ActiveImage Protector 2018 Update
for CLUSTERPRO

Backup and Recovery Guide
4th Edition － September 25, 2020
This guide provides description about the installation and operating proceduresof ActiveImage Protector 2018 Update for CLUSTERPRO (hereinafter “AIP”) in
CLUSTERPRO cluster environment.
CLUSTERPRO is designed for two-node cluster, one for active server and theother for passive server.
For more detailed procedures, please refer to AIP Help and CLUSTERPRO User
Guide.
Copyright Actiphy, Inc. All rights reserved.
The software and the related documentation are proprietary products ofActiphy, Inc., and are copyrighted to the company.
ActiveImage Protector, ActiveImage Protector Server, ActiveImage Protector
Desktop, ActiveImage Protector IT Pro, ActiveImage Protector for Hyper-V with
SHR, ActiveImage Protector for Hyper-V Enterprise, ReZoom, ActiveImage
Protector Linux, ActiveImage Protector Virtual, ActiveImage Protector Cluster,
ActiveImage Protector Cloud, ActiveImage Protector Basic, ImageBoot andImageCenter LE are trademarks of Actiphy, Inc.
CLUSTERPRO is registered trademark of NEC Corporation.
Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.
Windows Preinstallation Environment and Windows PE are trademarks ofMicrosoft Corporation.

Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPRO

Revision History

Edition

Revised on

1st Edition

9/26/2018

2nd Edition

4/23/201931-38

3rd Edition

6/29/2020

1, 4, footer

4th Edition

9/25/2020

8, 12, 15, 20, 26

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Revised page

Description
First Edition
Changes made corresponding to the user guidefor CLUSTERPRO X4.1
Corrections according to the company namechangeAdded and changed descriptions.

2Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPROCONTENTS
Revision History .............................................................................................................................................................. 2
CONTENTS .......................................................................................................................................................................... 3
Introduction ....................................................................................................................................................................... 4
1.

Configuration Example .................................................................................................................................... 52.

Before Backing up CLUSTERPRO ............................................................................................................ 6

3.

AIP Backup Feature ........................................................................................................................................... 7
3.1 Backup Feature ................................................................................................................................................ 7
3.2 Backup Operating Procedures .............................................................................................................. 8
3.3 Check backup task behavior ................................................................................................................ 11

4.

Recovery Operating Procedures ............................................................................................................ 13
4.1 System Recovery Procedures --- AIPBE Linux-based boot environment --.............................................................................................................................................................................................. 13
4.2 System Recovery Procedures --- AIPBE Windows PE-based bootenvironment ............................................................................................................................................................... 19
4.3 Data Partition Recovery Procedures .............................................................................................. 24

Appendix 1 Script to stop application service ....................................................................................... 29
Appendix 2 Restore clustered data partition ......................................................................................... 31
Appendix 3 Reconfiguration of Servers ..................................................................................................... 36

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Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPROIntroduction
This document is subject to change without prior notice.
No part of this document may be reproduced, altered or translated by any means without priorpermission from Actiphy.
This document is not officially provided by NEC Corporation. Any information included in thisdocument is provided solely on informational purposes and Actiphy shall not be liable for technicalor editorial errors or omissions contained herein.
This document provides general descriptions for standard settings to use CLUSTERPRO andActiveImage Protector that may not be applicable to a specific system environment or operation.
You will be solely responsible for the installation, the use, the operation of the product in yourcustomer’s system environment.
This document is intended for the system engineers who are engaged in an effort to design andintroduce a new system or the system administrators and maintenance staff who are engaged
in maintenance and operational management of the existing system.
The readers of this document are supposed to have specialized expertise about Windows Server
operating system and computer literacy.
This document provides the minimum of the required information for the operation of ActiveImage
Protector and CLUSTERPRO. For more detailed information about the operating procedures, pleaserefer to the manuals for the respective products.
The screen images included in this document provide only examples of the settings but
may differ from the actual appearance.

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1. Configuration Example
This user guide provides backup and recovery procedures based on the following system
environment.
Configuration Example
ServerSRV1

SRV2

Public Network IP Address

192.168.0.41

192.168.0.42

Mirror Network IP Address

172.16.0.41

172.16.0.42

Heartbeat Redundant Network IP

192.168.10.41

192.168.10.42

Data Partition (Mirror Drive)

E Drive

E Drive

Cluster Partition

Q Drive

Q Drive

Address

The following recovery procedures are described assuming that the system failure occurs on SRV 1, failover
to SRV 2 takes place, restore of SRV 1 and cluster configuration is performed.
The operating procedures are provided by using ActiveImage Protector (hereinafter “AIP”).

