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User Manual: vmware vCenter Site Recovery Manager - 6.1 - Administration Guide Free User Guide for VMware vCenter Software, Manual

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Site Recovery Manager Administration
Site Recovery Manager 6.1

This document supports the version of each product listed and
supports all subsequent versions until the document is
replaced by a new edition. To check for more recent editions
of this document, see http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs.

EN-001772-01

Site Recovery Manager Administration

You can find the most up-to-date technical documentation on the VMware Web site at:
http://www.vmware.com/support/
The VMware Web site also provides the latest product updates.
If you have comments about this documentation, submit your feedback to:
docfeedback@vmware.com

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3401 Hillview Ave.
Palo Alto, CA 94304
www.vmware.com

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Contents

About VMware Site Recovery Manager Administration 7
Updated Information 9

1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions 11
How Site Recovery Manager Handles Permissions 12
Site Recovery Manager and the vCenter Server Administrator Role 13
Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication Roles 13
Managing Permissions in a Shared Recovery Site Configuration 14
Assign Site Recovery Manager Roles and Permissions 15
Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference 17

2 Replicating Virtual Machines 23

Using Array-Based Replication with Site Recovery Manager 23
Configure Array-Based Replication 24
Using vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager 28
Replicating a Virtual Machine and Enabling Multiple Point in Time Instances 29
Using Array-Based Replication and vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager 30

3 Configuring Mappings 33

Inventory Mappings for Array-Based Replication Protection Groups and vSphere Replication
Protection Groups 34
Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy Protection Groups 34
Configure Temporary Placeholder Mappings 35
Users Gain Access to Virtual Machines After Configuring Temporary Placeholder Mappings 37
Configure Inventory Mappings 37
About Storage Policy Mappings 39
Select Storage Policy Mappings 39

4 About Placeholder Virtual Machines 41

What Happens to Placeholder Virtual Machines During Recovery
Select a Placeholder Datastore 43

5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups 45

About Array-Based Replication Protection Groups and Datastore Groups
How Site Recovery Manager Computes Datastore Groups 46
About vSphere Replication Protection Groups 47
About Storage Policy Protection Groups 48
Prerequisites for Storage Policy Protection Groups 49
Limitations of Storage Policy Protection Groups 50
Storage Policy Protection Groups and Periodic Polling 52

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Storage Policy Protection Groups and Nonprotected Virtual Machines

Create Protection Groups 53
Organize Protection Groups in Folders 55
Add or Remove Datastore Groups or Virtual Machines to or from a Protection Group 56
Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a Protection Group 57
Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection Group 58
Modifying the Settings of a Protected Virtual Machine 59
Remove Protection from a Virtual Machine 60
Protection Group Status Reference 61
Virtual Machine Protection Status Reference

6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans 65

Testing a Recovery Plan 66
Test Networks and Datacenter Networks 67
Performing a Planned Migration or Disaster Recovery By Running a Recovery Plan 67
Running a Recovery with Forced Recovery 68
Differences Between Testing and Running a Recovery Plan 69
Performing Test Recovery of Virtual Machines Across Multiple Hosts on the Recovery Site 70
Create, Test, and Run a Recovery Plan 70
Create a Recovery Plan 71
Organize Recovery Plans in Folders 71
Edit a Recovery Plan 72
Test a Recovery Plan 72
Clean Up After Testing a Recovery Plan 73
Run a Recovery Plan 74
Recover a Point-in-Time Snapshot of a Virtual Machine 75
Cancel a Test or Recovery 76
Export Recovery Plan Steps 76
View and Export a Recovery Plan History 77
Delete a Recovery Plan 77
Recovery Plan Status Reference 77

7 Configuring a Recovery Plan 81

Recovery Plan Steps 81
Creating Custom Recovery Steps 82
Types of Custom Recovery Steps 83
How Site Recovery Manager Handles Custom Recovery Step Failures 84
Create Top-Level Message Prompts or Command Steps 84
Create Message Prompts or Command Steps for Individual Virtual Machines 85
Guidelines for Writing Command Steps 86
Environment Variables for Command Steps 86
Suspend Virtual Machines When a Recovery Plan Runs 87
Specify the Recovery Priority of a Virtual Machine 88
Configure Virtual Machine Dependencies 88
Enable vSphere vMotion for Planned Migration 89
Configure Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown Options 90
Limitations to Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines 91

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Contents

8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines 93

Manually Customize IP Properties For an Individual Virtual Machine 94
Customizing IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines 95
Customizing IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines By Using the DR IP Customizer Tool 95
Customize IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines by Defining IP Customization Rules 109

9 Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery 111

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Array Based Replication 112
How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with vSphere Replication 113
How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage Policy Protection 113
Preconditions for Performing Reprotect 114
Reprotect Virtual Machines 115
Reprotect States 115

10 Restoring the Pre-Recovery Site Configuration By Performing Failback 117
Perform a Failback

118

11 Interoperability of Site Recovery Manager with Other Software 121

Site Recovery Manager and vCenter Server 122
Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware Virtual SAN Storage and vSphere Replication 122
How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with DPM and DRS During Recovery 123
How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Storage DRS or Storage vMotion 123
Using Site Recovery Manager with Array-Based Replication on Sites with Storage DRS or
Storage vMotion 123
Using Site Recovery Manager with vSphere Replication on Sites with Storage DRS or Storage
vMotion 124
How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with vSphere High Availability 125
How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Stretched Storage 125
Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware NSX 127
Site Recovery Manager and vSphere PowerCLI 127
Site Recovery Manager and vRealize Orchestrator 128
Automated Operations That the vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for Site Recovery Manager
Provides 128
Protecting Microsoft Cluster Server and Fault Tolerant Virtual Machines 130
Using Site Recovery Manager with SIOC Datastores 131
Using Site Recovery Manager with Admission Control Clusters 131
Site Recovery Manager and Virtual Machines Attached to RDM Disk Devices 132
Site Recovery Manager and Active Directory Domain Controllers 132

12 Advanced Site Recovery Manager Configuration 133

Reconfigure Site Recovery Manager Settings 133
Change Connections Settings 133
Change Site Recovery Manager History Report Collection Setting
Change Local Site Settings 134
Change Logging Settings 135
Change Recovery Settings 137
Change Remote Manager Settings 140
Change Remote Site Settings 141

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134

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Change Replication Settings

141

Change SSO Setting 142
Change Storage Settings 142
Change ABR Storage Policy Setting 143
Change Storage Provider Settings 144
Change vSphere Replication Settings 146
Modify Settings to Run Large Site Recovery Manager Environments
Settings for Large Site Recovery Manager Environments 148

13 Site Recovery Manager Events and Alarms 151

How Site Recovery Manager Monitors Connections Between Sites
Configure Site Recovery Manager Alarms 152
Site Recovery Manager Events Reference 153

14 Collecting Site Recovery Manager Log Files 163

147

151

Collect Site Recovery Manager Log Files By Using the Site Recovery Manager Interface
Collect Site Recovery Manager Log Files Manually 164
Change Size and Number of Site Recovery Manager Server Log Files 164
Configure Site Recovery Manager Core Dumps 166

163

15 Troubleshooting Site Recovery Manager 169

Site Recovery Manager Doubles the Number of Backslashes in the Command Line When Running
Callouts 170
Powering on Many Virtual Machines Simultaneously on the Recovery Site Can Lead to Errors 171
LVM.enableResignature=1 Remains Set After a Site Recovery Manager Test Recovery 171
Adding Virtual Machines to a Protection Group Fails with an Unresolved Devices Error 172
Configuring Protection fails with Placeholder Creation Error 172
Rapid Deletion and Recreation of Placeholders Fails 173
Planned Migration Fails Because Host is in an Incorrect State 173
Recovery Fails with a Timeout Error During Network Customization for Some Virtual Machines 174
Recovery Fails with Unavailable Host and Datastore Error 174
Reprotect Fails with a vSphere Replication Timeout Error 175
Recovery Plan Times Out While Waiting for VMware Tools 175
Synchronization Fails for vSphere Replication Protection Groups 175
Rescanning Datastores Fails Because Storage Devices are Not Ready 176
Recovery Sticks at 36% During Planned Migration 177
Operations Fail with Error About a Nonreplicated Configuration File 177

Index

179

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About VMware Site Recovery Manager
Administration

VMware Site Recovery Manager is an extension to VMware vCenter Server that delivers a business
continuity and disaster recovery solution that helps you plan, test, and run the recovery of vCenter Server
virtual machines. Site Recovery Manager can discover and manage replicated datastores, and automate
migration of inventory from one vCenter Server instance to another.

Intended Audience
This book is intended for Site Recovery Manager administrators who are familiar with vSphere and its
replication technologies, such as host-based replication and replicated datastores. This solution serves the
needs of administrators who want to configure protection for their vSphere inventory. It might also be
appropriate for users who need to add virtual machines to a protected inventory or to verify that an existing
inventory is properly configured for use with Site Recovery Manager.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

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Updated Information

Site Recovery Manager Administration is updated with each release of the product or when necessary.
This table provides the update history of Site Recovery Manager Administration.
Revision

Description

EN-001772-01

n
n
n
n
n
n
n
n
n
n

EN-001772-00

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Revised and expanded the information in “Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy Protection
Groups,” on page 34.
Revised and expanded the information about storage policy protection groups throughout Chapter 5,
“Creating and Managing Protection Groups,” on page 45.
Added stretched storage information to “Recovery Plan Steps,” on page 81.
Added “Enable vSphere vMotion for Planned Migration,” on page 89.
Added “How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage Policy Protection,”
on page 113.
Corrected the supported version of VMware Virtual SAN in “Using Site Recovery Manager with
VMware Virtual SAN Storage and vSphere Replication,” on page 122.
Added “How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Stretched Storage,” on page 125.
Added “Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware NSX,” on page 127.
Revised and expanded “Recovery Plan Steps,” on page 81, adding subtopics about adding recovery
settings to VMs in a recovery plan and in a protection group.
Added “Operations Fail with Error About a Nonreplicated Configuration File,” on page 177.

Initial release.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Privileges,
Roles, and Permissions

Site Recovery Manager provides disaster recovery by performing operations for users. These operations
involve managing objects, such as recovery plans or protection groups, and performing operations, such as
replicating or powering off virtual machines. Site Recovery Manager uses roles and permissions so that only
users with the correct roles and permissions can perform operations.
Site Recovery Manager adds several roles to vCenter Server, each of which includes privileges to complete
Site Recovery Manager and vCenter Server tasks. You assign roles to users to permit them to complete tasks
in Site Recovery Manager.
Privilege

The right to perform an action, for example to create a recovery plan or to
modify a protection group.

