Blogs and Podcasts

With VBR v12 Linux proxy server can get a new role! A Linux server can become a Tape Server.We will see more details like supported Linux distributions and versions with general availability of v12.But I would bet on one thing: Linux Hardened Repository Server will be excluded from this feature – for security reasons.

One of the must-have features for providing access security for any sensitive application is the ability to implement multi-factor authentication (MFA) as part of the login process. The release of Veeam Backup and V12 added the ability to enable Multi-factor authentication for logging into the Veeam console (including the remote console). The details:Before discussing the setup and configuration of MFA, we should discuss what MFA apps are supported.Veeam Backup and Replication supports Time-Based One-Time Passwords (TOTP) as per RFC 6238 installed on a mobile device.  For example, the following MFA TOTP applications are supported:Microsoft Authenticator Google Authenticator LastPass Authenticator DUO Okta Verify Many more are listed if you do a quick internet search ;)A console auto-logout time can also be set to ensure that a user gets logged out of the Veeam console after a configurable period of inactivity. Configuring MFA:Step 1:Access the Users and Groups selection on the options

This is the description of an unusual scenario where Backup Job Files (.vbk and .vib Files) are backed up with a File-to-Tape Job instead a Backup-to-Tape Job. This has several disadvantages, e.g., you must know on which tape your files you want to restore are residing. You cannot find your tape backups under the backups section in the “Home” view of console and many more…OK, now have a look how we get these files back from tape.See the results of the File-to-Tape job and find the tape number the files reside on. If you don’t know the tape, read further, and use the search function ( Note: the warning in the screenshot can be ignored. The filesystem is too big for VSS Snapshots, I have forgotten to switch the VSS snapshots off for this test backup job.).Then go in the Veeam Console to the “Tape Infrastructure” section. Either go to the media pool where the affected tape is in or look for it in the Media section of your tape library.Right click on the tape and select “Restore Content”.

SPOILER Warning if you’re awaiting your swag, don’t watch the video!I was lucky enough to be selected as a Veeam Legend this year and luckier still to be one of the first to receive the swag by the amazing @Kseniya & @Rick Vanover  (and of course Alfred).Check out my unboxing video below to see all the goodies  If you’re still on the fence about the Veeam Legend programme, it’s been an amazing experience so far, I whole heartedly recommend it!

Phenomenal Strategy to Defend the Ransomware Attacks and Protect Data from Cyber Attacks is the Flagship Feature of Veeam VeeamON Forum back to India! Take part in an action-packed experience with hours of technical content that will help you adapt and thrive in today’s challenging IT landscape. Explore Key Topics The most awaited and passionately curious to see how Veeam is addressing the complex, everchanging issues of the modern IT landscape with cutting-edge solutions that will help you go above and beyond in your Modern Data Protection strategy. New V12 Ransomware Kubernetes AWS/Azure/Google Microsoft 365 For more details logon to Transform your Modern Data Protection strategy (veeam.com)

Check out our introduction to Containers, Kubernetes and Kasten K10. Look after your pets (services) and ensure fast recovery times.Introduction to Containers and Kasten - Veeam looking after your animals (services) Part 2 -  Vets for your pets - Speedy Recovery of your pets (key containerised services) coming soon!

Hi! In this video, I show how to install Veeam Backup for Google Cloud and integrate it with Google Cloud Plug-In for Veeam Backup & Replication. I hope it's helpful. 

In this demo I illustrate how you too can utilize the Pure Storage platform to provide rapid recovery and near-zero replication for your Veeam repositories.This lab consists of 2 Pure arrays, 2 vSphere clusters and a single VCenter. Though in this lab we could use other means to provide recovery, say through vSphere, this setup up was used to simply illustrate an easy to use and efficient DR strategy from Production to a DR cluster. Utilizing, Veeam.In this lab I built 2 Veeam servers. The first holds the Veeam Backup Server, proxy, and primary repository. The second runs the Veeam Disaster Recovery (VDRO) server and is the remote repository. In this lab – I do not utilize VDRO for recovery – that will come in a later post.Normally, in a Veeam scenario like this there would be 2 Veeam jobs providing restores and the local and remote sites. The first would be the primary backup job to the repository local to the production site. The second, would be what is called a backup copy job from

