Manage CDP Backups

Introduction

CDP Backups can help you manage a node’s backup policy to save files and folders of your E2E Node and also, rolling back to a previous backup recovery point anytime. We recommend you to subscribe for CDP backup service for all your nodes, especially the servers for a production environment. CDP backups secure your data from accidental data loss or modifications along with the option of retaining data for a longer period without consuming the server’s disk space. They are helpful in projects or milestones to back up the complete data or a set of files containing important information.

How does CDP Backup work?

Backups are created as a replica of your file system which is taken automatically at periodic intervals. Each backup recovery point contains all the data which was backed up to restore from the provisioning till the most recent data block update. This allows point-in-time to restore from any of the recovery points present in the archive. Before you enable CDP backup service, we recommend familiarizing yourself with concepts and terminologies.

Completely Secure

The backups are created and stored in our backup servers. The connections to these are encrypted using SSL to ensure the security of the data being backed up.

Incremental in nature

The backup server takes a complete snapshot of the entire filesystem for the first time and from the next run, it only copies over the differential Deltas (data that has changed since the last backup run) thus speeding up the backup process.

Database Backups

It is always important to backup all your databases stored in your server.

  • The CDP for MySQL Add-On integrates Continuous Data Protection with an online hot backup (snapshot) of MySQL databases to provide fast, efficient, and safe MySQL backups.

  • MySQL add-on ensures that tables are locked and flushed before a backup operation can take place. MySQL Add-On coordinates with the point-in-time file system snapshot.

  • The only requirement for MySQL Add-On is a MySQL account with administrative privileges that is used by the Agent to flush tables with the read lock before the file system snapshot is taken and the lock must be held until the snapshot completes. Click here to check more details.

Backup Frequency

We do have pre configured backup plans. You can choose one which matches up your requirement.

Backup Recovery Points

A recovery point is created as a result of data replication. The first recovery point is called an initial replica because it is performed only one time. In simple words, a Recovery Point appears like a Full backup as each Recovery Point only contains block-level Deltas or changes since the last Synchronization (recovery point creation). In other words, a Recovery Point is a point-in-time backup of the node (or selected files/folders on devices).

Each recovery point is all-inclusive i.e it contains all the data and can be used for a restore independently.

Backup Recovery Points Retention Policy

The Recovery Point Retention policy is default defined and it is applicable for each server for which backup service is enabled. The retention policy will be set as per the backup schedule chosen which will define at which recovery point the backups will be merged and retained.

Note

After exceeding the defined recovery/archive point number, the old Archive Points will subsequently be replaced by the new ones.

Archive Backup Recovery Point

Archive backups are considered a best practice to protect your data from natural disasters, malware, and malicious acts. Even enterprises often need to retain long-term backups for business continuity, compliance, customer contracts, and e-Discovery.

An Archive Point is a snapshot of a backup recovery point that is stored in another location (object storage-bucket) for long-term data storage to provide further integrity and safe-keeping of data. It will significantly reduce costs while retaining a snapshot of backup recovery point backup for long-term availability.

With Archive, you can expand your backup policy to create and manage off-site snapshots of backup recovery points on the E2E Object storage. Archive backup policy can be configured to create a snapshot on a daily, weekly, or monthly schedule in accordance with your retention requirements. According to these configurations, an Archive is created once the policy runs.

  • Daily, the last recovery point of the day is archived.

  • Weekly, the last recovery point of the week is archived.

  • Monthly, the last recovery point of the month is archived.

So your backup schedule must be at least daily to archive daily recovery points. You need to adjust the retention policy because the retention policy automatically decides on how many numbers of backup recovery points needed to retain and when to merge old recovery points and archived recovery points.

Restore functionality

The backup restore rates are inversely proportional to the load on your system. In an ideal environment, Our backup systems can restore at an avg rate of 20 MB/s which translates to 65-70 GB per hour. However, the actual rates may vary and we have seen better speeds than this. The way to request a rollback/restore is to select the files/folders from the recovery points and initiate the restore process.

Plans & Prices

Please check here for our Backups pricing.

How to activate CDP Backup service for nodes?

