Control stack by running ExaBR as follows:
```
./exabr start control-stack
```
This command starts the Exalogic Control, Proxy Controller 1, and Proxy Controller 2 vServers, in that order.