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51 Posts
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770
July 25th, 2011 14:00
Celerra Replication Concern
Greetings All!
I wanted to verify something just to make sure before I move further with a project.
Quick Background:
Initial Provisioning of the storage for the Celerra was not performed using CSA with Provisioning Tool. It appears the partner that configured it, went in through the backend (CX) and provisioned everything in a Thin Pool and provisioned to the Celerra Storage Group. Customer did not want it provisioned this way and only realized it was done this way after I was called in to investigate why they had no more space for CIFS shares. I acquired two trays of SATA Disks and provisioned them to the Celerra using the Provisioning Tool and have created a replication pair using the loopback. All File Systems have replicated successfully.
I believe I know the answer to this but wanted to bounce it off the community and "make absolutely" sure I am correct before proceeding any further.
In order to tear down the original pool and then reprovision it I replicated from the original to the temp storage. I performed a switchover, did not restart replication, and recreated the shares to include the new file system path. All is well in accessing the shares and permissions are identical.
What I am questionining is the next steps:
I need to break the replication.
Reprovision the old storage
Create new replication from temp back to permanent
Replicate
Switchover
Recreate the shares
Break the replication
Remove Temp Storage from Celerra via CLI.
My question is at the very first step. Since this Temp Storage is the R/W File Systems for the CIFS Servers/Shares, when I break the replication, I am only doing just that... breaking and removing the replication pair. The Temp Storage will still remain as the primary FS for the CIFS Servers and Shares correct?
Since I have not had to perform this before I am a concerned as to what the effect will be when I break the replication pairs on the FS. I am assuming all will function normally and I am just being a worry wart. However, since this is on a production NS I want to make doubly sure!
Any input would be greatly appreciated to help me sleep at night.
Jerry
Riaan1
4 Posts
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July 25th, 2011 19:00
Hi Jerry,
Your steps are correct. Stopping / breaking the replication is just that and will not affect the mounted r/w file system.
You can also verify by referring back to the Replicating Celerra CIFS Environment document on Powerlink.
Regards,
Riaan
jerry.reddick
51 Posts
0
July 26th, 2011 06:00
Thank you Riaan!
I did go through that document but must have missed the part that made me feel reassured.
Thanks again.
Jerry
Riaan1
4 Posts
0
July 26th, 2011 13:00
You are welcome Jerry.
We are in the process of full DR testing a newly installed solution with Celerra Replicator A between sites. Part of the implementation was to move data between sites instead of backing up and shipping tapes around. We have done quite a few replications, switchovers, and deleting creating new replication sessions bi-directional, in which none has impacted any of the mounted file systems. Generally if anything is attached to a mounted/exported file system, and you want to make changes which could impact the file systems, the Celerra will complain/warn you about the mounted/exported file system as part of protecting the data integrity.
The process which you described is spot on to the work we did and you should be fine.
Apologies for not elaborating more on my answer the first time.
Regards,
Riaan