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ghettoVCB.sh - Free alternative for backing up VM's for ESX(i) 3.5, 4.x, 5.x, 6.x & 7.x

ghettoVCB.sh - Free alternative for backing up VM's for ESX(i) 3.5, 4.x, 5.x, 6.x & 7.x

Table of Contents:

Description

Features

Requirements

Setup

Configurations

Usage

Sample Execution

Dry run Mode

Debug backup Mode

Backup VMs stored in a list

Backup All VMs residing on specific ESX(i) host

Backup All VMs residing on specific ESX(i) host and exclude the VMs in the exclusion list

Backup VMs using individual backup policies

Enable compression for backups

Email Backup Logs

Restore backups (ghettoVCB-restore.sh)

Cronjob FAQ

Stopping ghettoVCB Process

FAQ

Our NFS Server Configuration

Useful Links

Change Log

Description:

This script performs backups of virtual machines residing on ESX(i) 3.5/4.x/5.x/6.x/7.x servers using methodology similar to VMware's VCB tool. The script takes snapshots of live running virtual machines, backs up the  master VMDK(s) and then upon completion, deletes the snapshot until the next backup. The only caveat is that it utilizes resources available to the Service Console of the ESX server or Busybox Console (Tech Support Mode) of the ESXi server  running the backups as opposed to following the traditional method of offloading virtual machine backups through a VCB proxy.

This script has been tested on ESX 3.5/4.x/5.x and ESXi 3.5/4.x/5.x/6.x/7.x and supports the following backup mediums: LOCAL STORAGE, SAN and NFS. The script is non-interactive and can be setup to run via cron. Currently, this script accepts a text file that lists the display names of virtual machine(s) that are to be backed up. Additionally, one can specify a folder containing configuration files on a per VM basis for  granular control over backup policies.

Additionally, for ESX(i) environments that don't have persistent NFS datastores designated for backups, the script offers the ability to automatically connect the ESX(i) server to a NFS exported folder and then upon backup completion, disconnect it from the ESX(i) server. The connection is established by creating an NFS datastore link which enables monolithic (or thick) VMDK backups as opposed to using the usual  *nix mount command which necessitates breaking VMDK files into the 2gbsparse format for backup. Enabling this mode is self-explanatory and will evidently be so when editing the script (Note: VM_BACKUP_VOLUME variable is ignored if ENABLE_NON_PERSISTENT_NFS=1 ).

In its current configuration, the script will allow up to 3 unique backups of the Virtual Machine before it will overwrite the previous backups; this however, can be modified to fit procedures if need be. Please be diligent in running the script in a test or staging environment before using it on production live Virtual Machines; this script functions well within our environment but there is a chance that  it may not fit well into other environments.

If you have any questions, you may post in the dedicated ghettoVCB VMTN community group.

If you have found this script to be useful and would like to contribute back, please click here to donate.

Please read ALL documentation + FAQ's before posting a question about an issue or problem. Thank You

Features

Online back up of VM(s)

Support for multiple VMDK disk(s) backup per VM

Only valid VMDK(s) presented to the VM will be backed up

Ability to shutdown guestOS and initiate backup process and power on VM afterwards with the option of hard power timeout

Allow spaces in VM(s) backup list (not recommended and not a best practice)

Ensure that snapshot removal process completes prior to to continuing onto the next VM backup

VM(s) that intially contain snapshots will not be backed up and will be ignored

Ability to specify the number of backup rotations for VM

Output back up VMDK(s) in either ZEROEDTHICK (default behavior) or 2GB SPARSE or THIN or EAGERZEROEDTHICK format

Support for both SCSI and IDE disks

Non-persistent NFS backup

Fully support VMDK(s) stored across multiple datastores

Ability to compress backups (Experimental Support - Please refer to FAQ #25)

Ability to configure individual VM backup policies

Ability to include/exclude specific VMDK(s) per VM (requires individual VM backup policy setup)

Ability to configure logging output to file

Independent disk awareness (will ignore VMDK)

New timeout variables for shutdown and snapshot creations

Ability to configure snapshots with both memory and/or quiesce options

Ability to configure disk adapter format

Additional debugging information including dry run execution

Support for VMs with both virtual/physical RDM (pRDM will be ignored and not backed up)

Support for global ghettoVCB configuration file

Support for VM exclusion list

Ability to backup all VMs residing on a specific host w/o specifying VM list

Implemented simple locking mechenism to ensure only 1 instance of ghettoVCB is running per host

Updated backup directory structure - rsync friendly

Additional logging and final status output

Logging of ghettoVCB PID (proces id)

Email backup logs (Experimental Suppport)

Rsync "Link" Support (Experimental Suppport)

Enhanced "dryrun" details including configuration and/or VMDK(s) issues

New storage debugging details pre/post backup

Quick email status summary

Updated ghettoVCB documentation

ghettoVCB available via github

Support for ESXi 5.1 NEW!

Support for individual VM backup via command-line NEW!

Support VM(s) with existing snapshots NEW!

Support mulitple running instances of ghettoVCB NEW!
(Experimental Suppport)

Configure VM shutdown/startup order NEW!

Support changing custom VM name during restore NEW!

Requirements:

VMs running on ESX(i) 3.5/4.x+/5.x

SSH console access to ESX(i) host

Setup:

1) Download ghettoVCB from github by clicking on the ZIP button at the top and upload to either your ESX or ESXi system (use scp or WinSCP to transfer the file)

2) Extract the contents of the zip file (filename will vary):

# unzip ghettoVCB-master.zip

Archive:  ghettoVCB-master.zip
creating: ghettoVCB-master/
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/README
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/ghettoVCB-restore.sh
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/ghettoVCB-restore_vm_restore_configuration_template
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/ghettoVCB.conf
inflating: ghettoVCB-master/ghettoVCB.sh

3) The script is now ready to be used and is located in a directory named ghettoVCB-master

# ls -l

-rw-r--r--    1 root     root           281 Jan  6 03:58 README
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root         16024 Jan  6 03:58 ghettoVCB-restore.sh
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root           309 Jan  6 03:58 ghettoVCB-restore_vm_restore_configuration_template
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root           356 Jan  6 03:58 ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root           631 Jan  6 03:58 ghettoVCB.conf
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root         49375 Jan  6 03:58 ghettoVCB.sh

4) Before using the scripts, you will need to enable the execute permission  on both ghettoVCB.sh and ghettoVCB-restore.sh by running the following:

chmod +x ghettoVCB.shchmod +x ghettoVCB-restore.sh

Configurations:

The following variables need to be defined within the script or in VM backup policy prior to execution.

Defining the backup datastore and folder in which the backups are stored (if folder does not exist, it will automatically be created):

VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS

Defining the backup disk format (zeroedthick, eagerzeroedthick, thin, and 2gbsparse are available):

DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT=thin

Note: If you are using the 2gbsparse on an ESXi 5.1 host, backups may fail. Please download the latest version of the ghettoVCB script which automatically resolves this or take a look at this article for the details.

Defining the backup rotation per VM:

VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3

Defining whether the VM is powered down or not prior to backup (1 = enable, 0 = disable):

Note: VM(s) that are powered off will not require snapshoting

POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0

Defining whether the VM can be hard powered off when  "POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP" is enabled and VM does not have VMware  Tools installed

ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0

If "ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF" is enabled, then this defines the number  of (60sec) iterations the script will before executing a hard power off  when:

ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=3

The number (60sec) iterations the script will wait when powering off  the VM and will give up and ignore the particular VM for backup:

POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT=5

The number (60sec) iterations the script will wait when taking a  snapshot of a VM and will give up and ignore the particular VM for  backup:

Note: Default value should suffice

SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT=15

Defining whether or not to enable compression (1 = enable, 0 = disable):

ENABLE_COMPRESSION=0

NOTE: With ESXi 3.x/4.x/5.x, there is a limitation of the maximum size of a VM for compression within the unsupported Busybox Console which should not affect backups running classic ESX 3.x,4.x or 5.x. On ESXi 3.x the largest supported VM is 4GB for compression and on ESXi 4.x the largest  supported VM is 8GB. If you try to compress a larger VM, you may run into issues when trying to extract upon a restore. PLEASE TEST THE RESTORE PROCESS BEFORE MOVING TO PRODUCTION SYSTEMS!

Defining the adapter type for backed up VMDK (DEPERCATED - NO LONGER NEEDED

ADAPTER_FORMAT=buslogic

Defining whether virtual machine memory is snapped and if quiescing is enabled (1 = enable, 0 = disable):

Note: By default both are disabled

VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE=0

NOTE: VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY is only used to ensure when the snapshot is taken, it's memory contents  are also captured. This is only relevant to the actual snapshot and it's  not used in any shape/way/form in regards to the backup. All backups  taken whether your VM is running or offline will result in an offline VM  backup when you restore. This was originally added for debugging  purposes and in generally should be left disabled

Defining VMDK(s) to backup from a particular VM either a list of vmdks or "all"

VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP="myvmdk.vmdk"

Defining whether or not VM(s) with existing snapshots can be backed up. This flag means it will CONSOLIDATE ALL EXISTING SNAPSHOTS for a VM prior to starting the backup (1 = yes, 0 = no):

ALLOW_VMS_WITH_SNAPSHOTS_TO_BE_BACKEDUP=0

Defining the order of which VM(s) should be shutdown first, especially if there is a dependency between multiple VM(s). This should be a comma seperate list of VM(s)

VM_SHUTDOWN_ORDER=vm1,vm2,vm3

Defining the order of VM(s) that should be started up first after backups have completed, especially if there is a dependency between multiple VM(s). This should be a comma seperate list of VM(s)

VM_STARTUP_ORDER=vm3,vm2,vm1

Defining NON-PERSISTENT NFS Backup Volume (1 = yes, 0 = no):

ENABLE_NON_PERSISTENT_NFS=0

NOTE: This is meant for environments that do not want a persisted connection to their NFS backup volume and allows the NFS volume to only be mounted during backups. The script expects the following 5 variables to be defined if this is to be used: UNMOUNT_NFS, NFS_SERVER, NFS_MOUNT, NFS_LOCAL_NAME and NFS_VM_BACKUP_DIR

Defining whether or not to unmount the NFS backup volume (1 = yes, 0 = no):

UNMOUNT_NFS=0

Defining the NFS server address (IP/hostname):

NFS_SERVER=172.51.0.192

Defining the NFS export path:

NFS_MOUNT=/upload

Defining the NFS datastore name:

NFS_LOCAL_NAME=backup

Defining the NFS backup directory for VMs:

NFS_VM_BACKUP_DIR=mybackups

NOTE: Only supported if you are running vSphere 4.1 and this feature is experimental. If you are having issues with sending mail, please take a look at Email Backup Log section

Defining whether or not to email backup logs (1 = yes, 0 = no):

EMAIL_LOG=1

Defining whether or not to email message will be deleted off the host  whether it is successful in sending, this is used for debugging  purposes. (1 = yes, 0 = no):

EMAIL_DEBUG=1

Defining email server:

EMAIL_SERVER=auroa.primp-industries.com

Defining email server port:

EMAIL_SERVER_PORT=25

Defining email delay interval (useful if you have slow SMTP server and would like to include a delay in netcat using -i param, default is 1second):

EMAIL_DELAY_INTERVAL=1

Defining recipient of the email:

EMAIL_TO=[email-masked]

Defining from user which may require specific domain entry depending on email server configurations:

EMAIL_FROM=root@ghettoVCB

Defining to support RSYNC symbolic link creation (1 = yes, 0 = no):

RSYNC_LINK=0

Note: This  enables an automatic creation of a generic symbolic link (both a  relative & absolution path) in which users can refer to run  replication backups using rsync from a remote host. This does not  actually support rsync backups with ghettoVCB. Please take a look at the  Rsync Section of the documentation for more details.