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2. Before Backing up CLUSTERPRO
Before you start backing up CLUSTERPRO cluster environment, please note that the data partition
on passive server is RAW (file system) that cannot be backed up.
For example, suppose that SRV1 is configured as the active server and SRV2 as the passive
server. Because the data partition on the passive server is RAW partition, the use of Explorer does
not allow you to browse in the data partition.

Referring to the above disk management window, the drive letters and file system information aredisplayed for the active server. On the other hand, because the data partitions on the passive
server are RAW partitions, you are not allowed to monitor the status.
Therefore, the sector information of the drive is not readable on the passive server and backup is
not allowed.
The use of AIP’s Backup feature by enabling [Ignore inaccessible volumes] option that prevents
backup task interruptions when an inaccessible volume is encountered and allows the backup task
to be completed.

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3. AIP Backup Feature
3.1 Backup Feature
Please install AIP on both active and passive servers.
For more detailed AIP installation procedures, please refer to [Install and Start ActiveImage
Protector] in AIP Help.
If cluster environment is already configured by using CLUSTERPRO, the data partition must beplaced online to read the drive information. To run AIP backup task or to create a schedule,
please make sure that the data partition is placed online.
*For the detailed operating procedures, please refer to ActiveImage Protector or CLUSTERPRO
User Manual.
Summary of Operating Procedures(1) Create a schedule on the active server(2) Manually perform failover(3) Create a schedule on the active server after switchover as a result of failover(4) Manually perform failover and restore the active server back to the active nodeCreate Backup ScheduleOnce a schedule is created while the data partition is readable, backup task normally runs on
passive server.

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3.2 Backup Operating Procedures
1. Go to [Backup] – [Schedule Backup] in AIP menu to launch Backup wizard.

When backing up the system in uEFI environment, please back up uEFI system volume as well as
the Windows system volume since uEFI system volume has to be restored before restoring
Windows system volume.
You are recommended to back up the entire uEFI system disk, so that the backup image of theentire disk will be restored.
Also, please remember to back up the cluster partition together with mirror disk by selecting[Entire Disk].

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2. Select Destination

Please make sure that [Designate a separate image file set per disk] option is enabled.
3. Image Option

Click [Advanced Options] at the upper right corner in the right pane.

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4. Advanced Backup Options

Enable [Ignore inaccessible volumes] option (enabled by default). If non-VSS-compliant
application or database is up and running, please use Scripting feature to stop the service or aprocess before taking a snapshot.
5. Schedule Settings

Configure the schedule settings depending on your system environment.
For more detailed operating procedures, please refer to [Backup] – [Create Backup Schedule]in AIP Help.
6. Create Backup Schedule on Passive Server
Manually perform failover and create backup schedule on passive server.
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3.3 Check backup task behavior
Run Full (Base) Backup according to the schedule configured for the both servers and makesure that the tasks successfully completed.
Upon completion of the backup task, you can monitor the task log from AIP Console.
Backup Event on Active Server

You can make sure that backup images are created and “Success” is displayed for active
server.

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Backup Event on Passive ServerOn the passive server, though you cannot browse in data partition, “Success” is indicated.
If a backup image of the mirror drive of passive server is not created yet, execution of the first
backup task creates a full backup file. When other disks (volumes) such as the system disk areincluded in backup source, a full backup image file will be created instead of an incremental
backup.

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4. Recovery Operating Procedures
Take the following are the steps to restore CLUSTERPRO cluster environment.
Restore the system from backup file.



Restore the mirror drive from backup file

CLUSTERPRO Recovery Approaches
Recovery Approach

Requirements

Restore the system

AIP backup image of the system is created.

Restore data in mirror drive

AIP backup image is created.

4.1 System Recovery Procedures --- AIPBE Linux-based boot environment --To restore the system, you need to boot your machine into AIP boot environment (by using AIP’s
media) while the OS is shut down. If the OS is up and running, please shut down the OS and bootup AIP boot environment.
*For more detailed operating procedures, please refer to ActiveImage Protector User Guide.
1.

Boot up AIP boot environment

Boot up AIP Boot Environment by using AIP media.

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2.