Role

A collection of privileges. Default roles provide the privileges that certain
users require to perform a set of Site Recovery Manager tasks, for example
users who manage protection groups or perform recoveries. A user can have
at most one role on an object, but roles can be combined if the user belongs to
multiple groups that all have roles on the object.

Permission

A role granted to a particular user or user group on a specific object. A user
or user group is also known as a principal. A permission is a combination of
a role, an object, and a principal. For example, a permission is the privilege to
modify a specific protection group.

For information about the roles that Site Recovery Manager adds to vCenter Server and the privileges that
users require to complete tasks, see “Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference,” on page 17.
n

How Site Recovery Manager Handles Permissions on page 12
Site Recovery Manager determines whether a user has permission to perform an operation, such as
configuring protection or running the individual steps in a recovery plan. This permission check
ensures the correct authentication of the user, but it does not represent the security context in which
the operation is performed.

Site Recovery Manager and the vCenter Server Administrator Role on page 13
If a user or user group has the vCenter Server administrator role on a vCenter Server instance when
you install Site Recovery Manager, that user or user group obtains all Site Recovery Manager
privileges.

Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication Roles on page 13
When you install vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager, the vCenter Server administrator
role inherits all of the Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication privileges.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Managing Permissions in a Shared Recovery Site Configuration on page 14
You can configure permissions on Site Recovery Manager to use a shared recovery site. The
vCenter Server administrator on the shared recovery site must manage permissions so that each user
has sufficient privileges to configure and use Site Recovery Manager, but no user has access to
resources that belong to another user.

Assign Site Recovery Manager Roles and Permissions on page 15
During installation of Site Recovery Manager, users with the vCenter Server administrator role are
granted the administrator role on Site Recovery Manager. At this time, only vCenter Server
administrators can log in to Site Recovery Manager, unless they explicitly grant access to other users.

Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference on page 17
Site Recovery Manager includes a set of roles. Each role includes a set of privileges, which allow users
with those roles to complete different actions.

How Site Recovery Manager Handles Permissions
Site Recovery Manager determines whether a user has permission to perform an operation, such as
configuring protection or running the individual steps in a recovery plan. This permission check ensures the
correct authentication of the user, but it does not represent the security context in which the operation is
performed.
Site Recovery Manager performs operations in the security context of the user ID that is used to connect the
sites, or in the context of the ID under which the Site Recovery Manager service is running, for example, the
local system ID.
After Site Recovery Manager verifies that a user has the appropriate permissions on the target vSphere
resources, Site Recovery Manager performs operations on behalf of users by using the vSphere
administrator role.
For operations that configure protection on virtual machines, Site Recovery Manager validates the user
permissions when the user requests the operation. Operations require two phases of validation.
1

During configuration, Site Recovery Manager verifies that the user configuring the system has the
correct permissions to complete the configuration on the vCenter Server object. For example, a user
must have permission to protect a virtual machine and use resources on the secondary vCenter Server
instance that the recovered virtual machine uses.

The user performing the configuration must have the correct permissions to complete the task that they
are configuring. For example, a user must have permissions to run a recovery plan.
Site Recovery Manager then completes the task on behalf of the user as a vCenter Server administrator.

As a result, a user who completes a particular task, such as a recovery, does not necessarily require
permissions to act on vSphere resources. The user only requires the permission to run a recovery in
Site Recovery Manager. The role authorizes the action, but the action is performed by
Site Recovery Manager acting as an administrator. Site Recovery Manager performs the operations by using
the administrator credentials that you provide when you connect the protected and recovery sites.
Site Recovery Manager maintains a database of permissions for internal Site Recovery Manager objects that
uses a model similar to the one the vCenter Server uses. Site Recovery Manager verifies its own
Site Recovery Manager privileges even on vCenter Server objects. For example, Site Recovery Manager
checks for the Resource.Recovery Use permission on the target datastore rather than checking multiple lowlevel permissions, such as Allocate space. Site Recovery Manager also verifies the permissions on the
remote vCenter Server instance.
To use Site Recovery Manager with vSphere Replication, you must assign vSphere Replication roles to users
as well as Site Recovery Manager roles. For information about vSphere Replication roles, see
vSphere Replication Administration.

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Chapter 1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions

Site Recovery Manager and the vCenter Server Administrator Role
If a user or user group has the vCenter Server administrator role on a vCenter Server instance when you
install Site Recovery Manager, that user or user group obtains all Site Recovery Manager privileges.
If you assign the vCenter Server administrator role to users or user groups after you install
Site Recovery Manager, you must manually assign the Site Recovery Manager roles to those users on
Site Recovery Manager objects.
You can assign Site Recovery Manager roles to users or user groups that do not have the vCenter Server
administrator role. In this case, those users have permission to perform Site Recovery Manager operations,
but they do not have permission to perform all vCenter Server operations.

Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication Roles
When you install vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager, the vCenter Server administrator role
inherits all of the Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication privileges.
If you manually assign a Site Recovery Manager role to a user or user group, or if you assign a
Site Recovery Manager role to a user or user group that is not a vCenter Server administrator, these users do
not obtain vSphere Replication privileges. The Site Recovery Manager roles do not include the privileges of
the vSphere Replication roles. For example, the Site Recovery Manager Recovery Administrator role
includes the privilege to run recovery plans, including recovery plans that contain vSphere Replication
protection groups, but it does not include the privilege to configure vSphere Replication on a virtual
machine. The separation of the Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication roles allows you to
distribute responsibilities between different users. For example, one user with the VRM administrator role is
responsible for configuring vSphere Replication on virtual machines, and another user with the
Site Recovery Manager Recovery Administrator role is responsible for running recoveries.
In some cases, a user who is not vCenter Server administrator might require the privileges to perform both
Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication operations. To assign a combination of
Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication roles to a single user, you can add the user to two user
groups.

Example: Assign Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication Roles to a
User
By creating two user groups, you can grant to a user the privileges of both a Site Recovery Manager role and
a vSphere Replication role, without that user being a vCenter Server administrator.
1

Create two user groups.

Assign a Site Recovery Manager role to one user group, for example Site Recovery Manager
administrator.

Assign a vSphere Replication role to the other user group, for example VRM administrator.

Add the user to both user groups.

The user has all the privileges of the Site Recovery Manager administrator role and of the VRM
administrator role.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Managing Permissions in a Shared Recovery Site Configuration
You can configure permissions on Site Recovery Manager to use a shared recovery site. The vCenter Server
administrator on the shared recovery site must manage permissions so that each user has sufficient
privileges to configure and use Site Recovery Manager, but no user has access to resources that belong to
another user.
In the context of a shared recovery site, a user is the owner of a pair of Site Recovery Manager Server
instances. Users with adequate permissions must be able to access the shared recovery site to create, test,
and run the recovery plans for their own protected site. The vCenter Server administrator at the shared
recovery site must create a separate user group for each user. No user's user accounts can be a member of
the vCenter Server Administrators group. The only supported configuration for a shared recovery site is for
one organization to manage all of the protected sites and the recovery site.
CAUTION Certain Site Recovery Manager roles allow users to run commands on
Site Recovery Manager Server, so you should assign these roles to trusted administrator-level users only.
See “Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference,” on page 17 for the list of Site Recovery Manager roles that
run commands on Site Recovery Manager Server.
On a shared recovery site, multiple customers share a single vCenter Server instance. In some cases,
multiple customers can share a single ESXi host on the recovery site. You can map the resources on the
protected sites to shared resources on the shared recovery site. You might share resources on the recovery
site if you do not need to keep all of the customers' virtual machines separate, for example if all of the
customers belong to the same organization.
You can also create isolated resources on the shared recovery site and map the resources on the protected
sites to their own dedicated resources on the shared recovery site. You might use this configuration if you
must keep all of the customers' virtual machines separate from each other, for example if all of the
customers belong to different organizations.

Guidelines for Sharing User Resources
Follow these guidelines when you configure permissions for sharing user resources on the shared recovery
site:
n

All users must have read access to all folders of the vCenter Server on the shared recovery site.

Do not give a user the permission to rename, move, or delete the datacenter or host.

Do not give a user the permission to create virtual machines outside of the user’s dedicated folders and
resource pools.

Do not allow a user to change roles or assign permissions for objects that are not dedicated to the user’s
own use.

To prevent unwanted propagation of permissions across different organizations’ resources, do not
propagate permissions on the root folder, datacenters, and hosts of the vCenter Server on the shared
recovery site.

Guidelines for Isolating User Resources
Follow these guidelines when you configure permissions for isolating user resources on the shared recovery
site:
n

Assign to each user a separate virtual machine folder in the vCenter Server inventory.
Set permissions on this folder to prevent any other user from placing their virtual machines in it.
For example, set the Administrator role and activate the propagate option for a user on that user's
folder. This configuration prevents duplicate name errors that might otherwise occur if multiple
users protect virtual machines that have identical names.

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Chapter 1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions

Place all of the user's placeholder virtual machines in this folder, so that they can inherit its
permissions.

Do not assign permissions to access this folder to other users.

Assign dedicated resource pools, datastores, and networks to each user, and configure the permissions
in the same way as for folders.

CAUTION A deployment in which you isolate user resources still assumes trust between the vSphere sites.
Even though you can isolate user resources, you cannot isolate the users themselves. This is not a suitable
deployment if you must keep all users completely separate.

Viewing Tasks and Events in a Shared Recovery Site Configuration
In the Recent Tasks panel of the vSphere Client, users who have permissions to view an object can see tasks
that other users start on that object. All users can see all of the tasks that other users perform on a shared
resource. For example, all users can see the tasks that run on a shared host, datacenter, or the vCenter Server
root folder.
Events that all of the instances of Site Recovery Manager Server generate on a shared recovery site have
identical permissions. All users who can see events from one instance of Site Recovery Manager Server can
see events from all Site Recovery Manager Server instances that are running on the shared recovery site.