A sample global ghettoVCB configuration file is included with the download called ghettoVCB.conf.  It contains the same variables as defined from above and allows a user  to customize and define multiple global configurations based on a user's  environment.

# cat ghettoVCB.conf
VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT=thin
VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3
POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0
ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0
ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=3
POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT=5
ENABLE_COMPRESSION=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE=0
ALLOW_VMS_WITH_SNAPSHOTS_TO_BE_BACKEDUP=0
ENABLE_NON_PERSISTENT_NFS=0
UNMOUNT_NFS=0
NFS_SERVER=172.30.0.195
NFS_MOUNT=/nfsshare
NFS_LOCAL_NAME=nfs_storage_backup
NFS_VM_BACKUP_DIR=mybackups
SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT=15
EMAIL_LOG=0
EMAIL_SERVER=auroa.primp-industries.com
EMAIL_SERVER_PORT=25
EMAIL_DELAY_INTERVAL=1
EMAIL_TO=[email-masked]
EMAIL_FROM=root@ghettoVCB
WORKDIR_DEBUG=0
VM_SHUTDOWN_ORDER=
VM_STARTUP_ORDER=

To override any existing configurations within the ghettoVCB.sh script  and to use a global configuration file, user just needs to specify the  new flag -g and path to global configuration file (For an example,  please refer to the sample execution section of the documenation)

Running multiple instances of ghettoVCB is now supported with the latest release by specifying the working directory (-w) flag.

By default, the working directory of the ghettoVCB instance is /tmp/ghettoVCB.work and you can run another instance by providing an alternate working directory. You should try to minimize the number of ghettoVCB instances running on your ESXi host as it does consume some amount of resources when running in the ESXi Shell. This is considered an experimental feature, so please test in a development environment to ensure everything is working prior to moving to production system.

Ensure that you do not edit past this section:

########################## DO NOT MODIFY PAST THIS LINE ##########################

Usage:

# ./ghettoVCB.sh
###############################################################################
#
# ghettoVCB for ESX/ESXi 3.5, 4.x+ and 5.x
# Author: William Lam
# http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/
# Documentation: http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-8760
# Created: 11/17/2008
# Last modified: 2012_12_17 Version 0
#
###############################################################################

Usage: ghettoVCB.sh [options]

OPTIONS:
-a     Backup all VMs on host
-f     List of VMs to backup
-m     Name of VM to backup (overrides -f)
-c     VM configuration directory for VM backups
-g     Path to global ghettoVCB configuration file
-l     File to output logging
-w     ghettoVCB work directory (default: )
-d     Debug level [info|debug|dryrun] (default: info)

(e.g.)

Backup VMs stored in a list
./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup

Backup a single VM
./ghettoVCB.sh -m vm_to_backup

Backup all VMs residing on this host
./ghettoVCB.sh -a

Backup all VMs residing on this host except for the VMs in the exclusion list
./ghettoVCB.sh -a -e vm_exclusion_list

Backup VMs based on specific configuration located in directory
./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -c vm_backup_configs

Backup VMs using global ghettoVCB configuration file
./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -g /global/ghettoVCB.conf

Output will log to /tmp/ghettoVCB.log (consider logging to local or remote datastore to persist logs)
./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -l /vmfs/volume/local-storage/ghettoVCB.log

Dry run (no backup will take place)
./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -d dryrun

The input to this script is a file that contains the display name of the  virtual machine(s) separated by a newline. When creating this file on a  non-Linux/UNIX system, you may introduce ^M character which can cause  the script to miss-behave. To ensure this does not occur, plesae create  the file on the ESX/ESXi host.

Here is a sample of what the file would look like:

[root@himalaya ~]# cat vms_to_backup
vCOPS
vMA
vCloudConnector

Sample Execution:

Dry run Mode

Debug Mode

Backup VMs stored in a list

Backup Single VM using command-line

Backup All VMs residing on specific ESX(i) host

Backup VMs based on individual VM backup policies

Dry run Mode (no backup will take place)

Note: This execution mode provides a qucik summary of details on whether a given set of VM(s)/VMDK(s) will be backed up. It provides additional information such as VMs that may have snapshots, VMDK(s) that are configured as independent disks, or other issues that may cause a VM or VMDK to not backed up.

Log verbosity: dryrun

Log output: stdout & /tmp (default)

Logs by default will be stored in /tmp, these log files may not persist through reboots, especially when dealing with ESXi. You should log to either a local or remote datastore to ensure that logs are kept upon a reboot.

[root@himalaya ghettoVCB]# ./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -d dryrun
Logging output to "/tmp/ghettoVCB-2011-03-13_15-19-57.log" ...
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG START ==============================

2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VERSION = 2011_03_13_1
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - GHETTOVCB_PID = 30157
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_VOLUME = /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT = 3
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION = 2011-03-13_15-19-57
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT = thin
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP = 0
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF = 0
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN = 3
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT = 5
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT = 15
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - LOG_LEVEL = dryrun
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - BACKUP_LOG_OUTPUT = /tmp/ghettoVCB-2011-03-13_15-19-57.log
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY = 0
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE = 0
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP = all
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info: CONFIG - EMAIL_LOG = 0
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- info:
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: ###############################################
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: Virtual Machine: scofield
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VM_ID: 704
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VMX_PATH: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VMX_DIR: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VMX_CONF: scofield/scofield.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VMFS_VOLUME: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:19:57 -- dryrun: VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun:  scofield_3.vmdk 3 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun:  scofield_2.vmdk 2 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun:  scofield_1.vmdk 1 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun:  scofield.vmdk   5 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: INDEPENDENT VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: TOTAL_VM_SIZE_TO_BACKUP: 11 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: ###############################################

2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: ###############################################
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: Virtual Machine: vMA
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VM_ID: 1440
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_PATH: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vMA/vMA.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_DIR: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vMA
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_CONF: vMA/vMA.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMFS_VOLUME: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun:  vMA-000002.vmdk 5 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: INDEPENDENT VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: TOTAL_VM_SIZE_TO_BACKUP: 5 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: Snapshots found for this VM, please commit all snapshots before continuing!
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: THIS VIRTUAL MACHINE WILL NOT BE BACKED UP DUE TO EXISTING SNAPSHOTS!
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: ###############################################

2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: ###############################################
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: Virtual Machine: vCloudConnector
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VM_ID: 2064
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_PATH: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_DIR: /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vCloudConnector
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMX_CONF: vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector.vmx
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMFS_VOLUME: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:19:58 -- dryrun: VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun:  vCloudConnector.vmdk    3 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun: INDEPENDENT VMDK(s):
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun:  vCloudConnector_1.vmdk  40 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun: TOTAL_VM_SIZE_TO_BACKUP: 3 GB
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun: Snapshots can not be taken for indepdenent disks!
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun: THIS VIRTUAL MACHINE WILL NOT HAVE ALL ITS VMDKS BACKED UP!
2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- dryrun: ###############################################

2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- info: ###### Final status: OK, only a dryrun. ######

2011-03-13 15:19:59 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG END ================================

In the example above, we have 3 VMs to be backed up:

scofield has 4 VMDK(s) that total up to 11GB and does not contain any snapshots/independent disks and this VM should backup without any issues

vMA has 1 VMDK but it also contains a snapshot and clearly this VM will not be backed up until the snapshot has been committed

vCloudConnector has 2 VMDK(s), one which is 3GB and another which is 40GB and configured as an independent disk. Since snapshots do not affect independent disk, only the 3GB VMDK will be backed up for this VM as denoted by the "TOTAL_VM_SIZE_TO_BACKUP"

Debug backup mode

Note: This execution modes provides more in-depth information about environment/backup process including additional storage debugging information which provides information about both the source/destination datastore pre and post backups. This can be very useful in troubleshooting backups

Log verbosity: debug

Log output: stdout & /tmp (default)

Logs by default will be stored in /tmp, these log files may not persist  through reboots, especially when dealing with ESXi. You should log to  either a local or remote datastore to ensure that logs are kept upon a  reboot.

[root@himalaya ghettoVCB]# ./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -d debug
Logging output to "/tmp/ghettoVCB-2011-03-13_15-27-59.log" ...
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG START ==============================

2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- debug: Succesfully acquired lock directory - /tmp/ghettoVCB.lock

2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- debug: HOST VERSION: VMware ESX 4.1.0 build-260247
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- debug: HOST LEVEL: VMware ESX 4.1.0 GA
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- debug: HOSTNAME: himalaya.primp-industries.com

2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VERSION = 2011_03_13_1
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - GHETTOVCB_PID = 31074
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_VOLUME = /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT = 3
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION = 2011-03-13_15-27-59
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT = thin
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP = 0
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF = 0
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN = 3
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT = 5
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT = 15
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - LOG_LEVEL = debug
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - BACKUP_LOG_OUTPUT = /tmp/ghettoVCB-2011-03-13_15-27-59.log
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY = 0
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE = 0
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP = all
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info: CONFIG - EMAIL_LOG = 0
2011-03-13 15:27:59 -- info:
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: Storage Information before backup:
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1830.5 GB
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_FREE: 539.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: 4
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: 1024 GB
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE: dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1348.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_FREE: 296.8 GB
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:28:01 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:28:02 -- info: Initiate backup for scofield
2011-03-13 15:28:02 -- debug: /usr/sbin/vmkfstools -i "/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_3.vmdk" -a "buslogic" -d "thin" "/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/scofield/scofield-2011-03-13_15-27-59/scofield_3.vmdk"
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_3.vmdk'...
Clone: 37% done.
2011-03-13 15:28:04 -- debug: /usr/sbin/vmkfstools -i "/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_2.vmdk" -a "buslogic" -d "thin" "/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/scofield/scofield-2011-03-13_15-27-59/scofield_2.vmdk"
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_2.vmdk'...
Clone: 85% done.
2011-03-13 15:28:05 -- debug: /usr/sbin/vmkfstools -i "/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_1.vmdk" -a "buslogic" -d "thin" "/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/scofield/scofield-2011-03-13_15-27-59/scofield_1.vmdk"

2011-03-13 15:28:06 -- debug: /usr/sbin/vmkfstools -i "/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield.vmdk" -a "buslogic" -d "thin" "/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/scofield/scofield-2011-03-13_15-27-59/scofield.vmdk"
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield.vmdk'...
Clone: 78% done.
2011-03-13 15:29:52 -- info: Backup Duration: 1.83 Minutes
2011-03-13 15:29:52 -- info: Successfully completed backup for scofield!