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  • The number of E2E Nodes currently created by you will be listed on the ‘Manage Backups’ page.

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  • If you have not enabled the backups for your E2E Node while creating then the backup status will be ‘Backup Not Activated’. To enable CDP backup service for your E2E Node you will need to click on the ‘Activate Backup’ action.

  • Backup Schedule Configuration pop-up window will appear on the screen.

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Backup Schedule Configuration

Choose Schedule Plan- Please select the plan as per your requirement.

Note

The scheduled backup run time may vary based on the number of backup policies running at that point in time on our backup server.

  • Regular Plan: If you select the Regular Plan backup schedule it will create a backup every 6 hours and it will store the data as per these retention policies.

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  • High Frequency - Long terms backups: If you select the High Frequency - Long terms backups backup schedule then it will create backup every 4 hours and it will store the data as per these retention policies.

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  • Low Frequency - Long terms backups: If you select the Low Frequency - Long terms backups backup schedule then it will create backup every 10 hours and it will store the data as per these retention policies.

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  • High Frequency - Short terms backups: If you select the High Frequency - Short terms backups backup schedule then it will create backup every 4 hours and it will store the data as per these retention policies.

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  • Low Frequency - Short terms backups: If you select the Low Frequency - Short terms backups backup schedule then it will create backup every 10 hours and it will store the data as per these retention policies

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  • Exclude File/Folder: By default, all files and folders located on your node are replicated. However, if you want to ignore specific files/folders during backup, you can exclude them by specifying the path of the file/folder. You can use comma separation to add multiple paths.

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  • You will receive notification emails for backup service activation and after the first backup recovery point creation.

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Backup Status

  • Backup Unsupported

Backup Unsupported status represents that CDP backup service is not available for the respective Node type.

  • Backup Not Activated

Backup Not Activated status represents that CDP backup service is disabled for the respective Node type

  • Backup Provisioning Failed

Backup Provisioning Failed status represents that activation of backup service is failed for the respective node.

  • First Run Pending

First Run Pending status represents that Backup service has activated for the respective node and first backup recovery point creation is pending as per your scheduled time.

  • Backup Available

Backup Available status represents that backup service is active and backup recovery points are available.

  • Powered Off

Powered Off status represents that backup service is turned off due to the respective node being powered off.

  • Backup Failed

Backup Failed status represents that the last backup recovery point creation is failed for the respective node.

Manage CDP Backup Service

Once the CDP backup service is enabled and status changes from ‘First Run Pending’ to ‘Backup Available’ after initial recovery point creation for the respective E2E Node then you will be able to manage and check backup details & actions as described.

Actions

You can perform the following actions for the backup service.

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  • Change Backup Schedule Or Exclude File/Folder

Click on the Change Schedule button to modify the current backup schedule type & frequency, and to change/add exclude files/folders paths.

Exclude File/Folder- By default, all files and folders located on your node are replicated. However, if you want to ignore specific files/folders during backup, you can exclude them by specifying the path of the file/folder.

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  • Archive Backups

To archive the recovery point of backups, you have to click on the ‘Archive Backup’. A popup will appear.

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Choose Archive Recovery Point- Please select the type either “Enable” or “Disable” based on your use case. Archiving can be enabled/disabled for the protected compute node.

Choose EOS Bucket- Please select the object storage bucket (archiving destination) to archive the recovery point snapshot.

Access Key- Please Specify the access key to use when connecting to the object storage bucket.

Secret Key- Please Specify the secret key to use when connecting to the object storage bucket.

Archiving Policy- Archive backup policy can be configured to create a snapshot on a daily, weekly, or monthly schedule in accordance with your retention requirements. According to these configurations, an Archive is created once the policy runs.

  • Daily, the last recovery point of the day is archived.

  • Weekly, the last recovery point of the week is archived.

  • Monthly, the last recovery point of the month is archived.

  • Deactivate Backups

To deactivate CDP backup service, you have to click on the Deactivate Backup switch to disable the backup service for your E2E Networks E2E Node. A confirmation popup will appear, click on the ‘Deactivate’ button to stop your E2E Node backups.

