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Re: [Xen-users] Consistent snapshots

To: Gak <ganbidada@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Xen-users] Consistent snapshots
From: John Haxby <john.haxby@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:23:06 +0100
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On 25/06/09 11:01, Gak wrote:
How do i create consistent snapshots of VM's from Dom0?. What are the backup methods or snapshot/snaprestore methods that are followed for Xen Virtual environments?.

Shut down the VM, take the snapshot.

Anything else requires serious cooperation from VM and, equally importantly, the applications running in it. Sometimes you can get away with suspending the guest and taking a snapshot of memory and disk at the same time -- that isn't very useful though because to recover, say, an individual file from the back up you have to restart the suspended copy. Even worse, if there are any in-flight transactions between the VM and other machines (virtual or otherwise) those will restart -- having your bank balance debited twice would be very annoying.

In the general case, you're better off running your backup within the VM. In special cases you can do something different -- for example, you might have a database that can get itself into a consistent state so you can take a snapshot of its file system on a suitable NAS or SAN.

jch

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