2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: Storage Information after backup:
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1830.5 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_FREE: 539.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: 4
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: 1024 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE: dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1348.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_FREE: 296.8 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:54 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: Storage Information before backup:
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1830.5 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_FREE: 539.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: 4
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: 1024 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE: dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1348.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_FREE: 296.8 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:55 -- info: Snapshot found for vMA, backup will not take place

2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: Storage Information before backup:
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE: himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1830.5 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_FREE: 539.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: 4
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: SRC_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: 1024 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE: dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_CAPACITY: 1348.4 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_FREE: 296.8 GB
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_BLOCKSIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug: DST_DATASTORE_MAX_FILE_SIZE: NA
2011-03-13 15:29:57 -- debug:
2011-03-13 15:29:58 -- info: Initiate backup for vCloudConnector
2011-03-13 15:29:58 -- debug: /usr/sbin/vmkfstools -i "/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector.vmdk" -a "buslogic" -d "thin" "/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector-2011-03-13_15-27-59/vCloudConnector.vmdk"
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector.vmdk'...
Clone: 97% done.
2011-03-13 15:30:45 -- info: Backup Duration: 47 Seconds
2011-03-13 15:30:45 -- info: WARN: vCloudConnector has some Independent VMDKs that can not be backed up!

2011-03-13 15:30:45 -- info: ###### Final status: ERROR: Only some of the VMs backed up, and some disk(s) failed! ######

2011-03-13 15:30:45 -- debug: Succesfully removed lock directory - /tmp/ghettoVCB.lock

2011-03-13 15:30:45 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG END ================================

Backup VMs stored in a list

[root@himalaya ~]# ./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup

Backup Single VM using command-line

# ./ghettoVCB.sh -m MyVM

Backup All VMs residing on specific ESX(i) host

/ghettoVCB # ./ghettoVCB.sh -a

Backup All VMs residing on specific ESX(i) host and exclude the VMs in the exclusion list

/ghettoVCB # ./ghettoVCB.sh -a -e vm_exclusion_list

Backup VMs based on individual VM backup policies and log output to /tmp/ghettoVCB.log

Log verbosity: info (default)

Log output: /tmp/ghettoVCB.log

Logs by default will be stored in /tmp, these log files may not persist  through reboots, especially when dealing with ESXi. You should log to  either a local or remote datastore to ensure that logs are kept upon a  reboot.

1. Create folder to hold individual VM backup policies (can be named anything):

[root@himalaya ~]# mkdir backup_config

2. Create individual VM backup policies for each VM that ensure each  file is named exactly as the display name of the VM being backed up (use  provided template to create duplicates):

[root@himalaya backup_config]# cp ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template scofield
[root@himalaya backup_config]# cp ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template vCloudConnector

Listing of VM backup policy within backup configuration directory

[root@himalaya backup_config]# ls
ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template  scofield  vCloudConnector

Backup policy for "scofield" (backup only 2 specific VMDKs)

[root@himalaya backup_config]# cat scofield
VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT=thin
VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3
POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0
ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0
ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=4
POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT=5
SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT=15
ENABLE_COMPRESSION=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE=0
VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP="scofield_2.vmdk,scofield_1.vmdk"

Backup policy for VM "vCloudConnector" (backup all VMDKs found)

[root@himalaya backup_config]# cat vCloudConnector
VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT=thin
VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3
POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0
ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0
ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=4
POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT=5
SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT=15
ENABLE_COMPRESSION=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY=0
VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE=0
VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP="vCloudConnector.vmdk"

Note: When specifying -c option (individual VM backup policy mode) if a VM is listed in the backup list but DOES NOT have a corresponding backup policy, the VM will be backed up using the  default configuration found within the ghettoVCB.sh script.

Execution of backup

[root@himalaya ~]# ./ghettoVCB.sh -f vms_to_backup -c backup_config -l /tmp/ghettoVCB.log

2011-03-13 15:40:50 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG START ==============================

2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - USING CONFIGURATION FILE = backup_config//scofield
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VERSION = 2011_03_13_1
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - GHETTOVCB_PID = 2967
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_VOLUME = /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT = 3
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION = 2011-03-13_15-40-50
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT = thin
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN = 4
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT = 5
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT = 15
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - LOG_LEVEL = info
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - BACKUP_LOG_OUTPUT = /tmp/ghettoVCB.log
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP = scofield_2.vmdk,scofield_1.vmdk
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info: CONFIG - EMAIL_LOG = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:51 -- info:
2011-03-13 15:40:53 -- info: Initiate backup for scofield
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_2.vmdk'...
Clone: 100% done.

Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/scofield/scofield_1.vmdk'...
Clone: 100% done.

2011-03-13 15:40:55 -- info: Backup Duration: 2 Seconds
2011-03-13 15:40:55 -- info: Successfully completed backup for scofield!

2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VERSION = 2011_03_13_1
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - GHETTOVCB_PID = 2967
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_VOLUME = /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT = 3
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION = 2011-03-13_15-40-50
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT = thin
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN = 3
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT = 5
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT = 15
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - LOG_LEVEL = info
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - BACKUP_LOG_OUTPUT = /tmp/ghettoVCB.log
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP = all
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info: CONFIG - EMAIL_LOG = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:57 -- info:
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: Snapshot found for vMA, backup will not take place

2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - USING CONFIGURATION FILE = backup_config//vCloudConnector
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VERSION = 2011_03_13_1
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - GHETTOVCB_PID = 2967
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_VOLUME = /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT = 3
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION = 2011-03-13_15-40-50
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - DISK_BACKUP_FORMAT = thin
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN = 4
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - POWER_DOWN_TIMEOUT = 5
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - SNAPSHOT_TIMEOUT = 15
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - LOG_LEVEL = info
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - BACKUP_LOG_OUTPUT = /tmp/ghettoVCB.log
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VM_SNAPSHOT_QUIESCE = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP = vCloudConnector.vmdk
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info: CONFIG - EMAIL_LOG = 0
2011-03-13 15:40:59 -- info:
2011-03-13 15:41:01 -- info: Initiate backup for vCloudConnector
Destination disk format: VMFS thin-provisioned
Cloning disk '/vmfs/volumes/himalaya-local-SATA.RE4-GP:Storage/vCloudConnector/vCloudConnector.vmdk'...
Clone: 100% done.

2011-03-13 15:41:51 -- info: Backup Duration: 50 Seconds
2011-03-13 15:41:51 -- info: WARN: vCloudConnector has some Independent VMDKs that can not be backed up!

2011-03-13 15:41:51 -- info: ###### Final status: ERROR: Only some of the VMs backed up, and some disk(s) failed! ######

2011-03-13 15:41:51 -- info: ============================== ghettoVCB LOG END ================================

Enable compression for backups (EXPERIMENTAL SUPPORT)

Please take a look at FAQ #25 for more details before continuing

To make use of this feature, modify the variable ENABLE_COMPRESSION from 0 to 1. Please note, do not mix uncompressed backups with  compressed backups. Ensure that directories selected for backups do not contain any backups with previous versions of ghettoVCB before enabling  and implementing the compressed backups feature.

Email Backup Logs (EXPERIMENTAL SUPPORT)

nc (netcat) utility must be present for email support to function, this utility is a now a default with the release of vSphere 4.1 or greater, previous releases of VI 3.5 and/or vSphere 4.0 does not contain this utility. The reason this is listed as experimental is it may not be compatible with all email servers as the script utlizes nc (netcat) utility to communicate to an email server. This feature is  provided as-is with no guarantees. If you enable this feature, a  separate log will be generated along side  any normal logging which will  be used to email recipient. If for whatever reason, the email fails to  send, an entry will appear per the normal logging mechanism.

Users should also make note due to limited functionality of netcat, it uses SMTP pipelining which is not the most ideal method of communicating with an SMTP server. Email from ghettoVCB may not work if your email server does not support this feature.

You can define an email recipient in the following two ways:

EMAIL_TO=[email-masked]

OR

EMAIL_TO=[email-masked],[email-masked]

If you are running ESXi 5.1, you will need to create a custom firewall rule to allow your email traffic to go out which I will assume is default port 25. Here are the steps for creating a custom email rule.

Step 1 - Create a file called /etc/vmware/firewall/email.xml with contains the following:

<ConfigRoot>
<service>
<id>email</id>
<rule id="0000">
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<porttype>dst</porttype>
<port>25</port>
</rule>
<enabled>true</enabled>
<required>false</required>
</service>
</ConfigRoot>

Step 2 - Reload the ESXi firewall by running the following ESXCLI command:

~ #

esxcli network firewall refresh

Step 3 - Confirm that your email rule has been loaded by running the following ESXCLI command:

~ # esxcli network firewall ruleset list | grep email
email                  true

Step 4 - Connect to your email server by usingn nc (netcat) by running the following command and specifying the IP Address/Port of your email server:

~ # nc 172.30.0.107 25
220 mail.primp-industries.com ESMTP Postfix

You should recieve a response from your email server and you can enter Ctrl+C to exit. This custom ESXi firewall rule will not persist after a reboot, so you should create a custom VIB to ensure it persists after a system reboot. Please take a look at this article for the details.

Rsync Support  (EXPERIMENTAL SUPPORT)

To make use of this feature, modify the variable RSYNC_LINK from 0  to 1. Please note, this is an experimental feature request from users that rely on rsync to replicate changes from one datastore volume to  another datastore volume. The premise of this feature is to have a standardized folder that rsync can monitor for changes to replicate to  another backup datastore. When this feature is enabled, a symbolic link  will be generated with the format of "<VMNAME>-symlink" and will  reference the latest successful VM backup. You can then rely on this  symbolic link to watch for changes and replicate to your backup  datastore.

Here is an example of what this would look like:

[root@himalaya ghettoVCB]# ls -la /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/vcma/
total 0
drwxr-xr-x 1 nobody nobody 110 Sep 27 08:08 .
drwxr-xr-x 1 nobody nobody  17 Sep 16 14:01 ..
lrwxrwxrwx 1 nobody nobody  89 Sep 27 08:08 vcma-symlink -> /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/WILLIAM_BACKUPS/vcma/vcma-2010-09-27_08-07-37
drwxr-xr-x 1 nobody nobody  58 Sep 27 08:04 vcma-2010-09-27_08-04-26
drwxr-xr-x 1 nobody nobody  58 Sep 27 08:06 vcma-2010-09-27_08-05-55
drwxr-xr-x 1 nobody nobody  58 Sep 27 08:08 vcma-2010-09-27_08-07-37

FYI - This feature has not been tested, please provide feedback if this does not work as expected.

Restore backups (ghettoVCB-restore.sh):

To recover a VM that has been processed by ghettoVCB, please take a look at this document: Ghetto Tech Preview - ghettoVCB-restore.sh - Restoring VM's backed up from ghettoVCB to ESX(i) 3.5, ...

Stopping ghettoVCB Process:

There may be a situation where you need to stop the ghettoVCB process and entering Ctrl+C will only kill off the main ghettoVCB process, however there may still be other spawn processes that you may need to identify and stop. Below are two scenarios you may encounter and the process to completely stop all processes related to ghettoVCB.