Go to [Recovery] – [Volume Recovery].

Select an image file to restore.

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3.

Restore Settings

Drag and drop the source object to the restore target disk.
If the source object disk includes the system only, please select the entire disk. If the disk
includes the system volume as well as data partition, please select the system volume in the
disk. (Please do not restore the cluster partition.)

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4.

Summary

Please review the summary and make sure that no changes are required. Click [Done] button
to start recovery process.
5.

Reboot boot environment.
Upon successful completion of the restore task, exit AIP boot environment and reboot thesystem again.
This is the end of the recovery operating procedures with AIP. Please find theoperating procedures with CLUSTERPRO as follows.

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6.

Recovery of CLUSTERPRO cluster environment
When the restored OS completely boots up, CLUSTERPRO Console status is displayed asfollows.
Restore status of one server OS

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Status after differential data synchronization between two servers

Upon completion of differential data synchronization, the status is indicated in green. The
difference copy log is recorded for the alert log.

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4.2 System Recovery Procedures --- AIPBE Windows PE-based boot environment
To restore the system, you need to boot your machine into Windows PE-based boot environment
while the OS is shut down. If the OS is up and running, please shut down the OS and boot up
Windows PE-based boot environment.
*For more detailed operating procedures, please refer to ActiveImage Protector User Guide.
1.

Boot up Windows PE-based boot environment

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Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPRO
2.

Go to [Recovery] – [Volume Recovery].

Select an image file created at the point in date/time to restore to.
3.

Restore Settings

Drag and drop the source object to the restore target disk (or right-click the source object).
If the source object disk includes the system only, please select the entire disk. If the disk
includes the system volume as well as data partition, please select the system volume in the
disk. (Please do not restore the cluster partition.)

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4.

Summary

Please review the summary and make sure that no changes are required. Click [Done] button
to start recovery process.
5.

Reboot boot environment.
Upon successful completion of the restore task, exit AIP boot environment and reboot thesystem again.
This is the end of the recovery operating procedures with AIP. Please find theoperating procedures with CLUSTERPRO as follows.

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6.

Recovery of CLUSTERPRO cluster environment
When the restored OS completely boots up, CLUSTERPRO Console status is displayed asfollows
Status of restoring one server OS

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Status upon completion of differential data synchronization between two servers

Upon completion of differential data synchronization, the status is indicated in green. The
difference copy log is recorded for the alert log.

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4.3 Data Partition Recovery Procedures
In the event of data loss in data partition such as corruption of data, deletion of data by mistake,
AIP Hot Restore feature enables you to restore the entire data partition or a specific file.
As Cold Restore of data partition updates the sector information, which the mirror driver
is not aware of, the data integrity between the both servers is not assured. Before you
start Cold Restore, please make sure that both servers are synchronized when the systemboots up.
1.

Stop Group

Select [Stop] button to stop the group before starting to restore the data.
＊From this point, the group is inaccessible from client.
＊Please make sure that the group is stopped before starting restore process.
Otherwise, if database or an application is running on data partition, the data integrity
is not ensured. As a result database or the application may crash.
2.

Start mirror disk resource.

Start mirror disk resource on the restore target server.

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3.

Suspend every monitor.

Please make sure that the monitors are suspended, since execution of recovery task fails
while the monitor is working.
4.

Restore Volume

Launch AIP console to restore a volume.

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5.

Restore Setting

Select an image file created at the point in date/time to restore to.
If you select an image of a data partition, you can select an image of the whichever server.
Please restore the data partition only in mirror disk (please do not restore the cluster
partition.)
6.

Summary

Please review the summary and make sure that no changes are required. Click [Done] button
to start recovery process.

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7.

Running Restore Volume Task

8.

Upon completion of restore process, stop server group.

Upon completion of restore task, stop server group.

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9.

Start the group.

Start the group on the server restored from the image.
10. Restart monitor.

Resume the suspended monitor.