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  • MySQL Backups

If MySQL server running on this E2E Node, then you may provide the Admin credentials of MySQL server for activating backup to protect the following MySQL objects:

  1. Databases

  2. Tables

  3. Indexes

  4. Constraints

  5. Triggers

  6. Events

  7. Views

  8. Stored procedures

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  • Click on the edit button to configuring MYSQL.

  • Enter the MySQL Server Username and MySQL Server Password.

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  • Click on the activate button.

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Note

E2E Networks is not liable for any backup failures arising out of incorrect credentials being provided by the customer.

CDP Backup Details

The CDP Backup Details tab contains information about the Backup status, Backup Size, Backup Schedule & frequency, Last Recovery Points Created On, Next Backup Scheduled Run, and MySQL Database for the respective E2E Node.

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Backup Recovery Points

The Backup Recovery Points tab having information about backup recovery points created for the respective E2E Node in chronological order. You can select any backup recovery points to restore files/folders to the respective node.

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Actions

You can perform the following actions for the backup recovery points.

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Backup Retention Policy

Backup recovery point retention policy is default defined. The retention policy automatically decides on how many numbers of Recovery Points needed to retain and when to merge old recovery points. You can change the default policy according to your requirement to retain recovery points based on recovery point age.

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Browse

You can use browse action to search & select files/folders from the Recovery Point for restoration.

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Lock

You can use lock action to prevent backup recovery point from being merged automatically as per the recovery point protection policy.

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Unlock

You can use unlock action to unlock the locked backup recovery point to allow it to be merged automatically as per the recovery point protection policy.

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Backup Task History

The Backup Task details tab has information about start and ends (with the date and time stamp) backup scheduled Tasks in a grid format.

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Status

  • Finished

‘Finished’ status represents that the backup recovery point is created.

  • Failed

‘Failed’ status represents that backup recovery point creation is failed for the respective node.

Restore Task History

The Restore Task details tab has information about start and ends (with the date and time stamp) file/folder restore scheduled Tasks in a grid format.

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Status

  • Finished

Finished status represents that the file/folder restored successfully.

  • Failed

Failed status represents that the file/folder restore is failed.

  • Warning

Warning status represents that file/folder restored but the respective node’s disk space is running low.

How to restore Files/ Folders?

Restore backups feature provides you with the facility to restore the entire file system or selected files and folders into your E2E Node from any available Backup Recovery Point. To know the process of restoring a database in MySQL click here

  • Go to the Backup Recovery Point tab and select the backup recovery point.

  • Now, you have to click on the browse action to browse the file system.

  • Browse Recovery Point pop up window will appear on the screen.

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  • Select the required files/folders.

  • After selecting the files/folder you have to click the Restore selected button.

  • Now, you need to select the restore location radio button.

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Default Location: If you selected the default location radio button the selected files/folders will be restored at a different path which is /e2e-backup-restore/ instead of the original path. You need to manually move folders/files from the restore path to the original path. The selected folder/files.

Alternate Location: If you selected the alternate location radio button the selected files/folders will be restored at your specified location of a disk in your Node.

Note

Please ensure that enough disk space is available on your node to restore files. Otherwise, the restoration will fail and due to restore failure might be node itself face downtime and you will be solely responsible for this.

  • An Information message will appear when the restoration process is initiated.

  • The restoration process will take a few minutes for completion. It will depend on the size of files/folders you have selected for restoration.

  • Once, Backup Restoration completed successfully for your E2E Node, you will be notified via email and the selected files/folders will be available in your E2E Node.

How to take a complete cPanel backup

Introduction to cPanel

cPanel is a Linux-based web hosting control panel. It provides a graphical interface and automation tools designed to simplify the process of hosting a web site. cPanel provides capabilities for administrators, resellers, and end-user website owners to control the various aspects of website and server administration through a standard web browser. To take a complete backup of the website using cPanel, follow the steps below:

Step 1: Log in to your cPanel.

Step 2: Select Backups in the Files section of cPanel.

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Step 3: In the Full Backup section, click the Download a Full Website Backup button.