Interactively running ghettoVCB:

Step 1 - Press Ctrl+C which will kill off the main ghettoVCB instance

Step 2 - Search for any existing ghettoVCB process by running the following:

# ps -c | grep ghettoVCB | grep -v grep
3360136 3360136 tail                 tail -f /tmp/ghettoVCB.work/ghettovcb.Cs1M1x

Step 3 - Here we can see there is a tail command that was used in the script. We need to stop this process by using the kill command which accepts the PID (Process ID) which is identified by the first value on the far left hand side of the command. In this example, it is 3360136.

# kill -9 3360136

Note: Make sure you identify the correct PID, else you could accidently impact a running VM or worse your ESXi host.

Step 4 - Depending on where you stopped the ghettoVCB process, you may need to consolidate or remove any existing snapshots that may exist on the VM that was being backed up. You can easily do so by using the vSphere Client.

Non-Interactively running ghettoVCB:

Step 1 - Search for the ghettoVCB process (you can also validate the PID from the logs)

~ # ps -c | grep ghettoVCB | grep -v grep
3360393 3360393 busybox              ash ./ghettoVCB.sh -f list -d debug
3360790 3360790 tail                 tail -f /tmp/ghettoVCB.work/ghettovcb.deGeB7

Step 2 - Stop both the main ghettoVCB instance & tail command by using the kill command and specifying their respective PID IDs:

kill -9 3360393
kill -9 3360790

Step 3 - If a VM was in the process of being backed up, there is an additional process for the actual vmkfstools copy. You will need to identify the process for that and kill that as well. We will again use ps -c command and search for any vmkfstools that are running:

# ps -c | grep vmkfstools | grep -v grep
3360796 3360796 vmkfstools           /sbin/vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/himalaya-temporary/VC-Windows/VC-Windows.vmdk -a lsilogic -d thin /vmfs/volumes/test-dont-use-this-volume/backups/VC-Windows/VC-Windows-2013-01-26_16-45-35/VC-Windows.vmdk

Step 4 - In case there is someone manually running a vmkfstools, make sure you take a look at the command itself and that it maps back to the current VM that was being backed up before kill the process. Once you have identified the proper PID, go ahead and use the kill command:

# kill -9 3360796

Step 5 - Depending on where you stopped the  ghettoVCB process, you may need to consolidate or remove any existing  snapshots that may exist on the VM that was being backed up. You can  easily do so by using the vSphere Client.

Cronjob FAQ:

Please take a moment to read over what is a cronjob and how to set one up, before continuing

The task of configuring cronjobs on classic ESX servers (with Service Console) is no different than traditional cronjobs on *nix operating  systems (this procedure is outlined in the link above). With ESXi on the  other hand, additional factors need to be taken into account when  setting up cronjobs in the limited shell console called Busybox because changes made do not persist through a system reboot. The following document will outline steps to ensure that cronjob configurations are saved and present upon a reboot.

Important Note: Always redirect the ghettoVCB output to /dev/null and/or to a log when automating via cron, this becomes very important as one user has identified a limited amount of buffer capacity in which once filled, may cause ghettoVCB to stop in the middle of a backup. This primarily only affects users on ESXi, but it is good practice to always redirect the output. Also ensure you are specifying the FULL PATH when referencing the ghettoVCB script, input or log files.

e.g.

0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/backuplist > /dev/null

or

0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/backuplist > /tmp/ghettoVCB.log

Task: Configure ghettoVCB.sh to execute a backup five days a week (M-F) at 12AM (midnight) everyday and send output to a unique log file

Configure on ESX:

1. As root, you'll install your cronjob by issuing:

[root@himalaya ~]# crontab -e

2. Append the following entry:

0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB-backup-$(date +\%s).log

3. Save and exit

[root@himalaya dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups]# crontab -e
no crontab for root - using an empty one
crontab: installing new crontab

4. List out and verify the cronjob that was just created:

[root@himalaya dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups]# crontab -l
0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups/ghettoVCB-backup-$(date +\%s).log

You're ready to go!

Configure on ESXi:

1. Setup the cronjob by appending the following line to /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root:

0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-$(date +\%s).log

If you are unable to edit/modify /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root, please make a copy and then edit the copy with the changes

cp /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root.backup

Once your changes have been made, then "mv" the backup to the original file. This may occur on ESXi 4.x or 5.x hosts

mv /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root.backup /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root

You can now verify the crontab entry has been updated by using "cat" utility.

2. Kill the current crond (cron daemon) and then restart the crond for the changes to take affect:

On ESXi < 3.5u3

kill $(ps | grep crond | cut -f 1 -d ' ')

On ESXi 3.5u3+

~ # kill $(pidof crond)
~ # crond

On ESXi 4.x/5.0

~ # kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
~ # busybox crond

On ESXi 5.1 to 6.x

~ # kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
~ # crond

On ESXi 7.x

~ # kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
~ # /usr/lib/vmware/busybox/bin/busybox crond

3. Now that the cronjob is ready to go, you need to ensure that this  cronjob will persist through a reboot. You'll need to add the following two lines to /etc/rc.local (ensure that the cron entry matches what was defined above). In ESXi 5.1, you will need to edit /etc/rc.local.d/local.sh instead of /etc/rc.local as that is no longer valid.

On ESXi 3.5

/bin/kill $(pidof crond)
/bin/echo "0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-\$(date +\\%s).log" >> /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root
crond

On ESXi 4.x/5.0

/bin/kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
/bin/echo "0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-\$(date +\\%s).log" >> /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root
/bin/busybox crond

On ESXi 5.1 to 6.x

/bin/kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
/bin/echo "0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-\$(date +\\%s).log" >> /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root
crond

On ESXi 7.x

/bin/kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid) > /dev/null 2>&1
/bin/echo "0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-\$(date +\\%s).log" >> /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root
/usr/lib/vmware/busybox/bin/busybox crond

Afterwards the file should look like the following:

~ # cat /etc/rc.local
#! /bin/ash
export PATH=/sbin:/bin

log() {
echo "$1"
logger init "$1"
}

#execute all service retgistered in /etc/rc.local.d
if [http:// -d /etc/rc.local.d |http:// -d /etc/rc.local.d ]; then
for filename in `find /etc/rc.local.d/ | sort`
do
if [ -f $filename ] && [ -x $filename ]; then
log "running $filename"
$filename
fi
done
fi

/bin/kill $(cat /var/run/crond.pid)
/bin/echo "0 0 * * 1-5 /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB.sh -f /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/backuplist > /vmfs/volumes/simplejack-local-storage/ghettoVCB-backup-\$(date +\\%s).log" >> /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root
/bin/busybox crond

This will ensure that the cronjob is re-created upon a reboot of the system through a startup script

2. To ensure that this is saved in the ESXi configuration, we need to manually initiate an ESXi backup by running:

~ # /sbin/auto-backup.sh
config implicitly loaded
local.tgz
etc/vmware/vmkiscsid/vmkiscsid.db
etc/dropbear/dropbear_dss_host_key
etc/dropbear/dropbear_rsa_host_key
etc/opt/vmware/vpxa/vpxa.cfg
etc/opt/vmware/vpxa/dasConfig.xml
etc/sysconfig/network
etc/vmware/hostd/authorization.xml
etc/vmware/hostd/hostsvc.xml
etc/vmware/hostd/pools.xml
etc/vmware/hostd/vmAutoStart.xml
etc/vmware/hostd/vmInventory.xml
etc/vmware/hostd/proxy.xml
etc/vmware/ssl/rui.crt
etc/vmware/ssl/rui.key
etc/vmware/vmkiscsid/initiatorname.iscsi
etc/vmware/vmkiscsid/iscsid.conf
etc/vmware/vmware.lic
etc/vmware/config
etc/vmware/dvsdata.db
etc/vmware/esx.conf
etc/vmware/license.cfg
etc/vmware/locker.conf
etc/vmware/snmp.xml
etc/group
etc/hosts
etc/inetd.conf
etc/rc.local
etc/chkconfig.db
etc/ntp.conf
etc/passwd
etc/random-seed
etc/resolv.conf
etc/shadow
etc/sfcb/repository/root/interop/cim_indicationfilter.idx
etc/sfcb/repository/root/interop/cim_indicationhandlercimxml.idx
etc/sfcb/repository/root/interop/cim_listenerdestinationcimxml.idx
etc/sfcb/repository/root/interop/cim_indicationsubscription.idx
Binary files /etc/vmware/dvsdata.db and /tmp/auto-backup.31345.dir/etc/vmware/dvsdata.db differ
config implicitly loaded
Saving current state in /bootbank
Clock updated.
Time: 20:40:36   Date: 08/14/2009   UTC

Now you're really done!

If you're still having trouble getting the cronjob to work, ensure that  you've specified the correct parameters and there aren’t any typos in  any part of the syntax.

Ensure crond (cron daemon) is running:

ESX 3.x/4.0:

[root@himalaya dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups]# ps -ef | grep crond | grep -v grep
root      2625     1  0 Aug13 ?        00:00:00 crond

ESXi 3.x/4.x/5.x:

~ # ps | grep crond | grep -v grep
5196 5196 busybox              crond

Ensure that the date/time on your ESX(i) host is setup correctly:

ESX(i):

[root@himalaya dlgCore-NFS-bigboi.VM-Backups]# date
Fri Aug 14 23:44:47 PDT 2009

Note: Careful attention must be noted if more than one backup is performed per day. Backup windows  should be staggered to avoid contention or saturation of resources  during these periods.

FAQ:

0Q: I'm getting error X when using the script or I'm not getting any errors, the backup didn’t even take place. What can I do?
0A: First off, before posting a comment/question, please thoroughly read through the ENTIRE documentation including the FAQs to see if your question has already been ansered.

1Q: I've read through the entire documentation + FAQs and still have not found my answer to the problem I'm seeing. What can I do?
1A: Please join the ghettoVCB Group to post your question/comment.

2Q: I've sent you private message or email but I haven't received a response? What gives?
2A: I do not accept issues/bugs reported via PM or email, I will  reply back, directing you to post on the appropriate VMTN forum (that's  what it's for). If the data/results you're providing is truely senstive  to your environment I will hear you out, but 99.99% it is not, so please  do not messsage/email me directly. I do monitor all forums that contain  my script including the normal VMTN forums and will try to get back to  your question as soon as I can and as time permits. Please do be patient as you're not the only person using the script (600,000+ views), thank you.

3Q: Can I schedule backups to take place hourly, daily, monthly, yearly?
3A: Yes, do a search online for crontab.

4Q: I would like to setup cronjob for ESX(i) 3.5 or 4.0?
4A: Take a look at the Cronjob FAQ section in this document.

5Q: I want to schedule my backup on Windows, how do I do this?
5A: Do a search for plink. Make sure you have paired SSH keys setup between your Windows system and ESX/ESXi host.

6Q: I only have a single ESXi host. I want to take backups and  store them somewhere else. The problem is: I don't have NFS, iSCSI nor  FC SAN. What can I do?
6A: You can use local storage to store your backups assuming that  you have enough space on the destination datastore.  Afterwards, you  can use scp (WinSCP/FastSCP) to transfer the backups from the ESXi host  to your local desktop.