I have been thinking a little more about how best customers can best utilize their technology to build in fool-proof data protection. Data protection which helps eliminates risk normally associated with managing a data protection solution.I have spent a long time dealing in this space, and I have found, that it’s common for organizations to put data protection solutions on the back burner. Utilizing cheaper, and sometimes older technology that lacks features and tools that reduce management risks. Because it isn’t viewed production data.This is only true, until it is. When your production is offline, you need a reliable solution to get you back to work, as fast as possible.Now, my approach has always been to match the best technology. Careful not to overcomplicate, but enough to allow best in breed, or match technology that is first class in their space to build the solution. So, in this demo I will show how features in Pure can help support those in Veeam. So, what does this demonstra

Hi Guy’s The path to success is rarely linear; it often winds through setbacks, challenges, and moments of doubt. My journey through the VMCA (Veeam Certified Architect) exam epitomizes this truth, culminating in a well-earned victory with a score of 79%. It's a story of resilience, growth, and the satisfaction that comes from persevering against the odds.Adding a unique layer to my journey is the fact that I have spent the last seven years dedicated to working with Veeam, a prominent player in the realm of data protection and management. This experience has given me an extensive and intimate understanding of the intricacies of data backup, recovery, and virtualization management.The VMCA exam was no small feat during my first two attempts, with scores of 55% and 64% respectively. Yet, each outcome held within it a lesson, a piece of the puzzle that would eventually lead me to success. These results could have deterred me, leading to discouragement and abandonment, but they had the opp

Hi  have currently this warning for 3 consecutive days. the backup jobs ara all success but I getthis warning message . can any one help me resolve thisWarning message:>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>8/31/2023 10:00:51 AM Warning Failed to connect to GCP plug-in: Failed to login to platform service: No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it xx.xx.xx.10x:9xxThnanks in advance>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>»  

I want to share my experience of an Active directory migration through the VB Replication software related to an Active directory environment 2012 R2 - forest and domain functional level 2012 R2.The customer asked me to migrate 3 Domain controllers from an old  VMware 5.5 to the new VMware 6.5 infrastructure for a technological refresh.Given that the best solution from Microsoft is to create new VMs and promote them Domain Controllers and transfer FSMO roles.That said, there are scenarios like mine, where this type of approach was not possible as it was mandatory to maintain the same FQDN and IP address due to application configuration problems.Microsoft advised against demoting and promoting a DC with a different OS but with the same FQDN and IP, even if my environment was relatively small 3 DC one forest \ domain and not complex it could be done with the metadata cleanup procedure but the customer did not give the approval. So I have adopted the solution of VM replica. Scenario -----

Due to multiple security vulnerabilities, many companies, including AWS, have deprecated TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1.AWS Security Blog - TLS 1.2 to become the minimum TLS protocol level for all AWS API endpoints This could lead to customers not being able to backup into a repository based on AWS S3 Bucket.Veeam KB article was created to show the the error in VBR to help customers remediate this issue: https://www.veeam.com/kb4490  

IntroductionSOBR is a logical construct allowing a backup administrator to group storage extents together to form a multi-tier storage "pool" to ease the management of backups.The Performance Tier holds the "operational restore window" parts of the backups on-premises, typically on block or file-based storage, while both the Capacity and Archive Tiers allow expansions to Object Storage.The Capacity tier offers two types of offload operations:Copy Move (after x days).Note: You can combine both offload operations.When offloading backups to the Capacity Tier, the “.VBK” or “.VIB” shell is cracked open. Veeam backup Meta-Data and Data bits become Objects stored onto the Capacity Tier via PUT operations.Note: It is safe to assume that 99% of all objects created are backup Data bits, the rest is backup Meta-Data.With most public cloud providers, API operations are not free.If you are considering an "on-premises" Object Storage solution, be mindful of vendor-specific limitations in their abil

Hi Folks, I was just forced to watch for the first time an AI generated tutorial/presentation. This was not Veeam training but I decided to send out this feedback just in case anyone at Veeam is thinking about jumping on this bandwagon.All of this hype about Chat/AI etc crashed miserably in my eyes after watching this content. The AI generated lady doing the tutorial had less personality and sincerity than RD2 in Star wars (reminder RD2 could only beep and not speak). The phoney AI generated smile would have been better placed in the film Aliens on the monsters that emerged from people’s stomachs.Then there were the pronunciation errors. Living in Toronto I hear all sorts of different pronunciations in English but they normally add some spice to the discussion. Italian, French, Chinese etc native speakers all have different pronunciations and if anything they add flavour to the conversation. Machine AI however is horrendous. It will go along for a bit perfectly but then blurt out somet