Assign Site Recovery Manager Roles and Permissions
During installation of Site Recovery Manager, users with the vCenter Server administrator role are granted
the administrator role on Site Recovery Manager. At this time, only vCenter Server administrators can log in
to Site Recovery Manager, unless they explicitly grant access to other users.
To allow other users to access Site Recovery Manager, vCenter Server administrators must grant them
permissions in the Site Recovery Manager interface in the vSphere Web Client. You assign site-wide
permission assignments on a per-site basis. You must add corresponding permissions on both sites.
Site Recovery Manager requires permissions on vCenter Server objects as well as on Site Recovery Manager
objects. To configure permissions on the remote vCenter Server installation, start another instance of the
vSphere Web Client. You can change Site Recovery Manager permissions from the same
vSphere Web Client instance on both sites after you connect the protected and recovery sites.
Site Recovery Manager augments vCenter Server roles and permissions with additional permissions that
allow detailed control over Site Recovery Manager specific tasks and operations. For information about the
permissions that each Site Recovery Manager role includes, see “Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference,”
on page 17.
You can assign more granular permissions to users by assigning them permissions on specific
Site Recovery Manager objects, including individual array managers, protection groups, and recovery plans.
You can also allow users to access specific groups of protections groups, recovery plans, and array managers
by assigning permissions to protection group and recovery plan folders, and to all of the array managers for
a site.
Procedure
1

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In the vSphere Web Client, select the objects on which to assign permissions.
Option

Description

Assign site-wide permissions

Click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

Assign permissions to an individual
protection group

Click Site Recovery, expand Inventories, click Protection Groups, and
select a protection group.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Option

Description

Assign permissions to a protection
group folder

Click Site Recovery, expand Inventory Trees, click Protection Groups and
select a protection group folder. You can assign permissions to the root
folder or to a subfolder.

Assign permissions to an individual
recovery plan

Click Site Recovery, expand Inventories, click Recovery Plans, and select
a recovery plan.

Assign permissions to a recovery
plan folder

Click Site Recovery, expand Inventory Trees, click Recovery Plans and
select a recovery plan folder. You can assign permissions to the root folder
or to a subfolder.

Assign permissions to an individual
array manager

Click Site Recovery > Array Based Replication, and select an array
manager.

Assign permissions to all array
managers for a site

Click Site Recovery, expand Inventory Trees, click Array Based
Replication and select a site folder.

In the Manage tab, click Permissions, then click the Add Permission icon.

Identify a user or group for the role.

Click Add in the Users and Groups column.

From the Domain drop-down menu, select the domain that contains the user or group.

Enter a user or user group name in the Search text box or select a name from the User/Group list.

Click Add and click OK.

Select a role from the Assigned Role drop-down menu to assign to the user or user group that you
selected in Step 3.
The Assigned Role drop-down menu includes all of the roles that vCenter Server and its plug-ins make
available. Site Recovery Manager adds several roles to vCenter Server.
Option

Action

Allow a user or user group to
perform all Site Recovery Manager
configuration and administration
operations.

Assign the SRM Administrator role.

Allow a user or user group to
manage and modify protection
groups and to configure protection
on virtual machines.

Assign the SRM Protection Groups Administrator role.

Allow a user or user group to
perform recoveries and test
recoveries.

Assign the SRM Recovery Administrator role.

Allow a user or user group to
create, modify, and test recovery
plans.

Assign the SRM Recovery Plans Administrator role.

Allow a user or user group to test
recovery plans.

Assign the SRM Recovery Test Administrator role.

When you select a role, the hierarchical list displays the privileges that the role includes. Click a
privilege in the hierarchical list to see a description of that privilege. You cannot modify the list of
privileges that each role includes.

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Chapter 1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions

Select Propagate to Children to apply the selected role to all of the child objects of the inventory objects
that this role can affect.
For example, if a role contains privileges to modify folders, selecting this option extends the privileges
to all the virtual machines in a folder. You might deselect this option to create a more complex
hierarchy of permissions. For example, deselect this option to override the permissions that are
propagated from the root of a certain node from the hierarchy tree, but without overriding the
permissions of the child objects of that node.

Click OK to assign the role and its associated privileges to the user or user group.

Repeat Step 2 through Step 6 to assign roles and privileges to the users or user groups on the other
Site Recovery Manager site.

You assigned a given Site Recovery Manager role to a user or user group. This user or user group has
privileges to perform the actions that the role defines on the objects on the Site Recovery Manager site that
you configured.

Example: Combining Site Recovery Manager Roles
You can assign only one role to a user or user group. If a user who is not a vCenter Server administrator
requires the privileges of more than one Site Recovery Manager role, you can create multiple user groups.
For example, a user might require the privileges to manage recovery plans and to run recovery plans.
1

Create two user groups.

Assign the SRM Recovery Plans Administrator role to one group.

Assign the SRM Recovery Administrator role to the other group.

Add the user to both user groups.

By being a member of groups that have both the SRM Recovery Plans Administrator and the SRM
Recovery Administrator roles, the user can manage recovery plans and run recoveries.

Site Recovery Manager Roles Reference
Site Recovery Manager includes a set of roles. Each role includes a set of privileges, which allow users with
those roles to complete different actions.
Roles can have overlapping sets of privileges and actions. For example, the Site Recovery Manager
Administrator role and the Site Recovery Manager Protection Groups Administrator have the Create
privilege for protection groups. With this privilege, the user can complete one aspect of the set of tasks that
make up the management of protection groups.
Assign roles to users on Site Recovery Manager objects consistently on both sites, so that protected and
recovery objects have identical permissions.
All users must have at least the System.Read privilege on the root folders of vCenter Server and the
Site Recovery Manager root nodes on both sites.
NOTE If you uninstall Site Recovery Manager Server, Site Recovery Manager removes the default
Site Recovery Manager roles but the Site Recovery Manager privileges remain. You can still see and assign
Site Recovery Manager privileges on other roles after uninstalling Site Recovery Manager. This is standard
vCenter Server behavior. Privileges are not removed when you unregister an extension from vCenter Server.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Table 1‑1. Site Recovery Manager Roles

Role
Site Recovery
Manager
Administrator

Site Recovery
Manager Protection
Groups
Administrator

Actions that this
Role Permits

Privileges that this Role Includes

The
Site Recovery
Manager
Administrator grants
permission to perform
all
Site Recovery
Manager
configuration and
administration
operations.
n Configure
advanced settings.
n Configure
connections.
n Configure
inventory
preferences.
n Configure
placeholder
datastores.
n Configure array
managers.
n Manage
protection groups.
n Manage recovery
plans.
n Perform reprotect
operations.
n Configure
protection on
virtual machines.
n Edit protection
groups.
n Remove
protection groups.
n View storage
policy objects.
Users with this role
cannot run recoveries.
Only users with the
Site Recovery
Manager Recovery
Administrator role can
perform recoveries.

Site Recovery Manager.Advanced Settings.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Array Manager.Configure
Site Recovery Manager.Diagnostics.Export
Site Recovery Manager.Inventory Preferences.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Placeholder
Datastores.Configure
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Assign to
Plan
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Create
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Remove
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Remove from
Plan
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery History .View
Deleted Plans
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Configure
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Create
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Remove
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Reprotect
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Test
Site Recovery Manager.Remote Site.Modify
Datastore.Replication.Protect
Datastore.Replication.Unprotect.Stop
Resource.Recovery Use
Virtual Machine. SRM Protection.Protect
Virtual Machine. SRM Protection.Stop
Site Recovery Manager.Profile-driven storage.Profiledriven storage view

The
Site Recovery
Manager Protection
Groups Administrator
role allows users to
manage protection
groups.

Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Create
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Remove
Datastore.Replication.Protect
Datastore.Replication.Unprotect.Stop
Resource.Recovery Use

Objects in
vCenter
Server
Inventory
that this
Role Can
Access
n

n
n

Virtual
machin
es
Datasto
res
vCenter
Server
folders
Resourc
e pools
Site
Recover
y
Manage
r
service
instance
s
Networ
ks
Site
Recover
y
Manage
r
folders
Protecti
on
groups
Recover
y plans
Array
manage
rs

Site
Recover
y
Manage
r
folders

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions

Table 1‑1. Site Recovery Manager Roles (Continued)

Role

Site Recovery
Manager Recovery
Administrator

VMware, Inc.

Actions that this
Role Permits

Privileges that this Role Includes

Objects in
vCenter
Server
Inventory
that this
Role Can
Access

Create protection
groups.
n Modify protection
groups.
n Add virtual
machines to
protection groups.
n Delete protection
groups.
n Configure
protection on
virtual machines.
n Remove
protection from
virtual machines.
Users with this role
cannot perform or test
recoveries or create or
modify recovery
plans.

Virtual Machine. SRM Protection.Protect
Virtual Machine. SRM Protection.Stop

Protecti
on
groups

The
Site Recovery
Manager Recovery
Administrator role
allows users to
perform recoveries
and reprotect
operations.
n Remove
protection groups
from recovery
plans.
n Test recovery
plans.
n Run recovery
plans.
n Run reprotect
operations.
n Configure custom
command steps
on virtual
machines.
n View deleted
recovery plans.
n Edit virtual
machine recovery
properties.
Users with this role
cannot configure
protection on virtual
machines, or create or
modify recovery
plans.

Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Remove from
plan
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Test
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Recovery
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Reprotect
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery
Plan.Configure.Configure commands
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery History.View deleted
plans

Protecti
on
groups
Recover
y plans
Site
Recover
y
Manage
r
service
instance
s

n
n

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Table 1‑1. Site Recovery Manager Roles (Continued)

Role
Site Recovery
Manager Recovery
Plans Administrator

Site Recovery
Manager Test
Administrator

Actions that this
Role Permits

Privileges that this Role Includes

The
Site Recovery
Manager Recovery
Plans Administrator
role allows users to
create and test
recovery plans.
n Add protection
groups to
recovery plans.
n Remove
protection groups
from recovery
plans.
n Configure custom
command steps
on virtual
machines.
n Create recovery
plans.
n Test recovery
plans.
n Cancel recovery
plan tests.
n Edit virtual
machine recovery
properties.
Users with this role
cannot configure
protection on virtual
machines, or perform
recoveries or reprotect
operations.

Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Assign to
plan
Site Recovery Manager.Protection Group.Remove from
plan
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Configure
Commands
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Create
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Remove
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Test
Resource.Recovery Use

The
Site Recovery
Manager Test
Administrator role
only allows users to
test recovery plans.
n Test recovery
plans.
n Cancel recovery
plan tests.
n Edit virtual
machine recovery
properties.
Users with this role
cannot configure
protection on virtual
machines, create

Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Modify
Site Recovery Manager.Recovery Plan.Test

Objects in
vCenter
Server
Inventory
that this
Role Can
Access
n

n
n

n
n
n

Protecti
on
groups
Recover
y plans
vCenter
Server
folders
Datasto
res
Resourc
e pools
Networ
ks

Recovery
plans

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 1 Site Recovery Manager Privileges, Roles, and Permissions

Table 1‑1. Site Recovery Manager Roles (Continued)

Role

Actions that this
Role Permits

Privileges that this Role Includes

Objects in
vCenter
Server
Inventory
that this
Role Can
Access

protection groups or
recovery plans, or
perform recoveries or
reprotect operations.

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

VMware, Inc.

Replicating Virtual Machines

Before you create protection groups, you must configure replication on the virtual machines to protect.
You can replicate virtual machines by using either array-based replication, vSphere Replication, or a
combination of both.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“Using Array-Based Replication with Site Recovery Manager,” on page 23

“Using vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager,” on page 28

“Using Array-Based Replication and vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager,” on page 30

Using Array-Based Replication with Site Recovery Manager
When you use array-based replication, one or more storage arrays at the protected site replicate data to peer
arrays at the recovery site. With storage replication adapters (SRAs), you can integrate
Site Recovery Manager with a wide variety of arrays.
To use array-based replication with Site Recovery Manager, you must configure replication first before you
can configure Site Recovery Manager to use it.
If your storage array supports consistency groups, Site Recovery Manager is compatible with vSphere
Storage DRS and vSphere Storage vMotion. You can use Storage DRS and Storage vMotion to move virtual
machine files within a consistency group that Site Recovery Manager protects. If your storage array does not
support consistency groups, you cannot use Storage DRS and Storage vMotion in combination with
Site Recovery Manager.
You can protect virtual machines that contain disks that use VMware vSphere Flash Read Cache storage.
Since the host to which a virtual machine recovers might not be configured for Flash Read Cache,
Site Recovery Manager disables Flash Read Cache on disks when it starts the virtual machines on the
recovery site. Site Recovery Manager sets the reservation to zero. Before performing a recovery on a virtual
machine that is configured to use vSphere Flash Read Cache, take a note of virtual machine's cache
reservation from the vSphere Web Client. After the recovery, you can migrate the virtual machine to a host
with Flash Read Cache storage and manually restore the original Flash Read Cache setting on the virtual
machine.
If you protect virtual machines by using storage policy protection groups, you must replicate those virtual
machines by using array-based replication.

Storage Replication Adapters
Storage replication adapters are not part of a Site Recovery Manager release. Your array vendor develops
and supports them. You must install an SRA specific to each array that you use with Site Recovery Manager
on the Site Recovery Manager Server host. Site Recovery Manager supports the use of multiple SRAs.

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Figure 2‑1. Site Recovery Manager Architecture with Array-Based Replication
Protected Site

Recovery Site

vSphere Web Client

SRM plug-in

SRA

SRM Server

vCenter Server

ESXi
Server

Storage
VMFS

vCenter Server

SRM Server

ESXi
Server

Array based replication

VMFS

ESXi
Server

Storage
VMFS

VMFS

Configure Array-Based Replication
To protect virtual machines that you replicate by using array-based replication, including virtual machines
that you protect by using storage policy protection groups, you must configure storage replication adapters
(SRAs) at each site.

Install Storage Replication Adapters
If you protect virtual machines by using array-based replication or by using array-based replication with
storage policy protection, you must install a Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) specific to each storage
array that you use with Site Recovery Manager. An SRA is a program that an array vendor provides that
enables Site Recovery Manager to work with a specific kind of array.
You must install an appropriate SRA on the Site Recovery Manager Server hosts at the protected and
recovery sites. If you use more than one type of storage array, you must install the SRA for each type of
array on both of the Site Recovery Manager Server hosts.
NOTE You can configure Site Recovery Manager to use more than one type of storage array, but you cannot
store the virtual machine disks for a single virtual machine on multiple arrays from different vendors. You
must store all of the disks for a virtual machine on the same array.
Storage replication adapters come with their own installation instructions. You must install the version of an
SRA that corresponds to a specific Site Recovery Manager version. Install the same version of the SRA at
both sites. Do not mix SRA versions.
If you are using vSphere Replication, you do not require an SRA.
Prerequisites
n

Check the availability of an SRA for your type of storage by consulting the VMware Compatibility Guide
for Site Recovery Manager at
http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php?deviceCategory=sra.

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 2 Replicating Virtual Machines

Download the SRA by going to https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/downloads, selecting VMware
vCenter Site Recovery Manager > Download Product, then selecting Drivers & Tools > Storage
Replication Adapters > Go to Downloads.

If you obtain an SRA from a different vendor site, verify that it has been certified for the
Site Recovery Manager release you are using by checking the VMware Compatibility Guide for
Site Recovery Manager at
http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php?deviceCategory=sra.

Read the documentation provided with your SRA. SRAs do not support all features that storage arrays
support. The documentation that your SRA provides details what the SRA supports and requires. For
example, HP and EMC have detailed physical requirements which must be met for the SRA to perform
as expected.

Install Site Recovery Manager Server before you install the SRAs.

Your SRA might require the installation of other vendor-provided components. You might need to
install some of these components on the Site Recovery Manager Server host. Other components might
require only network access by the Site Recovery Manager Server. For the latest information on such
requirements, review the release notes and readme files for the SRAs you are installing.

Enable the storage array's capability to create snapshot copies of the replicated devices. See your SRA
documentation.

Procedure
1

Install the SRA on each Site Recovery Manager Server host.
The installer installs the SRA in C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery
Manager\storage\sra.

In the vSphere Web Client, go to Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

In the Monitor tab, click SRAs, and click the Rescan SRAs button.
This action refreshes SRA information, allowing Site Recovery Manager to discover the SRAs.

Configure Array Managers
After you pair the protected site and recovery site, configure their respective array managers so that
Site Recovery Manager can discover replicated devices, compute datastore groups, and initiate storage
operations.
You typically configure array managers only once after you connect the sites. You do not need to
reconfigure them unless array manager connection information or credentials change, or you want to use a
different set of arrays.
Prerequisites
n

Connect the sites as described in Connect the Protected and Recovery Sites in Site Recovery Manager
Installation and Configuration.

Install SRAs at both sites as described in “Install Storage Replication Adapters,” on page 24.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Array Based Replication.

In the Objects tab, click the icon to add an array manager.

Select from two options:

VMware, Inc.

Add a pair of array managers

Add a single array manager

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Select a site or pair of sites for the array manager and click Next.

Select the array manager type that you want Site Recovery Manager to use from the SRA Type table
and click Next.
If no manager type appears, rescan for SRAs or check that you have installed an SRA on the
Site Recovery Manager Server host.

Enter a name for the array in the Display Name text box and click Next..
Use a descriptive name that makes it easy for you to identify the storage associated with this array
manager.

Provide the required information for the type of SRA you selected.
For more information about how to fill in these text boxes, see the documentation that your SRA vendor
provides. Text boxes vary between SRAs, but common text boxes include IP address, protocol
information, mapping between array names and IP addresses, and user name and password.

If you chose to add a pair of array managers, on the Enable array pairs page, select the the array pair to
enable, then click Next.
You can also configure array pairs in the single option mode if the array manager on the peer site is
already created.

Review the configuration and click Finish.

Repeat steps to configure an array manager for the recovery site, if necessary.

Rescan Arrays to Detect Configuration Changes
By default, Site Recovery Manager checks arrays for changes to device configurations by rescanning arrays
every 24 hours. However, you can force an array rescan at any time.
You can reconfgure the frequency with which Site Recovery Manager performs regular array scans by
changing the storage.minDsGroupComputationInterval option in Advanced Settings. See Change Storage
Settings.
Configuring array managers causes Site Recovery Manager to compute datastore groups based on the set of
replicated storage devices that it discovers. If you change the configuration of the array at either site to add
or remove devices, Site Recovery Manager must rescan the arrays and recompute the datastore groups.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Array Based Replication.

Select an array.

In the Manage tab, select Array Pairs.
The Array Pairs tab provides information about all the storage devices in the array, including the local
device name, the device it is paired with, the direction of replication, the protection group to which the
device belongs, whether the datastore is local or remote, and the consistency group ID for each SRA
device.

Right-click an array pair and select Discover Devices to rescan the arrays and recompute the datastore
groups.

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 2 Replicating Virtual Machines

Edit Array Managers
Use the Edit Array Manager wizard to modify an array manager's name or other settings, such as the IP
address or user name and password.
For more information about how to fill in the adapter fields, see the documentation that your SRA vendor
provides. While fields vary among SRAs, common fields include IP address, protocol information, mapping
between array names and IP addresses, and user names and passwords.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Array Based Replication.

Right-click an array and select Edit Array Manager.

Modify the name for the array in the Display Name field.
Use a descriptive name that makes it easy for you to identify the storage associated with this array
manager. You cannot modify the array manager type.

Modify the adapter information.
These fields are created by the SRA.

Enable the array pair and click Next.

Click Finish to complete the modification of the array manager.

Specify an Unreplicated Datastore for Swap Files
Every virtual machine requires a swap file. By default, vCenter Server creates swap files in the same
datastore as the other virtual machine files. To prevent Site Recovery Manager from replicating swap files,
you can configure virtual machines to create them in an unreplicated datastore.
Under normal circumstances, you should keep the swap files in the same datastore as other virtual machine
files. However, you might need to prevent replication of swap files to avoid excessive consumption of
network bandwidth. Some storage vendors recommend that you do not replicate swap files. Only prevent
replication of swap files if it is absolutely necessary.
NOTE If you are using an unreplicated datastore for swap files, you must create an unreplicated datastore
for all protected hosts and clusters at both the protected and recovery sites. The unreplicated datastore must
be visible to all hosts in a cluster, otherwise vMotion will not work.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Hosts and Clusters, select a host, and click Manage > Settings.

Under Virtual Machines, select Swap file location, and click Edit.

Select Use a specific datastore, and select an unreplicated datastore.

Click OK.

Power off and power on all of the virtual machines on the host.
Resetting the guest operating system is not sufficient. The change of swapfile location takes effect after
you power off then power on the virtual machines.