7Q: I’m pissed; the backup is taking too long. My datastore is of type X?
7A: YMMV, take a look at your storage configuration and make sure it is optimized.

8Q: I noticed that the backup rotation is occurring after a  backup. I don't have enough local storage space, can the process be  changed?
8A: This is primarily done to ensure that you have at least one  good backup in case the new backup fails. If you would like to modify  the script, you're more than welcome to do so.

9Q: What is the best storage configuration for datastore type X?
9A: Search the VMTN forums; there are various configurations for the different type of storage/etc.

10Q: I want to setup an NFS server to run my backups. Which is the best and should it be virtual or physical?
10A: Please refer to answer 7A. From experience, we’ve seen  physical instances of NFS servers to be faster than their virtual  counterparts. As always, YMMV.

11Q: I have VMs that have snapshots. I want to back these things up but the script doesn’t let me do it. How do I fix that?
11A: VM snapshots are not meant to be kept for long durations.  When backing up a VM that contains a snapshot, you should ensure all snapshots have been committed prior to running a backup. No exceptions  will be made…ever.

12Q: I would like to restore from backup, what is the best method?
12A: The restore process will be unique for each environment and  should be determined by your backup/recovery plans. At a high level you have the option of mounting the backup datastore and registering the VM  in question or copy the VM from the backup datastore to the ESX/ESXi  host. The latter is recommended so that you're not running a VM living  on the backup datastore or inadvertently modifying your backup VM(s). You can also take a look at ghettoVCB-restore which is experimentally supported.

13Q: When I try to run the script I get: "-bash: ./ghettoVCB.sh: Permission denied", what is wrong?
13A: You need to change the permission on the script to be executable, chmod +x ghettoVCB.sh

14Q: Where can I download the latest version of the script?
14A: The latest version is available on on github - https://github.com/lamw/ghettoVCB/downloads

15Q: I would like to suggest/recommend feature X, can I get it?  When can I get it? Why isn't it here, what gives?
15A: The general purpose of this script is to provide a backup  solution around VMware VMs. Any additional features outside of that  process will be taken into consideration depending on the amount of  time, number of requests and actual usefulness as a whole to the  community rather than to an individual.

16Q: I have found this script to be very useful and would like to contribute back, what can I do?
16A: To continue to develop and share new scripts and resources with the community, we need your support. You can donate here Thank You!

17Q: What are the different type of backup uses cases that are supported with ghettoVCB?
17A: 1) Live backup of VM with the use of a snapshot and 2)  Offline backup of a VM without a snapshot. These are the only two use  cases supported by the script.

18Q: When I execute the script on ESX(i) I get some funky errors such as ": not found.sh" or "command not found". What is this?
18A: Most likely you have some ^M characters within the script  which may have come from either editing the script using Windows editor,  uploading the script using the datastore browser OR using wget. The  best option is to either using WinSCP on Windows to upload the script  and edit using vi editor on ESX(i) host OR Linux/UNIX scp to copy the  script into the host. If you still continue to have the issue, do a  search online on various methods of removing this Windows return  carriage from the script

19Q: My backup works fine OR it works for a single backup but I get an error message  "Input/output error" or "-ash: YYYY-MM-DD: not found" during the snapshot removal process. What is this?
19A: The issue has been recently identified by few users as a problem with user's NFS server in which it reports an error when deleting large files that take longer than 10seconds. VMware has recently released a KB article http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1035332 explaining the details and starting with vSphere 4.1 Update 2 or vSphere 5.0, a new advanced ESX(i) parameter has been introduced to increase the timeout. This has resolved the problem for several users and maybe something to consider if you are running into this issue, specifically with NFS based backups.

20Q: Will this script function with vCenter and DRS enabled?
20Q: No, if the ESX(i) hosts are in a DRS enabled cluster, VMs  that are to be backed up could potentially be backed up twice or never  get backed up. The script is executed on a per host basis and one would  need to come up a way of tracking backups on all hosts and perhaps write  out to external file to ensure that all VMs are backed up. The main use  case for this script are for standalone ESX(i) host

21Q: I'm trying to use WinSCP to manually copy VM files but it's very slow or never completes on huge files, why is that?
21A: WinSCP was not designed for copying VM files out of your  ESX(i) host, take a look at Veeam's FastSCP which is designed for moving  VM files and is a free utility.

22Q: Can I use setup NFS Server using Windows Services for UNIX (WSFU) and will it work?
22A: I've only heard a handful of users that have successfully  implemented WSFU and got it working, YMMV. VMware also has a KB article  decribing the setup process here: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1004490 for those that are interested. Here is a thread on a user's experience between Windows Vs. Linux NFS that maybe helpful.

23Q: How do VMware Snapshots work?
23A: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1015180

24Q: What files make up a Virtual Machine?
24A: http://virtualisedreality.wordpress.com/2009/09/16/quick-reminder-of-what-files-make-up-a-virtual-ma...

25Q: I'm having some issues restoring a compressed VM backup?
25A: There is a limitation in the size of the VM for compression  under ESXi 3.x & 4.x, this limitation is in the unsupported Busybox  console and should not affect classic ESX 3.x/4.x. On ESXi 3.x,  the maximum largest supported VM is 4GB for compression and on ESXi 4.x  the largest supported VM is 8GB. If you try to compress a larger VM, you  may run into issues when trying to extract upon a restore. PLEASE TEST THE RESTORE PROCESS BEFORE MOVING TO PRODUCTION SYSTEMS!

26Q: I'm backing up my VM as "thin" format but I'm still not noticing any size reduction in the backup? What gives?
2bA: Please refer to this blog post which explains what's going on: http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2009/07/31/storage-vmotion-and-moving-to-a-thin-provisioned-disk/

27Q: I've enabled VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY and when I restore my VM it's still offline, I thought this would keep it's memory state?
27A: VM_SNAPSHOT_MEMORY is only used to ensure when the  snapshot is taken, it's memory contents are also captured. This is only  relavent to the actual snapshot itself and it's not used in any  shape/way/form in regards to the backup. All backups taken whether your  VM is running or offline will result in an offline VM backup when you  restore. This was originally added for debugging purposes and in  generally should be left disabled

28Q: Can I rename the directories and the VMs after a VM has been backed up?
28A: The answer yes, you can ... but you may run into all sorts  of issues which may break the backup process. The script expects a  certain layout and specific naming scheme for it to maintain the proper  rotation count. If you need to move or rename a VM, please take it out  of the directory and place it in another location

29Q: Can ghettoVCB support CBT (Change Block Tracking)?
29A: No, that is a functionality of the vSphere API + VDDK API (vSphere Disk Development Kit). You will need to look at paid solutions such as VMware vDR, Veeam Backup & Recovery, PHD Virtual Backups, etc. to leverage that functionailty.

30Q: Does ghettoVCB support rsync backups?
30A: Currently ghettoVCB does not support rsync backups, you either obtain or compile your own static rsync binary and run on ESXi, but this is an unsupported configuration. You may take a look at this blog post for some details.

31Q: How can I contribute back?

31A: You can provide feedback/comments on the ghettoVCB Group. If you have found this script to be useful and would like to contribute back, please click here to donate.

32Q: How can select individual VMDKs to backup from a VM?

32A: Ideally you would use the "-c" option which requires you to create individual VM configuration file, this is where you would select specific VMDKs to backup. Note, that if you do not need to define all properties, anything not defined will adhere from the default global properties whether you're editing the ghettoVCB.sh script or using ghettoVCB global configuration file. It is not recommended that you edit the ghettoVCB.sh script and modify the VMDK_FILES_TO_BACKUP variable, but if you would like to keep everything in one script, you may add the extensive list of VMDKs to backup but do know this can get error prone as script may be edited frequently and lose some flexibility to support multiple environments.

33Q: Why is email not working when I'm using ESXi 5.x but it worked in ESXi 4.x?

33A: ESXi 5.x has implemented a new firewall which requires the email port that is being used to be opened. Please refer to the following articles on creating a custom firewall rule for email:

http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2012/09/creating-custom-vibs-for-esxi-50-51.html

How to Create Custom Firewall Rules in ESXi 50

How to Persist Configuration Changes in ESXi 4.x/5.x Part 1

How to Persist Configuration Changes in ESXi 4.x/5.x Part 2

34Q: How do I stop the ghettoVCB process?

34A: Take a look at the Stopping ghettoVCB Process section of the documentation for more details.

Our NFS Server Configuration

Many have asked what is the best configuration and recommendation for  setting up a cheap NFS Server to run backups for VMs. This has been a  question we've tried to stay away from just because the possiblities and  solutions are endless. One can go with physical vs. virtual, use VSA  (Virtual Storage Appliances) such as OpenFiler or Lefthand Networks,  Windows vs. Linux/UNIX. We've not personally tested and verify all these  solutions and it all comes down to "it depends" type of answer. Though  from our experience, we've had much better success with a physical  server than a virtual.

It is also well known that some users are experiencing backup issues  when running specifically against NFS, primarily around the rotation and  purging of previous backups. The theory from what we can tell by  talking to various users is that when the rotation is occuring, the  request to delete the file(s) may take awhile and does not return within  a certain time frame and causes the script to error out with unexpected  messages. Though the backups were successful, it will cause unexpected  results with directory structures on the NFS target. We've not been able  to isolate why this is occuring and maybe due to NFS  configuration/exports or hardware or connection not being able to  support this process.

We'll continue to help where we can in diagonising this issus but we  wanted to share our current NFS configuration, perhaps it may help some  users who are new or trying to setup their system. ( Disclaimer: These configurations are not recommendations nor endorsement for any of the components being used)

UPDATE: Please also read FAQ #19 for details + resolution

Server Type: Physical
Model: HP DL320 G2
OS: Arch linux 2.6.28
Disks: 2 x 1.5TB
RAID: Software RAID1
Source Host Backups: ESX 3.5u4 and ESX 4.0u1 (We don't run any ESXi hosts)

uname -a output

Linux XXXXX.XXXXX.ucsb.edu 2.6.28-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Sun Jan 18 20:17:17 UTC 2009 i686 Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.06GHz GenuineIntel GNU/Linux

NICs:

00:05.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme BCM5702X Gigabit Ethernet (rev 02)
00:06.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme BCM5702X Gigabit Ethernet (rev 02)

NFS Export Options:

/exports/vm-backups XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX/24(rw,async,all_squash,anonuid=99,anongid=99)

*One important thing to check is to verify that your NFS exportion options are setup correctly, "async" should be configured to ensure that all IO requests are processed and  reply back to the client before waiting for the data to be written to  the storage.

*Recently VMware released a KB article describing the various "Advanced NFS Options" and their meanings and recommendations: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1007909 We've not personally had to touch any of these, but for other vendors  such as EMC and NetApp, there are some best practices around configuring  some of these values depending on the number of NFS volumes or number  of ESX(i) host connecting to a volume. You may want to take a look to  see if any of these options may help with NFS issue that some are seeing

*Users should also try to look at their ESX(i) host logs during the time  interval when they're noticing these issues and see if they can find  any correlation along with monitoring the performance on their NFS  Server.

*Lastly, there are probably other things that can be done to improve NFS  performance or further optimization, a simple search online will also  yield many resources.

