EAGLE's SAN Toolkit Programs Streamline SAN Backup and Recovery

EAGLE's SAN Toolkit Programs Streamline SAN Backup and Recovery

October 27, 2008 -- Salina, KS -- EAGLE has recently developed SAN Toolkit, a suite of programs designed to streamline and enhance the automation of backup and recovery of SAN storage. These products integrate seamlessly into existing backup solutions, and save management time and server resources. Currently these programs are compatible with Xiotech, Dell Equallogic and Compellent SAN solutions, but plans to develop the programs to work with other SAN manufacturers are currently being explored as well.

“Several years ago, one of our customers asked us to write programs that would allow them to leverage their SAN for doing LAN-free serverless backups,” explained Milton Larson, Storage Specialist for EAGLE on the evolution of the SAN Toolkit programs. “Backups of production servers across the LAN to tape were taking too long to do on a daily basis, and the performance impact on those servers was too great. The data already was on the SAN, and the SAN already allowed for point-in-time "snapshots", so why not connect those snapshots to a backup server, and then spin it off to tape? Because the data was being backed up locally by the backup server, there was no LAN traffic, no performance impact on the production servers, and the backups ran much faster. Since then, we've had requests from other customers for other SAN related utilities. Those utilities have evolved into the "SAN Toolkit", and as we create new SAN related utilities, the plan is to add those to the Toolkit too."

Illustration of SNAP Proxy

The programs included in the SAN Toolkit are SNAP Proxy, SNAP Back, SNAP Copy and SNAP Freeze for SQL. SNAP Proxy is a program that can be kicked off by an existing backup application to automate the process of generating snapshots or mirrors, changing volume permissions, and mounting the volume to a backup server. SNAP Proxy reduces the need for backup agents on SAN servers, and allows for LAN-free backup of SAN volumes.

SNAP Back automates the process of mounting snapshots into a recovery directory, allowing for quick and easy location of files to be recovered. SNAP Copy provides block-level copies of VSS snapshots production server volumes to a new SAN volume, providing faster online migration of data from DAS to SAN or SAN to SAN while maintaining shares. With SNAP Copy, the initial copy requires no downtime, and file system attributes are maintained.

Finally, SNAP Freeze for SQL uses Microsoft's SQL VDI to quiesce SQL, allowing snapshots to be created or mirrors to be paused or broken with SQL in a consistent state.

“So far, SAN Toolkit’s worked great for us,” explained Peter Kovaleski of Oral Roberts University. “We’re using the program in conjunction with a script of our own to quiesse our Groupwise Post Offices, take a snapshot and then bring them back into our CommVault environment for backups. We’ll soon be running it on five machines.”

Although the program was designed to simplify backup and DR in the SAN environment, one customer, Jason Wiser, of Highland Capital Management in Dallas, Texas is utilizing SAN Toolkit specifically to replicate his production SQL volumes. "We're using the product to replicate production SQL volumes to lower level environments for testing, development and QA," explained Wiser. "So far SAN Toolkit has worked great for us."

Contact EAGLE for more information on SAN Toolkit. EAGLE distributes a full line of storage and backup products including tape library backup solutions, backup and recovery software packages, and SAN and NAS storage solutions. EAGLE also provides pre-sales evaluation and design, integration and support services.

For more information on EAGLE's products and services, contact: EAGLE Software, 123 Indiana Ave., Salina, KS 67401; Phone (800) 477-5432; Fax: (785) 823-6185; email: contact@eaglesoft.com; website: http://www.storagebyeagle.com.

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