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Step 4: On the next screen make sure the Home Directory option is selected.

Step 5: If you want an email notification when the backup completes, enter your email address. If you do not want an email, check the box next to Do not send an email notification of backup completion.

Step 6: Click the Generate Backup button to begin the Full cPanel Backups.

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You will then see a message stating “Full Backup in Progress…” Allow some time for the backup to complete, you will receive an email notification upon completion (if you entered your email address in the last step).

Step 7: Download the file from your cPanel. It will be located in your /home directory, begin with backup, and include the date. For example backup-10.9.2015_15-52-08_exampl99.tar.gz You will now have a Full cPanel backup!

How to take backup and restore containers in Nvidia Docker?

Introduction

Please note that this section mainly discusses committing a container as an image. This works on the container that does not use data volume. For containers with data volume, backup of the data volume must be taken separately.

Now a new image jupyter-backup will be created. Kindly note that this will not cover the data volume. You need to take the backup of data-volume (if any) separately.

To know this data-directory (data volume location) of a container, use the command ‘docker inspect container-name‘. You will get a section called “Mounts”. Location mentioned in “Source” is the data volume. You may directly backup this folder(here /var/lib/docker/volumes/my-volume/_data) to get backup of data volume.

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Backing up the Containers

First of all, to backup the containers in docker, we’ll wanna see the list of containers that we wanna backup. To do so, we’ll need to run docker ps in our linux machine running docker engine with containers already created.

# nvidia-docker ps
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After that, we’ll choose the containers we wanna backup and then we’ll go for creating the snapshot of the container. We can use nvidia-docker commit command to create the snapshot.

# nvidia-docker commit -p 1568555b36ef jupyter-backup
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This will generate a snapshot of the container as the docker image. We can see the docker image by running the command nvidia-docker images as shown below.

# nvidia-docker images
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As we can see the snapshot that was taken above has been preserved as a docker image. Now, to back up that snapshot, we have two options, one is that we can log in into the docker registry hub and push the image and the next is that we can back up the docker image as tarballs for further use as it can be downloaded locally in your laptop or to the object storage like minio,s3.

If we wanna upload or backup the image in the docker registry hub , we can simply run docker login command to login into the docker registry hub and then push the required image.

# nvidia-docker login

Executing the above command will prompt for user and password for docker hub registry.

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# nvidia-docker tag e469e7acb748 hrrahman/jupyter-backup:test

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# nvidia-docker push hrrahman/jupyter-backup

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If we don’t want a backup to the docker registry hub and want to save the image for future use in the machine locally or to the object storage like minio,s3. then we can backup the image as tarballs. To do so, we’ll need to run the following nvidia-docker save command.

# nvidia-docker save -o ~/jupyter-backup.tar jupyter-backup
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To verify if the tarball has been generated or not, we can simply run ls inside the directory where we saved the tarball.

Restoring the Containers

Next, after we have successfully backed up our docker containers, we will now go for restoring those containers which are snapshotted as docker images. If we have pushed those docker images in the registry hub, then we can simply pull that docker image and run it out of the box.

# nvidia-docker pull hrrahman/jupyter-backup:test
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But if we have backed up those docker images locally or any other cloud storage like minio or s3 as tarball file, then we can easily sync from the respective source and load that docker image using nvidia-docker load command followed by the backed up tarball.

# docker load -i ~/jupyter-backup.tar
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Now, to ensure that those docker images have been loaded successfully, we’ll run nvidia-docker images command.

# nvidia-docker images
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After the images have been loaded, we will be going to run the docker container from the loaded image.

# nvidia-docker run “rm -p 8888:8888 -p 4040:4040 jupyter-backup:latest
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Conclusion

We have documented how we can backup, restore docker containers using nvidia-docker out of the box. This tutorial is the same for every platform of an operating system where nvidia-docker runs successfully.

The above methods make us comfortable to backup our containers so that we can restore them when needed in future. This can help us recover our containers and images even if our host system crashes or gets wiped out accidentally.

Disasters cannot be predicted or prevented, but you can always quickly bounce back from them if you maintain adequate backup plans for your business.