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February 04, 2010

Introduction to vStorage APIs for Data Protection

vStorage APIs for Data Protection were introduced in vSphere 4.0 to facilitate seamless virtual machine backup and recovery. Protecting virtual machines in the VMware environment with traditional data protection methodology had its challenges. vStorage APIs for Data Protection enables partners to integrate their backup/ recovery products; hence, giving customers more choices.
The vStorage APIs for Data Protection enable backup software to perform backups without interrupting or affecting the ESX servers with the processing of backup tasks. A backup product using these APIs can backup and restore virtual machine data from its central backup server or virtual machine without requiring that backup agents and backup processing be done inside of each virtual machine on the ESX server. This allows you to offload backup processing from ESX servers to reduce costs by allowing each ESX server to run more virtual machines.
The vStorage APIs for Data Protection leverages the snapshot capabilities of VMware vStorage VMFS to enable backup without requiring downtime for virtual machines. As a result, backups can be performed non-disruptively at any time of the day without requiring extended backup windows and the downtime to applications and users associated with backup windows. Native integration to data protection product facilitates user experience that is similar to physical backup. This also results in simpler management and restore.

vStorage APIs for Data Protection support:

• Windows and Linux guests
• All storage architectures ( FC, ISCSI and NAS.)
• Faster incremental, differential and full VM image backup
• File level backup and restore

Some people think this is the new VMware Consolidated Backup, but it is not (Table 1.) Unlike VCB (VMware Consolidated Backup), VMware vStorage APIs for Data Protection (VADP) doesn’t require Proxy server and is fully integrated with the Data Protection software such that backup application will leverage it seamlessly out of the box. Though, VMware continues to offer VMware Consolidated Backup to support the existing install base and on VSphere 4.0.

	VADP	VCB
Requires additional download & install	No, built into the data protection software	Yes
Full VM image backup	Yes, single step copy – source to target	Yes, with two step copy – source to VCB proxy and VCB proxy to the target
Incremental VM image backup	Yes	No
File level backup	Yes, both Windows and Linux	Yes, Windows only
Full VM image restore	Yes	Yes, by using VMware Converter
Incremental VM image restore	Yes	No
File level restore	Yes, using restore agents	Yes, using restore agents

Table 1: Differences between VADP and VCB

Although there are significant benefits for leveraging vStorage APIs for Data Protection compared to VMware Conslidated Backup, I would like to emphasize that it depends on the customers’ IT environment and their business requirements. VMware gives the customer the choice to choose the right data protection solution for their environment.
vStorage APIs from Data Protection also provides the framework for VMware Data Recovery product that was introduced in vSphere 4.0. VMware Data Recovery is a disk-based backup and recovery solution that enables quick, simple and complete data protection for your virtual machines. It’s fully integrated with VMware vCenter Server to enable centralized and efficient management of backup jobs and also includes data de-duplication to save on disk storage for your backups.

My next post will be on the vStorage APIs for Array Integration. In the meantime if you would like to read more on the other vStorage API feature, read the blog on vStorage APIs for Multipathing

Author: Ibrahim “Ibby” Rahmani
Sr Product Marketing Manager - Storage, VMware

Posted by Ibby Rahmani on February 4, 2010 | Permalink |

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