Hi,In this topic I want to highlight the possibilities to archive a backup for a VM before you want to delete or decommision.Every company that uses VMs has to deal with deleting existing VMs, replacing them with new VMs because of migrating the application running on the VM, migrating because of using a new OS on the VM, …A lot of reasons why existing VMs will soon or later will be deleted or replaced by new ones. What do you want to do as a proper engineer before deleting the old VM? → Of course, you first want to take a backup before deleting the VM.I often had the situation where the customer needs something being restored/recovered of the deleted VM 😊Personally the best way for a VM that will be deleted, is having an independent full backup. Is that possible with Veeam 🤣? Sure, in my opinion, there are 2 easy ways to do that.Using VeeamZIPIf the VM is still available on your hypervisor, the easiest way is to use VeeamZIP.It creates an independent full backup (.VBK file), which y

Found a perplexing issue when I was setting up VB365 the other day.  I was attempting to set up the Restore Portal in my multitenant environment using Jorge’s guide (for v6 mind you, but close enough) but when I was attempting to create the Azure AD application, I was receiving a pretty non-descript error.Veeam Error:  “Failed to create Azure Active Directory application.” A bit of googling didn’t turn up much.  After a lot of troubleshooting, I did manage to get an error when attempting to use an existing Application ID that I had renamed/repurposed about an invalid name but wrote it off because it was a strange possible workaround.  I thought that perhaps it was a certificate issue, something wrong with the port I was using, REST API settings, etc.So, like any reasonable person, I created a support ticket and gathered logs.  Props to support for isolating the issue on first try quickly with the logs provided.  And indeed, Azure AD was blocking the application due to an invalid name. 

Good morning community!I'd like to share with you a configuration I've come across these days: setting up notifications with Microsoft 365 modern authentication for VBR and VBO365 server. DOCUMENTATIONThe official links from Veeam Helpcenter are:https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backup/vsphere/general_email_notifications.html?ver=120 https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/vbo365/guide/m365_acc.html?ver=70 VEEAM CONSOLE CONFIGURATIONConfiguration is quite simple for both: the menu is always in the same tab "email settings" for VBR and "notification" for VBO 365.  AZURE AD APPLICATIONThe biggest difference from accounts with basic authentication is that in order for Veeam to send email on behalf of a Microsoft 365 account, it is necessary to use an Azure AD application registered on the Azure Portal.You can use an application preinstalled by Veeam, or register a new one.In my case I followed the second way, and the official links from Veeam Helpcenter and from Microsoft are:https://helpcenter

Alt Text: Blog Post Title on colourful backgroundTell me if you’ve seen this situation before. You’ve got some servers & applications that need protecting. You create your backup jobs as necessary, there’s different backup jobs for your various application-integration requirements, backup frequencies, and retention requirements, it’s starting to sprawl. Inevitably there’s some job scheduling overlap. Backup jobs are waiting for other backup jobs to complete, the running tasks section of your Veeam Backup & Replication Server is ticking upwards, no biggie right? It’ll clear down eventually! Well… Let’s explore that shall we? Background/Test Scenario I wanted to see just how much having multiple running jobs would impact VBR, when those jobs were all in a pending state, barring one. I then wanted to compare this impact vs scheduling backup jobs within chains.I created a Windows VM, installed the OS, then powered it down, so I’d have a static test VM to backup. I configured my bac

I’ve been in IT my entire adult life. There is generally two mantras to IT. “If its not broken, don’t fix it.” “Update often.” “If its not broken, don’t fix it.”You know the people I’m talking about. “My uptime on this system is 1287 days! It is rock solid!”I get it. Its great to have a system you can rely on. Stability and system uptime is the holy grail. You want your systems to be 100% available because that means you can focus your time on more important tasks than break/fix.  These people are also a security expert’s nightmare. Vulnerabilities get exposed and new exploits are created regularly. Its not enough to protect your perimeter anymore, you have to protect every aspect of your environment.  This mantra has outlived its usefulness. Uptime of 1287 days on a system is no longer a badge of honour, its downright scary. We’re not talking highly available services here where you can take individual components down to patch them, we’re talking those individual components themselves

