Protecting a virtual machine

By default, Double-Take Availability for VMware Infrastructure starts the initial synchronization of a protection immediately after the protection is created.

If you want to specify a date and time in the future at which the initial synchronization will be started, click the Schedule button at the top of the window. The Configure protection start time window will appear.

Select the Schedule this protection to start option, then click the drop-down field to select a date from the calendar. Click on the time in the field to modify the start time.

If a protection job has not yet started, you can use this window to reschedule the job start time, cancel a future start time, or prompt for the job to start immediately.

The protection name is a unique name that you can enter to identify the protected virtual machine and the target server with which it is associated. By default, the protection set is named <virtual machine name> to <target server name>.

Click the Change button in the Name area. The Change name window will appear.

Enter a name for the protection job. You might want to name it something like “source vm name to target”. When you are finished, click Save.

You can modify the data transmission options in order to make them more suitable for your environment.

Click the Change button in the Data Transmission area. The Set data transmission options window will appear.

1. You can change the snapshot data compression settings in the Compression area. The following options are available:

• Never—(Default) No compression will be applied to the data.
• Always—All transmissions associated with the protection set will be compressed.
• Only during the initial synchronization—Data will be compressed only during the initial transmission of the flat virtual disk files.

Note:

Enabling compression requires that additional CPU cycles be used on both the source and target servers.

2. In the Frequency area, select the time and file size thresholds that will trigger data transmission.

1. Transmit when the snapshot data reaches this size (MB)—(Default = 32 MB x the number of snapshot-capable virtual disks) Enter the size of snapshot file (in MB) that will trigger a transmission from the source to the target. When multiple virtual disks are used, any combination of writes across all virtual disks that accumulate to this size will trigger replication. The minimum size allowed is 32 MB.
2. Transmit data, regardless of snapshot size, after—(Default = 15 minutes) Enter a time value and unit that will trigger a transmission from the source to the target. The minimum time allowed is 5 minutes.

Note:

A snapshot transmission cycle from the source to the target will begin when either of the threshold conditions are met: time or size. During the snapshot transmission cycle, the thresholds are not monitored. After the snapshot transmission cycle has completed, the application will again monitor these thresholds. If either of the thresholds were crossed during the snapshot transmission cycle, then a new transmission cycle will begin immediately. You may need to adjust the data transmission frequency options to optimize performance in your environment. Some factors you need to consider when adjusting these settings include the volume of write traffic in the virtual machine, the allowed data loss time period, and the cost to the virtual infrastructure.

3. In the Target route area, enter the IP address on the target server to which you want to send data.

Note:

If your ESX host is on multiple networks and has multiple addresses associated with those networks, you can choose to use an IP address other than the one you entered for the target in Selecting the target ESX server. This setting only applies to SCP routing and is not applicable to Double-Take Availability for VMware Infrastructure network communications.

4. You can specify a limit for the bandwidth to be used by source-to-target communications for this protection job. In the Bandwidth Limit area, select the Limit Bandwidth checkbox, then enter a value (in kilobits per second) that bandwidth cannot exceed.
5. When you are finished, click Save.

You can configure e-mail addresses and select the events that you want to trigger automatic e-mail alerts.

Click the Change button in the E-mail notifications area. The Configure e-mail notifications window will appear.

If you have not yet configured an e-mail server, a message will appear at the top of the window prompting you to set up the e-mail server. Click Configure to launch the Set up e-mail server window. For more information, see Managing the e-mail server.

Note:

The e-mail server configuration will apply to all protection jobs.

1. In the Recipients area, enter the e-mail address(es) to which you want to send the automatic e-mail notifications. Separate the addresses with either a comma, semicolon, or carriage return.
2. In the Notifications area, select the events for which you want to send e-mail messages.
3. To verify that your settings are valid, click the Test E-mail Settings button. Double-Take Availability for VMware Infrastructure will verify that e-mail notifications can be sent to the recipients you entered using the configured e-mail server.

Note:

If you receive the following error message after testing the e-mail notification, the anti-virus software on your DTAVI server may be blocking the outbound e-mails. “Failure sending mail. Unable to connect to the remote server. An established connection was aborted by the software in your host machine.” In order to use automatic e-mail notification, you may need to do the following: Disable the anti-virus software Disable blocking of outbound e-mail messages Exclude VI_Service.exe from the processes that are blocked to send outbound e-mail messages Also consider that in many organizations, anti-virus software is administered centrally by an IT department, who may periodically send the policy to override machine-specific settings. You may need request that your IT department set the policy so that VI_Service.exe is excluded from the processes that are blocked to send e-mail messages. In addition, you may need to open port 25 in your anti-virus software to allow SMTP e-mail.

4. Click Save.

If you choose to disable e-mail notification for this protection job at a later time:

1. Select the job from the Monitor Protection window.
2. Click the Configure Protection button.
3. In the E-mail notifications area, click the Change button.
4. In the Configure e-mail notifications window, clear the checkboxes for all events in the Notifications area.
5. Click Save.

You can enter new credentials to be used when authenticating with VirtualCenter for this job.

Note:

This area will not be available if you did not configure VirtualCenter servers for the source or target. For more information, see Managing VirtualCenter servers. Changes you make here will only apply to the current protection job.

Click the Change button in the VirtualCenter credentials area. The Set VirtualCenter server credentials window will appear.

Enter the following information in the appropriate fields:

1. Source VirtualCenter credentials

1. Server—The Server field is automatically filled in with the IP address of the server you selected.
2. User name—Enter the user name for the account that will access the VirtualCenter server.
3. Password—Enter the password that is associated with the user name.

2. Target VirtualCenter credentials

1. Server—The Server field is automatically filled in with the IP address of the server you selected.
2. User name—Enter the user name for the account that will access the VirtualCenter server.
3. Password—Enter the password that is associated with the user name.

3. When you are finished, click Save.

Click the Change button in the Restart and Thresholds area. The Configure restart and thresholds window will appear.

1. If you want to disable auto-restart, un-select the Restart this protection automatically if the connection fails checkbox. Otherwise, by default Double-Take Availability for VMware Infrastructure will try twice to restart this protection if there is a problem. You can modify the value for the number of times to attempt the restart.

Note:

You can change the interval at which auto-restarts are attempted. For more information, see Configuring advanced options.

2. In the Disk space threshold area, enter the % or size of disk space on the source virtual machine primary datastore remaining to trigger stopping this protection.

1. %—Enter the percent of disk space remaining that should trigger the protection to stop.
2. MB—Enter the number of megabytes remaining that should trigger the protection to stop.

3. When you are finished, click Save.