Useful Links:

Windows utility to email ghettoVCB Backup Logs - http://www.waldrondigital.com/2010/05/11/ghettovcb-e-mail-rotate-logs-batch-file-for-vmware/
Windows front-end utility to ghettoVCB -  http://www.magikmon.com/mkbackup/ghettovcb.en.html

Note: Neither of these tools are supported, for questions or comments regarding these utilities please refer to the author's pages.

Change log:

01/13/13 -

Enhancements:

ghettoVCB & ghettoVCB-restore supports ESXi 5.1

Support for individual VM backup via command-line and added new -m flag

Support VM(s) with existing snapshots and added new configuration variable called ALLOW_VMS_WITH_SNAPSHOTS_TO_BE_BACKEDUP

Support multiple running instances of ghettoVCB running and added a new -w flag

Configure VM shutdown/startup order and added two new configuration variables called VM_SHUTDOWN_ORDER and VM_STARTUP_ORDER

Support changing custom VM name during restore

Documentation updates

Fixes:

Fixed tab/indentation for both ghettoVCB/ghettoVCB-restore

Temp email files and email headers

Fixed "whoami" command as it is no longer valid in ESXi 5.1 to check for proper user

Added 2gbsparse check in sanity method to auto-load VMkernel module

Various typos, for greater detail, you can refer to the "diff" in github repo

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

11/19/11 -

Enhancements:

ghettoVCB & ghettoVCB-restore is now packaged together and both scripts are versioned on github

ESXi 5 firewall check for email port (Check FAQ #33 for more details)

New EMAIL_DELAY_INTERVAL netcat variable to control slow SMTP servers

ADAPTER_TYPE (buslogic,lsilogic,ide) no longer need to manually specified, script will auto-detect based on VMDK descriptor file

Using symlink -f parameter for quicker unlink/re-link for RSYNC use case

Updated documentation, including NFS issues (Check FAQ #19 for more details including new VMware KB article)

Fixes:

vSphere 4.1 Update 2 introduced new vim-cmd snapshot.remove param, this has now been updated in script to detect this new param change

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

06/28/11 -

Enhancements:

Support for vSphere 5.0 - ESXi 5.0

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

05/22/11 -

Enhancements:

Support for multiple email recipients

Support for individual VMDK backup within ghettoVCB.sh script - FAQ #33

Fixes:

Minor fix in additional validation prior to VM rotation

03/14/11 -

Enhancements:

Enhanced "dryrun" details including configuration and/or VMDK(s) issues

Warning messages about physical RDM and Independent VMDK(s)

Warning messages about VMs with snapshots

New storage debugging details

Datastore details both pre and post backups

Datstore blocksize miss-match warnings

Quick email status summary is now included in the title of the email, this allows a user to quickly verify whether a backup was successful or had complete/partial failure without having to go through the logs.

Updated ghettoVCB documentation

ghettoVCB going forward will now be version tracked via github and previous releases will not be available for download

Fixes:

Updated absolute sym link path for RSYNC_LINK variable to relative path

Enhanced logging and details on warning/error messages

Big thanks to Alain Spineux and his contributions to the ghettoVCB script and helping with debugging and testing.

09/28/10 -

Enhancements:

Additional email support for Microsoft IIS and email debugging functionality (Experimental Support)

ghettoVCB PID is now captured in the logs

Rsync support, please take a look at the above documentation for Rsync Support (Experimental Support)

Fixes:

Fixed a few typos in the script

Trapping SIG 13

07/27/10 -

Enhancements:

Support for emailing backup logs (Experimental Support)

07/20/10 -

Enhancements:

Support for vSphere 4.1 (ESX and ESXi)

Additional logging information for debugging purposes

05/12/10 -

Enhancements:

Thanks to user Rodder who submitted a patch for a workaround  to handle the NFS I/O issue. The script will check to see if the return  code of the "rm" operation for VMs that are to be rotated. If the return  code has not returned right away, we may be running into the NFS I/O  issue, the script will not sleep and check perodically to see if NFS  volume is responsive and then continue to the next VM for backup.

Fixes:

Resolved the problem when trying to specify ghettoVCB global configuration file with the fullpath

05/11/10 -

Updated useful links to 2 utilties that were written by users for ghettoVCB

05/05/10 -

Fixes:

Resolved an issue where VMs with spaces were not being properly rotated. Thanks to user chrb for finding the bug

04/24/10 -

Enhancements:

Added the ability to include an exclusion list of VMs to not backup

Fixes:

Resolved persistent NFS configuration bug due to the addition of the global ghettoVCB conf

04/23/10 -

Fixes:

Resolved a bug in the VM naming directory which may not delete backups properly

04/20/10 -

Support for global ghettoVCB configuration file. Users no longer  need to edit main script and can use multiple configuration files based  on certain environment configurations

Ability to backup all VMs residing on a specific host w/o specifying VM list

Implemented simple locking mechenism to ensure only 1 instance of ghettoVCB is running per host

Updated backup directory structure - rsync friendly. All backup VM  directories will now have the format of "VMNAME-YYYY-MM-DD_HH_MM_SS"  which will not change once the backup has been completed. The script  will keep N-copies and purge older backups based on the configurations  set by the user.

Additional logging and final status output has been added to the  script to provide more useful error/warning messages and an additoinal  status will be printed out at the end of each backup to provide an  overall report

Big thanks goes out to the community for the suggested features and to those that submitted snippet of their modifications.

03/27/10 -

Updated FAQ #0-1 & #25-29 for common issues/questions.

For those experiencing NFS issue, please take a look at FAQ #29

Re-packaged ghettoVCB.sh script within a tarball (ghettoVCB.tar.gz)  to help assist those users having the "Windows affect" when trying to  execute the script

02/13/10 -

Updated FAQ #20-24 for common issues/questions.      Also included a new section about our "personal" NFS configuration and setup.

01/31/10 -

Fix the crontab section to reflect the correct syntax + updated FAQ #17,#18 and #19 for common issues.

11/17/09 -

The following enhancements and fixes have been implemented in this  release of ghettoVCB. Special thanks goes out to all the ghettoVCB BETA  testers for providing time and their environments to test features/fixes  of the new script!

Enhancements:

Individual VM backup policy

Include/exclude specific VMDK(s)

Logging to file

Timeout variables

Configur snapshot memory/quiesce

Adapter format

Additional logging + dryrun mode

Support for both physical/virtual RDMs

Fixes:

Independent disk awareE

Tags (20)

3.5

4.0

4.1

backup

esx3.5

esx4.1

esxi

esxi.40

esxi4

esxi4.1

esxi5

esxi5.0

esxi5_1

snapshot

vcb

vmkfstools

vsphere

vsphere4.1

vsphere5

vsphere5_1

Attachments

3_ghettoVCB4i.sh

7_ghettoVCB4i.sh

19_ghettoVCB.sh

ghettoVCB4i.sh

38_ghettoVCB.sh

16_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

11_ghettoVCB4i.sh

4_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

11_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

25_ghettoVCB4i.sh

9_ghettoVCBni.sh

37_ghettoVCB4i.sh

2_ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

12_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

10_ghettoVCB4i.sh

36_ghettoVCB4i.sh

1_ghettoVCBni.sh

14_ghettoVCB.sh

17_ghettoVCB4i.sh

28_ghettoVCB4i.sh

37_ghettoVCB.sh

1_example_virtual_machine_backup_list

1_ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

12_ghettoVCB.sh

20_ghettoVCB.sh

36_ghettoVCB.sh

31_ghettoVCB.sh

35_ghettoVCB4i.sh

7_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

21_ghettoVCB4i.sh

45_ghettoVCB.sh

example_virtual_machine_backup_list

26_ghettoVCB4i.sh

15_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

6_ghettoVCBni.sh

6_ghettoVCB.sh

10_ghettoVCB.sh

23_ghettoVCB4i.sh

30_ghettoVCB4i.sh

14_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

2_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

1_ghettoVCB4i.sh

16_ghettoVCB.sh

30_ghettoVCB.sh

18_ghettoVCB.sh

19_ghettoVCB4i.sh

43_ghettoVCB.sh

ghettoVCBni.sh

22_ghettoVCB4i.sh

ghettoVCB-vm_backup_configuration_template

4_ghettoVCB4i.sh

3_ghettoVCB.sh

40_ghettoVCB4i.sh

5_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

11_ghettoVCBni.sh

16_ghettoVCB4i.sh

ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

40_ghettoVCB.sh

14_ghettoVCB4i.sh

23_ghettoVCB.sh

ghettoVCB4i-previous.sh

2_ghettoVCBni.sh

32_ghettoVCB.sh

9_ghettoVCB.sh

8_ghettoVCBni.sh

3_ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

13_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

47_ghettoVCB.sh

38_ghettoVCB4i.sh

5_ghettoVCBni.sh

5_ghettoVCB.sh

10_ghettoVCBni.sh

3_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

46_ghettoVCB.sh

32_ghettoVCB4i.sh

4_ghettoVCB.sh

18_ghettoVCB4i.sh

8_ghettoVCB.sh

34_ghettoVCB.sh

8_ghettoVCB4i.sh

9_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

22_ghettoVCB.sh

25_ghettoVCB.sh

39_ghettoVCB4i.sh

1_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

39_ghettoVCB.sh

27_ghettoVCB4i.sh

ghettoVCB.sh

13_ghettoVCB4i.sh

20_ghettoVCB4i.sh

41_ghettoVCB.sh

24_ghettoVCB.sh

21_ghettoVCB.sh

11_ghettoVCB.sh

7_ghettoVCBni.sh

29_ghettoVCB.sh

8_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

29_ghettoVCB4i.sh

10_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

13_ghettoVCB.sh

2_ghettoVCB4i.sh

2_ghettoVCB.sh

6_ghettoVCB4i.sh

17_ghettoVCB.sh

7_ghettoVCB.sh

5_ghettoVCB4i.sh

15_ghettoVCB4i.sh

9_ghettoVCB4i.sh

6_ghettoVCB.tar.gz

15_ghettoVCB.sh

34_ghettoVCB4i.sh

31_ghettoVCB4i.sh

ghettoVCB.tar.gz

33_ghettoVCB.sh

4_ghettoVCBni.sh

42_ghettoVCB.sh

35_ghettoVCB.sh

1_ghettoVCB.sh

44_ghettoVCB.sh

24_ghettoVCB4i.sh

28_ghettoVCB.sh

ghettoVCB-previous.sh

41_ghettoVCB4i.sh

27_ghettoVCB.sh

12_ghettoVCB4i.sh

26_ghettoVCB.sh

33_ghettoVCB4i.sh

3_ghettoVCBni.sh

12

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Comments

Shaveht

‎12-17-2008

10:16 AM

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‎12-17-2008

10:16 AM

How can i edit it to run on VIMA?

lamw

‎12-19-2008

08:59 AM

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‎12-19-2008

08:59 AM

Forgot to mention, you can also find more scripts/resources located at:

http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

lamw

‎12-19-2008

09:08 AM

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‎12-19-2008

09:08 AM

Hi Shaveht,

This script can not be locally executed on VMware VIMA, but can be remotely kicked off from VIMA or any other UNIX/Linux, even a Windows host using plink.