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Browse the datastore that you selected for swapfiles and verify that VSWP files are present for the
virtual machines.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Isolating Devices For Stretched Storage During Disaster Recovery
In a disaster recovery with stretched storage, the failover command must isolate devices at the recovery site.
If some hosts at the protected site are still operational and continue running virtual machines when you
initiate a disaster recovery, Site Recovery Manager cannot power on the corresponding virtual machines at
the recovery site due to file locks. If the storage array isolates the devices at the recovery site, the ESX hosts
at the recovery site can break the necessary locks and power on the virtual machines.
Site Recovery Manager must use isolation="true" in the failover SRA command for the stretched devices
that were not deactivated at the protected site.
Implementation details of isolation for stretched storage is specific to array vendors. Some array vendors
might make the devices inaccessible at the protected site after running the failover SRA command with
isolation. Some array vendors might break the communication between source and target site for that
particular device.

Using vSphere Replication with Site Recovery Manager
Site Recovery Manager can use vSphere Replication to replicate data to servers at the recovery site.
You deploy the vSphere Replication appliance and configure vSphere Replication on virtual machines
independently of Site Recovery Manager. See the vSphere Replication documentation at
https://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-replication-pubs.html for information about deploying
and configuring vSphere Replication.
vSphere Replication does not require storage arrays. The vSphere Replication storage replication source and
target can be any storage device, including, but not limited to, storage arrays.
You can configure vSphere Replication to regularly create and retain snapshots of protected virtual
machines on the recovery site. Taking multiple point-in-time (PIT) snapshots of virtual machines allows you
to retain more than one replica of a virtual machine on the recovery site. Each snapshot reflects the state of
the virtual machine at a certain point in time. You can select which snapshot to recover when you use
vSphere Replication to perform a recovery.

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 2 Replicating Virtual Machines

Figure 2‑2. Site Recovery Manager Architecture with vSphere Replication
Protected Site

Recovery Site

vSphere Web Client

SRM plug-in

SRM Server

vCenter Server

SRM Server

VR Appliance

VR Appliance
Additional
VR Server

ESXi
Server

VR Agent

vSphere replication

Storage
VMFS

ESXi

Network
File Copy

Storage

VMFS

Replicating a Virtual Machine and Enabling Multiple Point in Time Instances
You can recover virtual machines at specific points in time (PIT) such as the last known consistent state.
When you configure replication of a virtual machine, you can enable multiple point in time (PIT) instances
in the recovery settings in the Configure Replication wizard. vSphere Replication retains a number of
snapshot instances of the virtual machine on the target site based on the retention policy that you specify.
vSphere Replication supports a maximum of 24 snapshot instances. After you recover a virtual machine,
you can revert it to a specific snapshot.
During replication, vSphere Replication replicates all aspects of the virtual machine to the target site,
including any potential viruses and corrupted applications. If a virtual machine suffers from a virus or
corruption and you have configured vSphere Replication to keep PIT snapshots, you can recover the virtual
machine and then revert it to a snapshot of the virtual machine in its uncorrupted state.
You can also use the PIT instances to recover the last known good state of a database.
NOTE vSphere Replication does not replicate virtual machine snapshots.

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Figure 2‑3. Recovering a Virtual Machine at Points in Time (PIT)
Source Site

Target Site

vSphere Web Client

Replication
VR Appliance

VR Appliance
t0

Using Array-Based Replication and vSphere Replication with
Site Recovery Manager
You can use a combination of array-based replication and vSphere Replication in your
Site Recovery Manager deployment.
To create a mixed Site Recovery Manager deployment that uses array-based replication and
vSphere Replication, you must configure the protected and recovery sites for both types of replication.
n

Set up and connect the storage arrays and install the appropriate storage replication adapters (SRA) on
both sites.

Deploy vSphere Replication appliances on both sites and configure the connection between the
appliances.

Configure virtual machines for replication using either array-based replication or vSphere Replication,
as appropriate.
NOTE Do not attempt to configure vSphere Replication on a virtual machine that resides on a datastore
that you replicate by using array-based replication.

You create array-based protection groups for virtual machines that you configure with array-based
replication, and vSphere Replication protection groups for virtual machines that you configure with
vSphere Replication. You cannot mix replication types in a protection group. You can mix array-based
protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups in the same recovery plan.

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 2 Replicating Virtual Machines

Figure 2‑4. Site Recovery Manager Architecture with Array-Based Replication and vSphere Replication
Protected Site

Recovery Site

vSphere Web Client

SRM plug-in

SRA

SRM Server

vCenter Server

SRM Server

VR Appliance

VR Appliance
Additional
VR Server

ESXi
Server

VR Agent

Storage
VMFS

VMware, Inc.

VMFS

vSphere replication

Array based replication

ESXi

Network
File Copy

Storage
VMFS

VMFS

Site Recovery Manager Administration

VMware, Inc.

Configuring Mappings

Mappings allow you to specify how Site Recovery Manager maps virtual machine resources on the
protected site to resources on the recovery site.
You can configure site-wide mappings to map objects in the vCenter Server inventory on the protected site
to corresponding objects in the vCenter Server inventory on the recovery site.
n

Networks, including the option to specify a different network to use for recovery plan tests

Datacenters or virtual machine folders

Compute resources, including resource pools, standalone hosts, vApps, or clusters

During a recovery, when virtual machines start on the recovery site, the virtual machines use the resources
on the recovery site that you specify in the mappings. To enable bi-directional protection and reprotect, you
can configure reverse mappings, to map the objects on the recovery site back to their corresponding objects
on the protected site. You can also configure different mappings in the opposite direction, so that recovered
virtual machines on a site use different resources to protected virtual machines on that site.
Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings differently depending on whether you use array-based
protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups, or storage policy protection groups. For
information about the differences between how Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings to the
different types of protection group, see “Inventory Mappings for Array-Based Replication Protection
Groups and vSphere Replication Protection Groups,” on page 34 and “Inventory Mappings for Storage
Policy Protection Groups,” on page 34.
If you use storage policy protection groups, in addition to mapping inventory objects, you map storage
polices on the protected site to storage policies on the recovery site.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“Inventory Mappings for Array-Based Replication Protection Groups and vSphere Replication
Protection Groups,” on page 34

“Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 34

“Configure Inventory Mappings,” on page 37

“About Storage Policy Mappings,” on page 39

“Select Storage Policy Mappings,” on page 39

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Inventory Mappings for Array-Based Replication Protection Groups
and vSphere Replication Protection Groups
For array-based protection and vSphere Replication protection, Site Recovery Manager applies inventory
mappings to all virtual machines in a protection group when you create that group.
Site Recovery Manager creates a placeholder virtual machine when you create an array-based or
vSphere Replication protection group. Site Recovery Manager derives the resource assignments for the
placeholder from the site-wide inventory mappings.
If you configure site-wide inventory mappings, you can reapply the inventory mappings to a protection
group whenever necessary, for example if you add new virtual machines to an existing protection group.
If you change the site-wide inventory mappings for a site, the changes do not affect virtual machines that
Site Recovery Manager already protects in an existing protection group. Site Recovery Manager only applies
the new mappings to previously protected virtual machines if you reconfigure protection on them.
Site Recovery Manager cannot protect a virtual machine unless it has valid inventory mappings. However,
configuring site-wide inventory mappings is not mandatory for array-based replication protection groups
and vSphere Replication protection groups. If you create an array-based replication protection group or
vSphere Replication protection group without having defined site-wide inventory mappings, you can
configure each virtual machine in the group individually. You can override site-wide inventory mappings
by configuring the protection of the virtual machines in a protection group. You can also create site-wide
inventory mappings after you create a protection group, and then apply those site-wide mappings to that
protection group.
n

For information about configuring site-wide inventory mappings, see “Configure Inventory
Mappings,” on page 37.

For information about configuring mappings on virtual machines individually, see “Configure
Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection Group,” on page 58.

For information about applying site-wide inventory mappings to an existing protection group, see
“Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a Protection Group,” on page 57.

Because placeholder virtual machines do not support NICs, you cannot change the network configurations
of placeholder virtual machines. You can only change the network for a placeholder virtual machine in the
inventory mappings. If no mapping for a network exists, you can specify a network when you configure
protection for an individual virtual machine. Changes that you make to the placeholder virtual machine
override the settings that you establish when you configure the protection of the virtual machine.
Site Recovery Manager preserves these changes at the recovery site during the test and recovery.

Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy Protection Groups
For storage policy protection, Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings to virtual machines when
you run a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group.
With array-based and vSphere Replication protection groups, Site Recovery Manager applies inventory
mappings at the moment that you configure protection on a virtual machine. With storage policy protection
groups, because storage policy protection is dynamic, Site Recovery Manager only applies the inventory
mappings at the moment that you run a recovery plan. Virtual machine placement decisions are made
according to the inventory mappings when a recovery plan runs, so Site Recovery Manager does not create
placeholder virtual machines on the recovery site.

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 3 Configuring Mappings

Because Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings for storage policy protection groups when you
run a recovery plan, you cannot configure individual mappings on virtual machines in storage policy
protection groups. Site Recovery Manager always uses the site-wide inventory mappings when you run a
recovery with storage policy protection. Test recovery, planned migration, and disaster recovery of recovery
plans that contain storage policy protection groups fail if inventory mappings are missing.
NOTE If the network mapping is missing but the other mappings are present and you run a test recovery,
Site Recovery Manager uses the auto-generated test network and the test succeeds with a warning. If a test
recovery succeeds with a warning about the missing network mapping, configure the network mapping and
run the test again. Planned migration and disaster recovery do not use the test network and fail if the
network mapping is missing.
If a recovery plan fails due to missing mappings and the protected site is available, configure the missing
mappings and run the plan again. For information about how to configure site-wide inventory mappings,
see “Configure Inventory Mappings,” on page 37.

