{"id":9471,"date":"2020-05-04T18:54:10","date_gmt":"2020-05-04T08:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nsrd.info\/blog\/?p=9471"},"modified":"2020-05-04T18:54:13","modified_gmt":"2020-05-04T08:54:13","slug":"automated-testing-of-virtual-machine-recoveries-using-networker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nsrd.info\/blog\/2020\/05\/04\/automated-testing-of-virtual-machine-recoveries-using-networker\/","title":{"rendered":"Automated Testing of Virtual Machine Recoveries using NetWorker"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

While Avamar has options for automating the test of virtual machine recoveries, it’s not functionality that’s present in NetWorker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recently I was contacted by Ugo Bellavance: would I be interested in checking out a script he’d written to automate testing of virtual machine recoveries. Interested? You bet! <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the end of the post I’ve got a link to Ugo’s blog post and Github for the script, but I’ll set your appetite by going through an example use of it in my lab.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As it stands, here’s how it works: you provide the script some details about your vCenter\/ESX environment and the virtual machine you want to do a recovery test against. In the spirit of good<\/em> randomised testing, the script picks a random backup or clone of the virtual machine and runs the recovery for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s the details you need to provide the script:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[Sun May 03 15:49:20]\n[\u2022 ~\/nwautomatedrecover-master \u2022]\nroot@orilla\n\n$ .\/nwrestvmrecover -h<\/strong>\nnwrestvmrecover [OPTION]\u2026 [-x] vmname - Script to trigger a restore via the Networker REST API\nwhere:\n-h shows this help text\n-a Authentication digest\n-b Networker (backup) server name\n-c Destination cluster resource\n-d Destination datacenter\n-e Destination (ESXi) host\n-f VM Folder\n-j Job name\n-n VM name (once recovered, destination)\n-p Power on after recover?\n-r Reconnect NIC after recover?\n-s Destination datastore\n-v vCenter Server\n-x Must be present to confirm that the recover must be executed\n\nvmname : Name of the Virtual Machine to recover (source)\nAll the parameters are required by this script (but may not be by the API)\n\nNote: Always test in a lab first<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
I had to make one minor modification to get the correct results in my lab \u2014\u00a0I changed the script’s invoked JSON to instead reference the compute resource instead of the cluster compute resource, given I don’t have a cluster in my lab. (For a business user of the script, that’s likely a modification they won’t need to make.) Here’s an example of running the script:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ .\/nwrestvmrecover -a base64EncodedCredentials<\/em> -b orilla -c domain-s26 -d datacenter-21 -e host-28 -f group-v22 -j Vulcan_RecMay3 -p false -r false -s datastore-32 -v oaktier.turbamentis.int -n vulcanTestMay3 -x vulcan\n\n==================================================\nHere are the values of the parameters you entered:\n\nServer = orilla\nVM to recover = vulcan\nAuth = xxxx\nvCenter Server = oaktier.turbamentis.int\nRecover Datastore = datastore-32\nCluster Compute Res. = domain-s26\nDatacenter = datacenter-21\nHost = host-28\nVMFolder = group-v22\nDestination VMname = vulcanTestMay3\nJobName = Vulcan_RecMay3\nPowerOn = false\nReconnectNIC = false\n\nGetting the uuid of the VM to recover\u2026\n\nVM uuid = 500f21cd-5865-dc0d-7fe5-9b93fad1a059\n\nGetting the number of available backups\u2026\n\nNumber of available backups: 103\n\nPicking a random backup to recover from\u2026\n\nRandom Backup = 51\n\nGetting the backup ID of the randomly selected backup\u2026\n\nBackup ID = 292e9504-00000006-4a7a207b-5e7a207b-02b75000-9f778f56\n\nChoosing randomly if we restore from a backup or a clone\u2026\n\nValue of the cloneornot variable: 1. If the value is 0, it will restore from a backup. If the value is 1, it will restore from a clone\n\nGetting the backup instance ID (That's the ID of the clone or backup)\u2026\n\nRecover URL = https:\/\/orilla:9090\/nwrestapi\/v3\/global\/vmware\/vcenters\/oaktier.turbamentis.int\/protectedvms\/500f21cd-5865-dc0d-7fe5-9b93fad1a059\/backups\/292e9504-00000006-4a7a207b-5e7a207b-02b75000-9f778f56\/instances\/1585063094\/op\/recover\n\nInstance is clone? = true\n\nGetting disk list from the backup\u2026\n\nHere's the contents of the JSON that will be sent to the REST API:\n\n==================================================================\n\n{\n\"recoverMode\": \"New\",\n\"computeResourceMoref\": \"domain-s26\",\n\"datacenterMoref\": \"datacenter-21\" ,\n\"datastoreMoref\": \"datastore-32\",\n\"vCenterHostname\": \"oaktier.turbamentis.int\",\n\"hostMoref\": \"host-28\",\n\"vmFolderMoref\": \"group-v22\",\n\"vmName\": \"vulcanTestMay3\",\n\"jobName\": \"Vulcan_RecMay3\",\n\"powerOn\": \"false\",\n\"disks\": [\n{\n\"name\": \"Hard disk 1\",\n\"key\": \"2000\",\n\"datastoreMoref\": \"datastore-32\"\n}\n],\n\"reconnectNic\": \"false\"\n}\n\n================================================================\n\nExecuting the REST call, here is the output:\n\nAbout to connect() to orilla port 9090 (#0)\nTrying 192.168.100.4\u2026 connected\nConnected to orilla (192.168.100.4) port 9090 (#0)<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
I’ve trimmed the remainder of the output. Continuing the REST API theme, here’s my webwatch<\/em> CGI output capturing the recovery in progress:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Randomised Virtual Machine Recovery in Progress<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
For the script, you do have to use the VMware internal identifiers for resources \u2014 my datastore I wanted to recover to (‘datastore4-ssd’) is actually datastore-32 as far as VMware is concerned. (Handily, Ugo has provided details on how to do this mapping \u2014 and you can always also do a one-off recovery using NetWorker, with debug mode level 9, to see the details captured: remember since this is automated recovery testing, you’ll likely be recovering to<\/em> a specific location all the time, regardless of what virtual machine you choose.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ugo has a blog post introducing his utility, and links to his Github project for it here \u2014 please check it out<\/strong><\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
While Avamar has options for automating the test of virtual machine recoveries, it’s not functionality that’s present in NetWorker. Recently…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9473,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[16,19,20,1357],"tags":[1252,1317,994,1087],"class_list":["post-9471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-networker","category-recovery","category-scripting","category-vproxy","tag-recovery","tag-rest-api","tag-testing","tag-vmware"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t