Hi all, Everyone that knows me knows that I am a massive Python geek and data science nerd outside of being a full time nerd. Anyway I’ve been working on a YouTube series on using the Veeam API with Python showing the long way and the easy way to connect, discover, manipulate and visualize data from the APIs.I will be doing deep dives later in the series as well as creating interesting apps and widgets with one of Python’s many libraries. I’ll also be branching off into other languages like C# and Golang overtime.The GitHub repo of all the Jupyter notebooks I am using in the series can be found here:https://github.com/shapedthought/veeam-api-and-python-youtube If you have any suggestions for reports or visualisations of data please let me know and I’ll try work them into the series.

I was lucky enough to be renewed in the first intake of 2023 Legends this year and completed a blog post about it.  Link to my blog as well - https://just-virtualization.tech/veeam-legends-program-renewed-for-2023 Veeam Legend 2023 It is official; I have been awarded Veeam Legends 2023 for the 2nd year. I received a great surprise in my email from Madalina Cristil (@MadiCristil), the manager of the Veeam Community Legends program, Rick Vanover (@rickvanover), Safiya Mohamed (@safiya), and Nikola Pejkova (@NikolaPejkova) I was renewed into the 2023 first intake. You can find out about the Veeam Legends program on the Community Hub here - Veeam Community Hub. It has been a great first year in the Legends program, and I was happy to contribute to helping the community. I look forward to another year and meeting many of the Legends in person at the #Veeam100 event in October. There are some great benefits to being a Legend - As a part of Veeam Legends, you’ll be eligible for unique content

Hi Folks, Being Monday I am in a bad mood and depressed about existence, questioning the meaning of life 🤣. Don’t worry it gets better by Wednesday and all cured by Friday. I have worked in IT for many years and vacations have always been an interesting intellectual study of the managerial species. I think it soon started after the year 2000. Y2K did not blow up the world so Managers everywhere decided that their many sins had gone unpunished. I can’t remember the first Manager who tried the “we are all just like family line” with me. Right away I knew that there was some horrible task that he wanted me to do during my vacation but did not want to pay more for it. He must have figured that a computer nerd social loser like myself had no friends and that my family were very happy that I was thousands of miles away. This was though back in the days before Twitter boss type sycophant  behaviour and “worship the boss for points” game, so I calmly answered that we could not be family genet

ALT TEXT: Banner with blog post title “Veeam & File Shares: Licensing & Feature Comparison” Hi!Today we’re going to talk about file shares and how to protect them. We’ll also look at how Veeam handles the various backup options available within the Veeam Universal License.File shares can take many forms, so we’re going to look at the following:A Physical/Virtual Server A NAS/SAN/Storage Device with File Share capabilities Azure Files Amazon EFS (Elastic File Systems) Physical & Virtual Servers Before Veeam introduced native file-share support for Veeam Backup & Replication, you could still backup physical or virtual servers. This was achieved via native hypervisor integrations, or the use of the Veeam Agent, on supported operating systems.When protecting servers that provide file shares from a traditional Windows/Linux/UNIX operating system, we license each server, without many considerations to the file shares themselves.There are a few considerations still to talk abo

I just had a situation in a customer environment where the customer complained that a restored VM had more disks than the one that was backed up before (6 instead of 5 for a SQL Server VM).The recovery was done using Entire VM Restore - User Guide for VMware vSphere (veeam.com).When restoring to the original location, Veeam prompts you that the original VM will be deleted first:At first, I though this was related to the user that Veeam uses to access vCenter no having the appropriate rights. For example, the user does not have permissions to delete the VM.But then I noticed that the additional disk to be 200GB in size. The old state the we wanted to restore only had 2x100, 2x300 and 1x500. So where did the 200GB disk come from?It turns out that the size of this disk was adjusted by the VMware team a few weeks ago (100 → 200). We wanted to restore from an older state with the 100GB still there. Could this be the reason? Does VBR leave resized disks being alone while recovering and adds