Temporary Placeholder Mappings for Storage Policy Protection
Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings for storage policy protection at the moment that you
run a recovery plan. If you run a recovery plan that contains storage policy protection groups and you have
not configured inventory mappings, or if the objects that you mapped are missing, test recovery, planned
migration, and disaster recovery fail.
You can usually only configure inventory mappings when both the protected site and the recovery site are
available. If a recovery plan with storage policy protection groups fails due to missing mappings and the
protected site is not available, you cannot configure the missing mappings in the normal way. To mitigate
this situation, when a recovery fails due to missing mappings and the protected site is not available,
Site Recovery Manager creates temporary placeholder mappings. Temporary placeholder mappings allow
you to configure the missing mappings so that you can run the recovery successfully when the protected site
is offline. Temporary placeholder mappings are incomplete mappings that identify inventory objects on the
protected site that contain virtual machines that are included in the recovery plan. The temporary
placeholder mappings do not include target objects on the recovery site. When a recovery fails due to
missing mappings, the protected site is unavailable, and Site Recovery Manager creates temporary
placeholder mappings, you can complete the temporary placeholder mappings and rerun the recovery
successfully.
For information about how to configure temporary placeholder mappings, see “Configure Temporary
Placeholder Mappings,” on page 35.

Configure Temporary Placeholder Mappings
If a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group fails due to missing mappings and the
protected site is unavailable, Site Recovery Manager creates temporary placeholder mappings. You
complete these temporary placeholder mappings so that the recovery can succeed.
Because Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings to virtual machines in storage policy protection
groups at the moment that you run a recovery plan, storage policy protection groups require site-wide
inventory mappings. If site-wide inventory mappings are missing, recovery tests, planned migrations, and
disaster recovery of recovery plans that contain storage policy protection groups fail.
If a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group fails due to missing mappings and the
protected site is available, configure the missing mappings in the normal way and run the recovery again.
For information about how to configure site-wide inventory mappings, see “Configure Inventory
Mappings,” on page 37.

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

If a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group fails due to missing mappings and the
protected site is unavailable, you cannot configure the missing mappings normally. To allow the recovery to
succeed, you must complete the temporary placeholder mappings that Site Recovery Manager creates when
a recovery plan fails due to missing mappings.
Prerequisites
n

The protected site is unavailable.

You ran a disaster recovery on a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group.

The recovery failed due to missing inventory mappings.

Procedure
1

Select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans and select the recovery plan that failed.

Select Monitor > Recovery Steps and expand the steps that are in an error state.

Hover your pointer over an error message to see the full message.
If inventory mappings are missing, you see an error about missing mappings.
For example, if resource mappings are missing, you see Cannot fetch hosts associated with
placeholder VMs. Mapping for resourcePool address missing in resource mappings.

Select Site Recovery > Sites and select the recovery site.
You see a message informing you that the protected site is offline and that Site Recovery Manager has
created temporary placeholder mappings.

Select each of the Network Mappings, Folder Mappings, Resource Mappings, and Storage Policies
tabs.
Where mappings are missing, Site Recovery Manager has selected a resource on the protected site. The
corresponding resource on the recovery site shows Mapping is missing.

Select the temporary placeholder mapping and click the icon to edit the mapping.

Select a resource on the recovery site to map to from the resource on the protected site that
Site Recovery Manager selected, and click OK.

Select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, select the recovery plan that failed, and run the recovery plan
again.
If you configured all of the missing mappings, the recovery succeeds. If there are still missing
mappings, the recovery fails.

If the recovery fails again, repeat steps Step 2 to Step 8 until the recovery succeeds.

What to do next
When the protected site is available again, configure site-wide inventory mappings in the normal way and
run recovery again so that Site Recovery Manager can complete the recovery steps on the protected site.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not retain temporary placeholder mappings. The temporary placeholder
mappings that you configured are lost if you restart Site Recovery Manager Server on the recovery site.
Always configure normal inventory mappings after you have run a recovery in which you had to configure
temporary placeholder mappings.

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Chapter 3 Configuring Mappings

Users Gain Access to Virtual Machines After Configuring Temporary
Placeholder Mappings
Users who complete temporary placeholder mappings when the protected site is unavailable might gain
access to virtual machines that they should not.
Problem
The protected site is unavailable during a disaster recovery and Site Recovery Manager creates temporary
placeholder mappings. The user who runs the recovery plan completes the temporary placeholder
mappings and reruns the plan. After the recovery, the user has access to virtual machines on the recovery
site that they did not have permission to access on the protected site.
n

A user runs a disaster recovery when the protected site is unavailable.

The user does not have permission to access all of the inventory objects on the protected site.

Site Recovery Manager detects missing mappings, and creates temporary placeholder mappings that
include objects on the protected site that the user does not have permission to access.

The user configures the target mappings from the objects on the protected site to objects on the recovery
site to which they do have access.

After the recovery, because the recovered virtual machines use resources on the recovery site that the
user has permission to access, the user can access virtual machines that they did not have permission to
access when those virtual machines were on the protected site.

Cause
If the protected site is unavailable, Site Recovery Manager cannot perform permission checks on inventory
objects on the protected site before it uses them to create temporary placeholder mappings.
Solution
Verify that users who have permission to run recovery plans also have permission to access all of the objects
on both sites.

Configure Inventory Mappings
Inventory mappings provide default objects in the inventory on the recovery site for the recovered virtual
machines to use when you run recovery.
For array-based protection and vSphere Replication protection, if you configure site-wide inventory
mappings before you create protection groups, you do not have to configure protection individually on each
virtual machine when you create a protection group. Site Recovery Manager applies the site-wide mappings
to all virtual machines in an array-based replication protection group or a vSphere Replication protection
group at the moment that you create the protection group.
When you use storage policy protection, Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings at the moment
that a recovery plan runs. You cannot configure protection individually on the virtual machines in a storage
policy protection group. As a consequence, you must configure site-wide inventory mappings if you use
storage policy protection.
Procedure
1

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In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

On the Manage tab, select the type of resource to configure.
Option

Action

Network Mappings

Map networks on the protected site to networks on the recovery site.

Folder Mappings

Map datacenters or virtual machine folders on the protected site to
datacenters or virtual machine folders on the recovery site.

Resource Mappings

Map resource pools, standalone hosts, vApps, or clusters on the protected
site to resource pools, standalone hosts, vApps, or clusters on the recovery
site. You can map any type of resource on one site to any type of resource
on the other site.
NOTE You cannot map individual hosts that are part of clusters to other
resource objects.

Click the icon to create a new mapping.

Select whether to create the mapping automatically or manually and click Next.
This step only applies to network mappings and folder mappings. Automatic mapping is only available
for network and folder mappings. You must configure resource mappings manually.

Option

Description

Automatically

Site Recovery Manager automatically maps networks and folders on the
protected site to networks and folders on the recovery site that have the
same name.

Manually

To map specific networks and folders on the protected site to specific
networks, folders, and resources on the recovery site.

Select the items on the protected site to map to items on the recovery site.
n

If you selected automatic mapping, expand the inventory items on the left to select a parent node
on the local site, for example a datacenter or a folder, then expand the inventory items on the right
to select a parent node on the remote site.

If you selected manual mapping, expand the inventory items on the left to select a specific object on
the local site, then expand the inventory items on the right to select the object on the remote site to
which to map this object.

If you select manual mapping, you can map multiple items on the local site to a single item on the
remote site. You can select only one item at a time on the remote site.
NOTE Auto-mapping for NSX universal wires is only supported with storage policy protection groups.
If you are using virtual machine protection groups, you must explicity configure network mapping
between the two ends of the universal wire to ensure that the virtual machines recover on the same
universal wire. See “Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware NSX,” on page 127.
6

Click Add mappings.
The mappings appear at the bottom of the page. If you selected automatic mapping,
Site Recovery Manager automatically maps all of the items under the node that you selected on the
protected site to items that have the same name under the node that you selected on the recovery site.

Click Next.

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Chapter 3 Configuring Mappings

(Optional) If you are configuring network mappings, in the Select test networks page, click the network
in the Test Network column and use the drop-down menu to select the network to use when you test
recovery plans.
You can configure Site Recovery Manager to create an isolated network on the recovery site for when
you test a recovery plan. Creating an isolated test network allows the test to proceed without adding
extra traffic on the production network on the recovery site.

Select Isolated network (auto created) to automatically create an isolated network on the recovery
site to use for tests. This is the default option.

Select an existing network on the recovery site to use for tests.

(Optional) On the Prepare reverse mappings page, select the check box for a mapping.
Selecting this option creates corresponding mappings from the item on the remote site to the item on
the local site. You require reverse mappings to establish bidirectional protection and to run reprotect
operations. You cannot select this option if two or more mappings have the same target on the remote
site.

Click Finish to create the mappings.

Repeat Step 2 through Step 10 to establish mappings for the remaining resource types.

About Storage Policy Mappings
You can protect virtual machines that you have associated with storage policies by including them in
storage policy protection groups.
Storage policies place virtual machines in the vCenter Server inventory and on datastores according to rules
and tags that you define in vCenter Server. Storage policies can move virtual machines in the inventory or to
different datastores, to accommodate changes in the vCenter Server environment.
If you map storage policies on the protected site to storage policies on the recovery site, when you run a
recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager places the recovered virtual machines in the vCenter Server inventory
and on datastores on the recovery site according to the storage policy that you mapped to on the recovery
site.

Select Storage Policy Mappings
If you map storage policies on the protected site to storage policies on the recovery site, when you run a
recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager can place the recovered virtual machines in the vCenter Server
inventory and on datastores on the recovery site according to the storage policy that you mapped to on the
recovery site.
Prerequisites
You created storage policies on both the protected site and the recovery site.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, select Storage Policy Mappings.

Click the icon to create a new mapping.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Select whether to create the mapping automatically or manually and click Next.
Option

Description

Automatically

Site Recovery Manager automatically maps storage policies on the
protected site to storage policies on the recovery site that have the same
name.

Manually

To map specific storage policies on the protected site to specific storage
policies on the recovery site.

Select the storage policies on the protected site to map to storage policies on the recovery site.
n

If you selected automatic mapping, Site Recovery Manager selects any storage policies on the
protected site for which a storage policy with the same name exists on the recovery site.

If you selected manual mapping, select a specific storage policy on the protected site, then select
the storage policy on the recovery site to which to map this storage policy.

If you select manual mapping, you can map multiple storage policies on the local site to a single storage
policy on the remote site. You can select only one item at a time on the remote site.
6

Click Add mappings.
The mappings appear at the bottom of the page.

Click Next.

(Optional) On the Prepare reverse mappings page, select the check box for a mapping.
Selecting this option creates corresponding mappings from the storage policy on the remote site to the
storage policy on the local site. You require reverse mappings to establish bidirectional protection and
to run reprotect operations. You cannot select this option if two or more mappings have the same target
on the remote site.

Click Finish to create the mappings.