The process is as follows:

You store the "ghettoVCB.sh" on shared storage (FC/iSCSI SAN / NFS), including the list of Virtual Machines you would like to backup. You can then create a cron entry that will kick off the backup process say every Friday at 12am. To ensure this does not require a user to enter a password, you'll need to utilize public/private SSH Key Authentication. This would then ssh into the ESX/ESXi host(s) and execute this script passing in the list which is also stored on the shared storage and the backup process would be kicked off.

This allows you to centralize your backup process without having to create separate cron entries on each of the ESX and ESXi hosts and storing a copy on each system. This does add an additional system to the process and if you know this VIMA host will always be accessible to the ESX/ESXi cluster, you should be fine.

An entry to the cron for the command would look like the following:

ssh [email-masked] "/vmfs/volumes/SOME_DATASTORE/ghettoVCB.sh /vmfs/volumes/SOME_ADMIN_DATASTORE/virtual_machine_backup_list"

Again, you would just create a cron entry for the set of ESX/ESXi hosts and ensure that the datastore that contains the backup script and backup list are presented and visiable to all hosts. This also includes the datastore that is used to backup all the VMs are also visible/presented to all hosts

Hopefully this cleared up some of your questions and good luck

Shaveht

‎12-29-2008

12:35 AM

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‎12-29-2008

12:35 AM

Hi lamw,

Thanks for the explanation.

in effect i was confused about how to use it.

thanks again.

dan82

‎01-09-2009

06:43 PM

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‎01-09-2009

06:43 PM

Hi,

I have 7 blade servers with approx 50 VM's, is it possible to run this script from just one esxi host and have it back up all the VM's that are running on it locally and also the VM's running on the other blades?

lamw

‎01-10-2009

10:53 PM

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‎01-10-2009

10:53 PM

Take a look at the my previous comment. I would not suggest setting this up on an ESXi host, probably an administrative linux/windows or even VIMA host.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

tuxfan2183

‎01-14-2009

03:51 PM

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‎01-14-2009

03:51 PM

Nice script and Thanks for the same. The backup runs fine after few issues being faced in the start. I have the following queries.

1. Is there a way I can backup the vm's without shutting them down?

2. What is the ideal restore procedure? (assuming Its going to be a disk-to-disk restoration.)

Thanks

tux

lamw

‎01-14-2009

04:05 PM

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‎01-14-2009

04:05 PM

Hi tuxfan2183,

1) The power down feature was recently added, if you want to backup your VM(s) while they're live, just ensure the flag "POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP" is set to 0=no, 1=yes. By default this option is set to 0 which is to backup while the VM is running

2) There are multitude of options, depending where and how the backups are being stored and what your backup scenario requires. You can either mount the backup datastore and register the VM either by browsing the VI Client datastore or manually using CLI tool like "vmware-cmd -s register" or "vim-cmd" for ESXi. If you do not want to directly mount your backup but rather restore back to your source ESX/ESXi host, you can just manually run "vmkfstools" copy from your backup datastore to your source datastore and then register your VM. Again, this will be environment specific, but those are your options and this can be easily scripted or done manually as this is a backup process which requires additional care.

Hope this answered your questions.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

tuxfan2183

‎01-14-2009

04:10 PM

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‎01-14-2009

04:10 PM

Thanks william. You are the best

nappyrat

‎01-21-2009

06:57 PM

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‎01-21-2009

06:57 PM

does this only back up 1 vmdk file per virtual machine? I ran it and it backed up teh vmdk of a vm i have but not another vmdk that is in the same directory

lamw

‎01-21-2009

07:43 PM

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‎01-21-2009

07:43 PM

No, it should backup all "valid" VMDK(s) that is associated with a VM. Yon can verify this by going into the VM's "edit virtual machine settings" and ensure that all disks are listed within the hardware tab.

When you use the VIC to delete a disk and selecting the option "Remove from virtual machine", this will only remove the disk from being accessible to the VM, but the actual disk will still be located on the datastore and within the .vmx file, the disk will have a present value of "false". If you want to truly delete the VM's disk, you need to select the other option, so be sure before doing so.

Let me know if you have any other questions

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

tuxfan2183

‎01-21-2009

08:09 PM

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‎01-21-2009

08:09 PM

There are certain things which I as a user thought could add more value to this script. When taking backup to compress and store the backup in a compressed format in the remote location. makes sense?

lamw

‎01-21-2009

08:12 PM

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‎01-21-2009

08:12 PM

That is a good suggestion, but unfortunately there are many options in terms of compression format/type/etc and I would leave that to the end user to implement if required.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

alubel

‎01-21-2009

08:27 PM

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‎01-21-2009

08:27 PM

Why dont you try to setup a solaris 10 or opensolaris box and use a compressed ZFS file system via NFS to ESXi host?

Its extremely easy - and no expensive hardware required.

nappyrat

‎01-21-2009

08:52 PM

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‎01-21-2009

08:52 PM

i found the problem. here is the 2nd disk in the .vmx file. I can almost guaruntee you this wasn't modified by hand because I don't think the person who created it has no idea how to.

scsi0:1.filename = "datastore_1.vmdk"

the line in your script that finds the disks is

VMDKS=`grep scsi "$" | grep fileName | awk -F "\"" '{print $2}'`

it's a case issue. maybe that should be changed to a "grep -i fileName"

lamw

‎01-21-2009

09:47 PM

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‎01-21-2009

09:47 PM

Yea it should be -i, but from the various .vmx file I've viewed in the past for both 3.0 and 3.5 it's always been "fileName". What version of ESX are you running btw? This is the first I've heard of this issue

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

nappyrat

‎01-22-2009

03:31 AM

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‎01-22-2009

03:31 AM

esx server 3i 3.5.0 build 123629

i just reproduced this by adding a second hard disk with VIC to the virtual machine and it puts it in the vmx with filename not fileName

Thomas_BRETON

‎01-22-2009

06:54 AM

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‎01-22-2009

06:54 AM

Hello,

I'm trying your script.

Thanks for your work.

Just a question relative to performance.

In fact i was using vcbMounter on a local datastore and on an nfs server.

Backup time for the same machine:

with vcbmount on local datastore: 7 min

with vcbmount on NFS: 13 min

With your script on local datastore: 5 min

With your script on NFS: 180 min

Have you got an explanation for this or any clue?

Regards

Tom

nappyrat

‎01-22-2009

07:09 AM

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‎01-22-2009

07:09 AM

my first run of this script was really slow over nfs too, around 25GB per hour. i blamed that on my cheap nas device.

i don't know what vcbmounter is, but does it copy with a straight copy or does it do a clone disk like this script does?

lamw

‎01-22-2009

08:34 AM

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‎01-22-2009

08:34 AM

I'm not familiar with the vcbMounter tool, YMMV with different environments and I've seen various postings about the different performance with NFS and it all depends on your configuration and the type of NFS server you're running. It should not differ with over 100+min so I'm not exactly sure what type of VM you're backing up/etc. Does this occur on all VM(s) or just this one?

Also and FYI, the VMware VCB tools that come installed by default on the ESX host are only available with the version of ESX w/Service Console, this is not part of the ESXi releaese.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

lamw

‎01-22-2009

08:35 AM

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‎01-22-2009

08:35 AM

Interesting, perhaps this is only with ESXi. I'll double check with my ESXi 3.5u3 and see if this is also the case, if so I'm surprised this is the first time it's been caught. I know there's quite a few people using this script on unlicensed version of ESXi. Thanks for the info

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

11:04 AM

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‎01-22-2009

11:04 AM

when I run the command sh ./ghetto.sh vm_list from path / vmfs/volumes/datastore1/ of esxi 3.5 returns the following error:

. / ghetto.sh:. / ghetto.sh: 76: Syntax error: word unexpected (expecting "do").

What could be the problem?

Thank you.

lamw

‎01-22-2009

11:27 AM

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‎01-22-2009

11:27 AM

I'm not exactly sure what the issue could be. I suggest re-downloading the script and ensure the script has been set to execute. If you download to a Windows system, you might have some ^M characters if you tried to edit prior to executing on ESX/ESXi host. Make sure you edit it on the host themselves to ensure you don't run into this issue.

You can always run:

sh -x ghetto.sh vm_list

and see what might be causing the issue.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

11:49 AM

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‎01-22-2009

11:49 AM

Thanks for your answer, the script has been set to execute and the file has been downloaded and modified with ubuntu desktop.

This is the result of the command:

/vmfs/volumes/4975d95d-45fc3458-7ff4-001b212e4341 # sh -x ghetto.sh vm_list

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 6:

+ VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/datastore2/backupvm/

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 9:

+ ENABLE_2GB_SPARSE=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 12:

+ VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 15:

+ date +%F

+ VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION=2009-01-22

: not foundghetto.sh: 17:

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 18:

+ POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 23:

+ ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 26:

+ ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=4

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 31:

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 36:

+ ENABLE_NON_PERSISTENT_NFS=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 38:

+ UNMOUNT_NFS=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 41:

+ NFS_SERVER=172.30.0.195

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 44:

+ NFS_MOUNT=/nfsshare

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 47:

+ NFS_LOCAL_NAME=nfs_storage_backup

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 50:

+ NFS_VM_BACKUP_DIR=mybackups

: not foundghetto.sh: 52:

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 53:

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 55:

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 57:

+ DEVEL_MODE=0

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 59:

+ basename ghetto.sh

+ SCRIPT_PATH=ghetto.sh

\n ghetto.sh

+ exit

: not foundghetto.sh: 63: exit

+ }

: not foundghetto.sh: 64: }

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 65:

+ local BACKUP_DIR_PATH=vm_list

+ local BACKUP_VM_NAMING_CONVENTION=

+ ls -tr vm_list

: No such file or directory

+ LIST_BACKUPS=

+

: not foundghetto.sh: 70:

ghetto.sh: ghetto.sh: 76: Syntax error: word unexpected (expecting "do")

/vmfs/volumes/4975d95d-45fc3458-7ff4-001b212e4341 # sh -x ./ghetto.sh vm_list

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 6:

+ VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/datastore2/backupvm/

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 9:

+ ENABLE_2GB_SPARSE=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 12:

+ VM_BACKUP_ROTATION_COUNT=3

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 15:

+ date +%F

+ VM_BACKUP_DIR_NAMING_CONVENTION=2009-01-22

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 17:

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 18:

+ POWER_VM_DOWN_BEFORE_BACKUP=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 23:

+ ENABLE_HARD_POWER_OFF=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 26:

+ ITER_TO_WAIT_SHUTDOWN=4

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 31:

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 36:

+ ENABLE_NON_PERSISTENT_NFS=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 38:

+ UNMOUNT_NFS=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 41:

+ NFS_SERVER=172.30.0.195

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 44:

+ NFS_MOUNT=/nfsshare

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 47:

+ NFS_LOCAL_NAME=nfs_storage_backup

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 50:

+ NFS_VM_BACKUP_DIR=mybackups

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 52:

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 53:

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 55:

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 57:

+ DEVEL_MODE=0

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 59:

+ basename ./ghetto.sh

+ SCRIPT_PATH=ghetto.sh

\n ghetto.sh

+ exit

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 63: exit

+ }

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 64: }

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 65:

+ local BACKUP_DIR_PATH=vm_list

+ local BACKUP_VM_NAMING_CONVENTION=

+ ls -tr vm_list

: No such file or directory

+ LIST_BACKUPS=

+

: not found: ./ghetto.sh: 70:

./ghetto.sh: ./ghetto.sh: 76: Syntax error: word unexpected (expecting "do")

/vmfs/volumes/4975d95d-45fc3458-7ff4-001b212e4341 #

lamw

‎01-22-2009

11:56 AM

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‎01-22-2009

11:56 AM

It's kind of hard to tell what's going on with the output. What system are you running this on? Which version of the script did you download? Can you also list the contents of your vm_list

Can you also try the following:

Change

VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/datastore2/backupvm/

to

VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/datastore2/backupvm

If that still yields the same results, can you also find the variable DEVEL_MODE and change that from 0 to 1 and see if the script progresses farther or continues to error out.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

nappyrat

‎01-22-2009

12:01 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:01 PM

also, you didn't remove the first line with #!/bin/bash did you? or you're not using some wierd shell are you?