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Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPROAppendix 1 Script to stop application service
In cluster environment on which VSS-unaware application is installed and clustered, you need toplace the service into a paused state before a snapshot is taken for backup, ensuring data
integrity.
Before stopping clustered service, please configure the advanced settings for AIP task and createa batch file to run in collaboration with CLUSTERPRO command.
・Script to execute before the snapshot is taken
1) Suspend CLUSTERPRO monitor resource.
2) Run CLUSTERPRO command to stop the clustered service.
Script to execute after the snapshot is taken
1) Run CLUSTERPRO command to start the clustered service.
2) Resume CLUSTERPRO monitor resource.
Sample script to execute before the snapshot is taken@echo offrem --- Suspend CLUSTERPRO monitor resource --echo %date% %time% >>c:\stop.log
echo clpmonctrl -s >>c:\stop.log
clpmonctrl -s >>c:\stop.log
echo.>>c:\stop.log
rem --- Stop service --echo %date% %time% >>c:\stop.log
echo clprsc -t Service’s resource name >>c:\stop.log
clprsc -t Service’s resource name >>c:\stop.log
echo **************************************** >>c:\stop.log

For more detailed information about CLUSTERPRO command, please refer to CLUSTERPRO
Reference Guide.

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Sample script to execute after the snapshot is taken@echo offrem --- Start Service --echo %date% %time% >>c:\start.log
echo clprsc -t Service’s resource name >>c:\start.log
clprsc -s Service’s resource name >>c:\start.log
echo.>>c:\start.log
rem --- Enable CLUSTERPRO Resource Monitor --echo %date% %time% >>c:\start.log
echo clpmonctrl -r >>c:\start.log
clpmonctrl -r >>c:\start.log
echo **************************************** >>c:\start.log

For more detailed information about CLUSTERPRO command, please refer to CLUSTERPRO
Reference Guide.
Please save this batch file in a specified location.
If you encounter a problem, the log information output by this batch may be required,
therefore, please save the log information in a safe place.

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Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPROAppendix 2 Restore clustered data partition
Configuration of mirror disk resource or disk resource (shared disk) entails configuration of cluster
partition (RAW partition) for saving management information and data partition for saving actual
data. In the event that the cluster partition or data partition are damaged or if the cluster
partition or data partition are deleted by mistake, the following description provides the operatingprocedures how to restore the mirror disk / disk resource.
1.

Create cluster / data Partition again

Go to [Disk Management] and please create RAW partition and mirror partition in the same
size.
Disk Management window is displayed as shown above when cluster partition and mirror
partition are created.

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2.

Configure the settings for mirror disk / disk resource

Select [Details] tab in [Resource Properties] of mirror disk / disk resource in Cluster WebUI
setting mode and change the setting.
Select a specific server from [Servers that can run the group] and click [Edit].

Click [Connect] and get the updated information of GUID.
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Apply the changes.

Suspend the cluster.

Resume the cluster.

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3.

Monitor the status of mirror disk resource in [Mirror Disk].

When the cluster is properly resumed, reconfiguration of mirror disk is automatically started.

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Reconfiguration of mirror disks completed and please make sure that the “Normal” is indicate
for [Status].
In the event that the mirror disks are not successfully restored, please refer to CLUSTERPRO
Reference Guide “Understand mirrored disk resource”, “How to replace server” and performthe recovery operating procedures.

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Backup & Restore Guide for CLUSTERPROAppendix 3 Reconfiguration of Servers
In the event of system crash for some reason or corruption of RAID, or if the backup data are notavailable, the following are the operating procedures to restore the system after reconfiguring theOS.
1.

Reinstallation of failed server OS and applications
Reinstall the OS and the clustered applications in the same configuration as before the system
failure.

2.

Same configuration settings
Please configure the settings for the following items same as before the system failure.
・NIC
・IP Addres
・Data Partition Size・Cluster Partition (RAW partition) size
・Drive Letter

3.

Reinstallation of CLUSTERPRO
Please install CLUSTERPRO in the same configuration as before, and register the license.

4.

Install CLUSTERPRO patch
Apply the same patch as on the running server and make sure that the same version of
CLUSTERPRO is installed on both servers.

5.

Export Cluster Configuration File
Export the configuration file from Cluster WebUI on the active server and save the file at a
specified folder.

6.

Import the cluster configuration file
Import the cluster configuration file exported from Cluster WebUI on the restored server.

7.

Apply the Configuration File
Apply the Configuration File from Cluster WebUI.

8.

Synchronize mirror disk resource
Select [Operation Mode] for Cluster WebUI and make sure that “Full copy of mirror disk
started” message is displayed in Status and Log of mirror disk resource.
In the event that the mirror disk cannot be successfully restored, please refer to
CLUSTERPRO Reference Guide “Understand mirrored disk resource”, “How to replace server”
and perform the recovery operating procedures”.

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