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About Placeholder Virtual Machines

When you create an array-based replication protection group that contains datastore groups or a
vSphere Replication protection group that contains individual virtual machines, Site Recovery Manager
creates a placeholder virtual machine at the recovery site for each of the virtual machines in the protection
group.
A placeholder virtual machine is a subset of virtual machine files. Site Recovery Manager uses that subset of
files to register a virtual machine with vCenter Server on the recovery site.
The files of the placeholder virtual machines are very small, and do not represent full copies of the protected
virtual machines. The placeholder virtual machine does not have any disks attached to it. The placeholder
virtual machine reserves compute resources on the recovery site, and provides the location in the
vCenter Server inventory to which the protected virtual machine recovers when you run recovery.
The presence of placeholder virtual machines on the recovery site inventory provides a visual indication to
vCenter Server administrators that the virtual machines are protected by Site Recovery Manager. The
placeholders also indicate to vCenter Server administrators that the virtual machines can power on and start
consuming local resources when Site Recovery Manager runs tests or runs a recovery plan.
When you recover a protected virtual machine by testing or running a recovery plan,
Site Recovery Manager replaces the placeholder with the recovered virtual machine and powers it on
according to the settings of the recovery plan. After a recovery plan test finishes, Site Recovery Manager
restores the placeholders and powers off the recovered virtual machines as part of the cleanup process.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not create placeholder virtual machines for storage policy protection
groups. For information about how Site Recovery Manager places virtual machines on the recovery site
when you use storage policy protection groups, see “Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy Protection
Groups,” on page 34 and “About Storage Policy Mappings,” on page 39.

About Placeholder Virtual Machine Templates
When you protect a template on the protected site, Site Recovery Manager creates the placeholder template
by creating a virtual machine in the default resource pool of a compute resource and then by marking that
virtual machine as a template. Site Recovery Manager selects the compute resource from the set of available
compute resources in the datacenter on the recovery site to which the folder of the virtual machine on the
protected site is mapped. All the hosts in the selected compute resource must have access to at least one
placeholder datastore. At least one host in the compute resource must support the hardware version of the
protected virtual machine template.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

About Placeholder Datastores
If you use array-based replication to protect datastore groups, or if you use vSphere Replication to protect
individual virtual machines, you must identify a datastore on the recovery site in which
Site Recovery Manager can store the placeholder virtual machine files.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not create placeholder virtual machines for storage policy protection
groups. You do not need to identify a placeholder datastore if you only use storage policy protection
groups.
Placeholder virtual machine files are very small, so the placeholder datastore does not need to be large
enough to accommodate the full virtual machines.
To enable planned migration and reprotect, you must select placeholder datastores on both sites.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“What Happens to Placeholder Virtual Machines During Recovery,” on page 42

“Select a Placeholder Datastore,” on page 43

What Happens to Placeholder Virtual Machines During Recovery
When you create array-based protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups,
Site Recovery Manager creates placeholder virtual machines on the recovery site. When you run a recovery
plan that contains these protection groups, Site Recovery Manager replaces the placeholders with real
virtual machines.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not create placeholder virtual machines for storage policy protection
groups. This example applies to array-based protection groups and to vSphere Replication protection
groups. It does not apply to storage policy protection groups. For information about how
Site Recovery Manager recovers virtual machines when you use storage policy protection groups, see
“About Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 48.
This example illustrates the process by which Site Recovery Manager replaces placeholder virtual machines
on the recovery site with real virtual machines when you run recovery plans that contain array-based
protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups.
1

Virtual machines replicate to the recovery site independently of Site Recovery Manager, according to
the type of replication that you use.
n

For datastore-based replication, the storage array replicates datastores that contain virtual machine
files as raw storage in the target storage array.

vSphere Replication replicates individual virtual machines by making copies of the virtual
machines in the datastore that you configure as the vSphere Replication target. These virtual
machine copies are not powered on.

You designate a datastore on the recovery site for Site Recovery Manager to use to store placeholder
virtual machine files.

When you configure Site Recovery Manager protection on a virtual machine by adding a datastore
group or an individual virtual machine to a protection group, Site Recovery Manager creates a
placeholder for that virtual machine in the placeholder datastore on the recovery site.

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Chapter 4 About Placeholder Virtual Machines

When you run a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager shuts down the virtual machines on the
protected site, and activates the virtual machines on the recovery site according to the type of
replication that you use.
n

For datastore-based replication, Site Recovery Manager surfaces the raw storage on the recovery
site that contains the replicated virtual machines as a vCenter Server datastore.
Site Recovery Manager registers the recovered datastore with the ESXi host or cluster with which
the placeholder datastore is registered.

vSphere Replication powers on the copies of the virtual machines on the recovery site.

Site Recovery Manager sends a request to vCenter Server to swap the identity of the placeholder virtual
machines for the replicated virtual machines that have surfaced on the recovery site.

Select a Placeholder Datastore
If you use array-based protection groups or vSphere Replication protection groups, you must specify a
placeholder datastore on the recovery site for Site Recovery Manager to use to store placeholder virtual
machines.
You must configure a placeholder datastore on both sites in the pair to establish bidirectional protection and
to perform reprotect.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not create placeholder virtual machines for storage policy protection
groups. You do not need to select a placeholder datastore if you only use storage policy protection groups.
Prerequisites
n

Verify that you connected and paired the protected and recovery sites.

Placeholder datastores must meet certain criteria.
n

For clusters, the placeholder datastores must be visible to all of the hosts in the cluster.

You cannot select as placeholder datastores any datastores that are replicated by using array-based
replication.

Do not select as placeholder datastores any datastores that you use as the replication target
datastore for vSphere Replication.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Placeholder Datastores.

Click the icon to configure a placeholder datastore.

Select a datastore to designate as the location for placeholder virtual machines on the local site, and
click OK.
Previously configured datastores appear but you cannot select them. If a datastore is replicated, but
Site Recovery Manager does not have an array manager for that datastore, the option to select the
replicated datastore might be available. Do not select replicated datastores that Site Recovery Manager
does not manage.
IMPORTANT If you use vSphere Replication, do not select a placeholder datastore that you already use
as the target datastore for replications. Selecting the same datastore for placeholder virtual machines as
you use to contain the replica virtual machines that vSphere Replication creates can cause problems
when you run reprotect.
Make sure placeholder datastores are not in the same Storage DRS cluster as the vSphere Replication
replica target datastores.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Select the other site in the pair.

Repeat Step 2 to Step 4 to configure a placeholder datastore on the other site.

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Creating and Managing Protection
Groups

After you configure a replication solution, you can create protection groups. A protection group is a
collection of virtual machines that Site Recovery Manager protects together.
You can include one or more protection groups in a recovery plan. A recovery plan specifies how
Site Recovery Manager recovers the virtual machines in the protection groups that it contains.
You configure virtual machines and create protection groups differently depending on whether you use
array-based replication, vSphere Replication, or storage policy protection. You cannot create protection
groups that combine virtual machines for which you configured array-based replication with virtual
machines for which you configured vSphere Replication or storage policy protection. You can include a
combination of array-based replication protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups in the
same recovery plan. You cannot include storage policy protection groups in the same recovery plan as
array-based replication protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups.
After you configure replication on virtual machines, you must assign each virtual machine to an existing
resource pool, folder, and network on the recovery site. You can specify site-wide defaults for these
assignments by selecting inventory mappings. For array-based replication protection groups and
vSphere Replication protection groups, if you do not specify inventory mappings, you configure mappings
individually for each virtual machine in the protection group. You cannot configure mappings individually
for virtual machines in storage policy protection groups, so you must configure site-wide inventory
mappings if you use storage policy protection groups.
After you create an array-based replication protection group or a vSphere Replication protection group,
Site Recovery Manager creates placeholder virtual machines on the recovery site and applies the inventory
mappings to each virtual machine in the group. If Site Recovery Manager cannot map a virtual machine to a
folder, network, or resource pool on the recovery site, Site Recovery Manager sets the virtual machine to the
Mapping Missing status, and does not create a placeholder for it. For storage policy protection groups,
Site Recovery Manager applies inventory mappings when you run a recovery plan. Site Recovery Manager
does not create placeholder virtual machines for storage policy protection groups.
Site Recovery Manager cannot protect virtual machines on which you did not configure or on which you
incorrectly configured replication. In the case of array-based replication, this is true even if the virtual
machines reside on a protected datastore.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“About Array-Based Replication Protection Groups and Datastore Groups,” on page 46

“About vSphere Replication Protection Groups,” on page 47

“About Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 48

“Create Protection Groups,” on page 53

“Organize Protection Groups in Folders,” on page 55

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

“Add or Remove Datastore Groups or Virtual Machines to or from a Protection Group,” on page 56

“Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a Protection Group,” on page 57

“Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection Group,” on
page 58

“Modifying the Settings of a Protected Virtual Machine,” on page 59

“Remove Protection from a Virtual Machine,” on page 60

“Protection Group Status Reference,” on page 61

“Virtual Machine Protection Status Reference,” on page 62

About Array-Based Replication Protection Groups and Datastore
Groups
When you create a protection group for array-based replication, you specify array information and
Site Recovery Manager computes the set of virtual machines to a datastore group. Datastore groups contain
all the files of the protected virtual machines.
You add virtual machines to an array-based replication protection group by placing them in a datastore that
belongs to a datastore group that Site Recovery Manager associates with a protection group.
Site Recovery Manager recomputes the datastore groups when it detects a change in a protected virtual
machine. For example, if you add a hard disk that is on another LUN to a protected virtual machine,
Site Recovery Manager adds the LUN to the datastore group of that protection group. You must reconfigure
the protection to protect the new LUN. Site Recovery Manager computes consistency groups when you
configure an array pair or when you refresh the list of devices.
You can also add virtual machines to the protection group by using Storage vMotion to move their files to
one of the datastores in the datastore group. You can remove a virtual machine from an array-based
replication protection group by moving the virtual machine's files to another datastore.
If your storage array supports consistency groups, Site Recovery Manager is compatible with vSphere
Storage DRS and vSphere Storage vMotion. You can use Storage DRS and Storage vMotion to move virtual
machine files within a consistency group that Site Recovery Manager protects. If your storage array does not
support consistency groups, you cannot use Storage DRS and Storage vMotion in combination with
Site Recovery Manager.