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

12:15 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:15 PM

I downloaded version ghettoVCB-enhance.sh. The contents of the list is as follows:

windows xp

ubuntu server 32bit

this change VM_BACKUP_VOLUME=/vmfs/volumes/datastore2/backupvm had no effect.

Aalso the change of value DEVEL_MOdE variable had no effect.

lamw

‎01-22-2009

12:20 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:20 PM

Are you running this on ESX or ESXi? I also noticed you're executing this script on one of your datastores, it should not matter but can you try to move the script to another location, perhaps /root. I just downloaded both scripts and they executed fine using the default and just modifying the backup path, the issue seems to be in your environment but I'm not sure what might be causing this issue.

Could you also run the following on the shell:

echo $SHELL

vmware -v

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

12:24 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:24 PM

I have not touched the first line of the script and the shell I use is integrated into the system vmware ESXi 3.5.I try to move the script in the root.

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

12:32 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:32 PM

The command echo $SHELL returns:/bin/ash

The command vmware -v returns:VMware ESX Server 3i 3.5.0 build-123629

Moving the file in the root me back the message: Operation not permitted

lamw

‎01-22-2009

12:38 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:38 PM

Okay so looks like you're running the the latest ESXi 3.5u3, which is the same release I just finished testing as well and I don't see any issues. Since you're running on ESXi, there will not be a directory /root, just /.

It's going to get pretty difficult to troubleshoot exactly what the issue is, for some reason the system isn't liking the script. If you understand what the script is doing or have some scripting experience, you can setup some basic echo statements and see exactly where the script stops execution. From the looks of it, it seems to get through all the user defined variables but halts right before the actual code starts. If you can narrow down on the junk of code that it fails on, perhaps I can assist you further.

Also, your two VM(s) have the following displayName?

windows xp

ubuntu server 32bit

Actually locate the following line and change that from

# DO NOT MODIFY PAST THIS LINE #

to

exit

# DO NOT MODIFY PAST THIS LINE #

I'm wondering if the issue is after the variable declaration or after.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

Thomas_BRETON

‎01-22-2009

12:53 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:53 PM

Hello,

I don't know really the difference between vcbmount and snapshots.

I know that vcbmount work on vmdk files to compact them.

The NFS server is a FreeNAS on a 2x3Ghz xeon with one disk of 300Gb 15K U320.

I'm using ESX 3.5.

I don't think it's related to nfs configuration or server performance because for the same vm and for the same nfs server the vcbmount take 13 min and your script take 180 min

And yes it's the same problem for all machines

I'm still investigating on this

Regards

Tom

RENATOG123

‎01-22-2009

12:58 PM

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‎01-22-2009

12:58 PM

Can you tell me what variables need to be changed (other than NFS_SERVER and VM_BACKUP_DIR) in order for this script to work?

Also, how can I create a script that will initiate a snapshot of each VM, store them in the NFS (for daily backups) and another script that will do a full backup of each VM?

We are using ESXi 3.5u3

Thanks

lamw

‎01-22-2009

01:00 PM

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‎01-22-2009

01:00 PM

Please take a look at the documentation for your questions, it should answer majority of them.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

01:00 PM

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‎01-22-2009

01:00 PM

I am not an expert in scripting and general Linux environment, I am a beginner.

Yes, my two VM(s) have that name.

Also by entering the command exit the error is always in the same line in the script

lamw

‎01-22-2009

01:11 PM

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‎01-22-2009

01:11 PM

The "exit' you inserted, allowed me to see where the issue is occuring. It's telling to the script to basically exit once it hits that line. This means the error is caused during the variable declaration section before it even starts to execute.

This brings me to believe the file may have some additional characters that may not be part of the original script/etc, perhaps characters from a Windows system. Did you download this from your Ubuntu box and scp the script to your ESXi host?

Can you run the following:

wc -l ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

wc -c ghettoVCB-enhance.sh

Also can you paste the variables you've modified from the default script and please format the output using the following tags {quote} ...your output... {quote}, it makes it easier for me to read and try to troubleshoot

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

RENATOG123

‎01-22-2009

01:11 PM

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‎01-22-2009

01:11 PM

I'm sorry, can you provide a link for the documentation?

Thanks

lamw

‎01-22-2009

01:17 PM

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‎01-22-2009

01:17 PM

If you're posting in this section of the forum, you're already looking at the documentation. Please go over the instructions carefully, I do ask that new users read through the documentation before posting a question as you can answer most of your questions this way. You'll see that both your use cases can be solved by using this script and may require slight modifications, again this script is intended to help backup VM(s) that may reside on ESX/ESXi 3.5+. This script will not cover all processes/requirements for a backup or recovery scenario, I leave it to the discretion of the end user to understand what this script is doing and making modifications that fit your operating environment and needs.

You're welcome to post follow-up questions if you're still unsure of how the script operates or question about the functionality of the script. Hope this helps

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

apignoloni

‎01-22-2009

02:04 PM

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‎01-22-2009

02:04 PM

Problem solved: the file ghettoVCB-enhance.sh downloaded from the link higher contains the end of each line the notorious ^M, while the other file ghettoVCB.sh is clean

Thanks to all.

nappyrat

‎01-22-2009

02:47 PM

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‎01-22-2009

02:47 PM

William,

I was wondering if you could recommend teh best way for recovering a vm from a backup like this. Like say your esxi server blew up one day and you put a brand new one in it's place and hooked it up to the nas you had bacccked up your vms to.

most of hte instructions out there involve manually creating a vm in vic like the one you used to have, deleting it's hard drive, cloning the backup disk into your vm dir with vmkfstools -i and then adding it to your virtual machine.

since all the vm information is stored in a .vmx it seems like it should be easier to restore a vm, is it just that there aren't vm creation tools at the command line that can be used?

lamw

‎01-22-2009

03:16 PM

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‎01-22-2009

03:16 PM

There are many scenarios in terms of recovery and this really depends on your requirements/environment. If you look at the simplest case where you have a new ESX/ESXi host and you present the NFS datastore which contains the backup VM(s) to the host. All you really need to do is just browse the datastore using the VIC and click into each of your VM(s) and right click and add to inventory. You should see your VM registered to the host and you can power them VM on. This assumes that want your recovered VM(s) running on your backup datastore, it's probably best to definitely copy the VM to your new host, register and power on. Going off of that, yes you'll need to copy the .vmx and copy the VMDK(s) associated with that VM and you should be using vmfkstools -i as you've suggested. Again once you understand this process manually, it's relatively easy to automate and script this process. Again, this process will vary from user to user and based on your requirements, you'll come up with a solution hat fits your environment.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

nappyrat

‎01-22-2009

03:28 PM

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‎01-22-2009

03:28 PM

gotcha, thanks again for your work!

apignoloni

‎01-23-2009

06:38 AM

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‎01-23-2009

06:38 AM

Good morning,

I created the script backupvm in /usr/local/bin running:

#!/bin/sh

ssh [email-masked] "sh /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/ghettoVCB.sh /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/vm_list"

#invio promemoria

echo backup vm posmailbe del `date ‘+%d-%B-%Y’`|mail -s “backup vm posmailbe” \ [email-masked]

I also assigned the permission of execution.

I changed the file cron as follows:

americo@ubuntuserver32:/usr/local/bin$ sudo crontab -l

m h dom mon dow command

15 15 * * * /usr/local/bin/backup_vm

but at the established nothing happens. The commands are formally correct?

Thank you

lamw

‎01-23-2009

07:31 AM

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‎01-23-2009

07:31 AM

When setting up a cron entry, make sure the paths to all the commands use are the fullpath.

Please take a look at this thread to ensure they are: http://communities.vmware.com/message/1151164#1151164

I believe the vmkfstools is not being passed in my script as the full path, so you'll probably have to fix at least that command.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

ollivetti

‎01-26-2009

10:37 AM

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‎01-26-2009

10:37 AM

Hello, I have a question: Is it possible to backup additional added disks too? We have the OS on disk1 and the files on disk2. Does this backupscript support this. I could not find anything and tying it only made a backup of disk1.

Another thing I would like to ask is if you know any troubles using this script wiht ESX Version 3.02.

Thank you very much - also for the hard work writing this script!

Regards

lamw

‎01-26-2009

10:38 AM

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‎01-26-2009

10:38 AM

Yes, please download the latest script ghettoVCB-enhance.sh which will backup all valid VMDK(s) presented to the VM. This was added awhile back but I guess I must have forgotten to update the doc. I'll make sure I do that tonight and also remove the old instance of the script.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

ollivetti

‎01-26-2009

11:13 AM

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‎01-26-2009

11:13 AM

I just read in the comments about the grep -i fileName change...It now works ...

That's really great work you've done! Respect!

Thank you

ollivetti

‎01-26-2009

11:48 PM

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‎01-26-2009

11:48 PM

Sorry one more stupid question - does it also work on ESX3.02? I see the note "You*'re not running ESX 3.5+ ....

Or are there known issues using the script with 3.02.

Thank you!

lamw

‎01-27-2009

07:24 AM

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‎01-27-2009

07:24 AM

Hi ollivetti,

Sorry, this script only supports ESX 3.5, the requirement is stated in the title and also noted in the body of the document. This was intentional since majority of the users were also using this on ESXi and the only common toolset between ESXi and ESX is vimsh. You probably can slightly modify it to support older version of ESX, as vimsh does exists going back to 3.0, but I have not tested that far back. You can uncomment the section of the code that blocks it from executing if you're not running either ESXi or ESX 3.5.

=========================================================================

--William

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at: http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

RENATOG123

‎01-27-2009

01:21 PM

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‎01-27-2009

01:21 PM

lamw,

I was finally able to get the NFS setup working with WSFU (in case anyone's pulling their hairs out, make that when you configure User Name Mapping, you map the LOCAL ADMIN account (not a domain admin) to "root")

I tested with a live running VIMA and it did a full backup of the VM.

I want to modify the script to do regular snapshots, not clone snapshots. Where/What do I have to change on the ghettoVCB-enhanced.sh script?

Thanks

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