How Site Recovery Manager Computes Datastore Groups
Site Recovery Manager determines the composition of a datastore group by the set of virtual machines that
have files on the datastores in the group, and by the devices on which those datastores are stored.
When you use array-based replication, each storage array supports a set of replicated datastores. On storage
area network (SAN) arrays that use connection protocols such as Fibre Channel and iSCSI, these datastores
are called logical storage units (LUN) and are composed of one or more physical datastores. On network file
system (NFS) arrays, the replicated datastores are typically referred to as volumes. In every pair of
replicated storage devices, one datastore is the replication source and the other is the replication target. Data
written to the source datastore is replicated to the target datastore on a schedule controlled by the
replication software of the array. When you configure Site Recovery Manager to work with a storage
replication adapter (SRA), the replication source is at the protected site and the replication target is at the
recovery site.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

A datastore provides storage for virtual machine files. By hiding the details of physical storage devices,
datastores simplify the allocation of storage capacity and provide a uniform model for meeting the storage
needs of virtual machines. Because any datastore can span multiple devices, Site Recovery Manager must
ensure that all devices backing the datastore are replicated before it can protect the virtual machines that use
that datastore. Site Recovery Manager must ensure that all datastores containing protected virtual machine
files are replicated. During a recovery or test, Site Recovery Manager must handle all such datastores
together.
To achieve this goal, Site Recovery Manager aggregates datastores into datastore groups to accommodate
virtual machines that span multiple datastores. Site Recovery Manager regularly checks and ensures that
datastore groups contain all necessary datastores to provide protection for the appropriate virtual machines.
When necessary, Site Recovery Manager recalculates datastore groups. For example, this can occur when
you add new devices to a virtual machine, and you store those devices on a datastore that was not
previously a part of the datastore group.
A datastore group consists of the smallest set of datastores required to ensure that if any of a virtual
machine's files is stored on a datastore in the group, all of the virtual machine's files are stored on datastores
that are part of the same group. For example, if a virtual machine has disks on two different datastores, then
Site Recovery Manager combines both datastores into a datastore group. Site Recovery Manager combines
devices into datastore groups according to set criteria.
n

Two different datastores contain files that belong to the same virtual machine.

Datastores that belong to two virtual machines share a raw disk mapping (RDM) device on a SAN
array, as in the case of a Microsoft cluster server (MSCS) cluster.

Two datastores span extents corresponding to different partitions of the same device.

A single datastore spans two extents corresponding to partitions of two different devices. The two
extents must be in a single consistency group and the SRA must report consistency group information
from the array in the device discovery stage. Otherwise, the creation of protection groups based on this
datastore is not possible even though the SRA reports that the extents that make up this datastore are
replicated.

Multiple datastores belong to a consistency group. A consistency group is a collection of replicated
datastores where every state of the target set of datastores existed at a specific time as the state of the
source set of datastores. Informally, the datastores are replicated together such that when recovery
happens using those datastores, software accessing the targets does not see the data in a state that the
software is not prepared to deal with.

Protecting Virtual Machines on VMFS Datastores that Span Multiple LUNs or
Extents
Not all SRAs report consistency group information from the storage array, because not all storage arrays
support consistency groups. If an SRA reports consistency group information from the array following a
datastore discovery command, the LUNs that constitute a multi-extent VMFS datastore must be in the same
storage array consistency group. If the array does not support consistency groups and the SRA does not
report any consistency group information, Site Recovery Manager cannot protect virtual machines located
on the multi-extent datastore.

About vSphere Replication Protection Groups
You can include virtual machines that you configured for vSphere Replication in vSphere Replication
protection groups.
Virtual machines in the vCenter Server inventory that are configured for vSphere Replication are available
for selection when you create or edit a vSphere Replication protection group.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

You select a target location on a datastore on the remote site when you configure vSphere Replication on a
virtual machine. When you include a virtual machine with vSphere Replication in a protection group,
Site Recovery Manager creates a placeholder virtual machine for recovery. It is possible for the replication
target for vSphere Replication and the placeholder virtual machine that Site Recovery Manager creates to
both be on the same datastore on the recovery site because they are created in different datastore folders.
When the replication target and the placeholder virtual machines are in the same datastore,
Site Recovery Manager creates the placeholder virtual machine name by using the replication target name
with the suffix (1). To avoid confusion, the best practice is to use different datastores for the
vSphere Replication replication target and for the Site Recovery Manager placeholder virtual machines.
Site Recovery Manager applies the inventory mappings to the placeholder virtual machine on the recovery
site.
vSphere Replication synchronizes the disk files of the replication target virtual machine according to the
recovery point objective that you set when you configured vSphere Replication on the virtual machine.
When you perform a recovery with Site Recovery Manager, Site Recovery Manager powers on the
replication target virtual machine and registers it with vCenter Server on the recovery site in the place of the
placeholder virtual machine.
When using vSphere Replication protection groups, Site Recovery Manager is dependent on
vSphere Replication, but vSphere Replication is not dependent on Site Recovery Manager. You can use
vSphere Replication independently of Site Recovery Manager. For example, you can use
vSphere Replication to replicate all of the virtual machines in the vCenter Server inventory, but only include
a subset of those virtual machines in protection groups. Changes that you make to vSphere Replication
configuration can affect the Site Recovery Manager protection of the virtual machines that you do include in
protection groups.
n

Site Recovery Manager monitors the vSphere Replication status of the virtual machines in
vSphere Replication protection groups. If replication is not functioning for a virtual machine in a
protection group, Site Recovery Manager cannot recover the virtual machine.

If you unconfigure vSphere Replication on a virtual machine, Site Recovery Manager continues to
include that virtual machine in protection groups in which you included it. Site Recovery Manager
cannot recover that virtual machine until you reconfigure replication. If you unconfigure
vSphere Replication on a virtual machine, you can remove it from the protection group manually.

If you configured vSphere Replication on a virtual machine that resides on a datastore that
Site Recovery Manager already protects with array-based replication, Site Recovery Manager reports an
error if you try to include that virtual machine in a vSphere Replication protection group.

If you remove a virtual machine with vSphere Replication from a protection group, vSphere Replication
continues to replicate the virtual machine to the recovery site. The virtual machine does not recover with the
rest of the virtual machines in the protection group if you run an associated recovery plan.

About Storage Policy Protection Groups
Storage policy protection groups enable the automatic protection of virtual machines that are associated
with a storage policy.
You use array-based replication to replicate the datastores from the protected site to the recovery site. If you
tag a datastore and you create a storage policy that maps to that tag, the datastore is automatically
associated with that storage policy. A storage policy protection group that includes that storage policy
automatically protects any virtual machines that have been tagged appropriately that reside on the
datastore. If you disassociate a virtual machine from the storage policy or move it off the datastore,
Site Recovery Manager automatically unprotects it.
When you create a storage policy protection group, Site Recovery Manager performs the following
operations:
n

Creates a managed object that represents the storage policy protection group on the local
Site Recovery Manager Server instance.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

Associates the storage policies that you select with the storage policy protection group.
Site Recovery Manager protects all compliant storage policies that you include in the storage policy
protection group.

The local storage policy protection group actively protects the appropriate vSphere entities on the local
vCenter Server instance and determines the compliance of the storage policies that it contains. The
initial protection of the newly created storage policy protection group includes protecting all of the
virtual machines that are associated with the storage polices in the protection group, based on the latest
known state of the vSphere inventory.
NOTE The initial protection does not include any storage synchronization for the associated consistency
groups. You must replicate the storage according to its regular schedule, independently of vSphere and
Site Recovery Manager.

Starts vSphere inventory monitoring to detect any vSphere entities that are added to the inventory after
the initial protection. If Site Recovery Manager fails to protect any vSphere entities, the creation of the
storage policy protection group does not fail, but errors appear in the protection group properties.

Creates a peer managed object to represent the storage policy protection group on the
Site Recovery Manager Server instance on the recovery site. This object is ready for recovery
immediately after creation, even if the underlying storage is not yet ready for recovery.

After you create a storage policy protection group, you might need to synchronize the underlying storage to
make sure that the protected vSphere entities are recoverable. Run a test recovery with the option to
replicate recent changes as soon as possible after you create the protection group.

Prerequisites for Storage Policy Protection Groups
When you create storage policy protection groups, you must first create storage policies and ensure that
your environment meets certain prerequisites.
Prerequisites
n

Create datastore tags and assign them to datastores to associate with a storage policy:
n

If your environment does not use Enhanced Linked Mode, create tag categories and tags and
assign them to the datastores to protect on the protected site. Create tag categories and tags and
assign them to the datastores to which to recover virtual machines on the recovery site. The tag and
category names must be identical on both sites.

If your environment uses Enhanced Linked Mode, create tag categories and tags only on the
protected site. The tags are replicated to other vCenter Server instances in Enhanced Linked Mode
environments.

Create virtual machine storage polices in vCenter Server on both sites, that include the tags that you
assigned to the datastores to protect. Create virtual machine policies on both sites even if your
environment uses Enhanced Linked Mode. The storage policies can have different names on each site.

Associate virtual machines to protect with the appropriate storage policy on the protected site. You
must associate all of a virtual machine's disks with the same storage policy.

Configure array-based replication of the datastores from the protected site to the recovery site by using
the replication technology that your array vendor provides.

Configure inventory mappings in Site Recovery Manager. If you use storage policy protection groups
and you do not configure mappings, planned migration or disaster recovery fail and
Site Recovery Manager creates temporary placeholder mappings.

When Site Recovery Manager Server starts, Site Recovery Manager queries the storage policy-based
management and tag manager services in vCenter Server to find virtual machines that are associated
with a storage policy. These services and vCenter Server must be running when you start or restart
Site Recovery Manager Server. If they are not running, Site Recovery Manager Server does not start.

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For information about how to create storage policies, see Virtual Machine Storage Policies in the VMware
vSphere ESXi and vCenter Server 6.0 Documentation.
For information about how to create inventory mappings, see “Configure Inventory Mappings,” on page 37.
For information about temporary placeholder mappings, see “Inventory Mappings for Storage Policy
Protection Groups,” on page 34.
For information about known limitations of storage policy protection groups, see “Limitations of Storage
Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50.

Limitations of Storage Policy Protection Groups
Storage policy protection groups are subject to limitations.

Adding Consistency Groups or Virtual Machines After Running a Recovery
Site Recovery Manager does not support the recovery of new consistency groups or virtual machines that
you add to a storage policy protection group that is in the Recovered or Partially Recovered states. Namely,
you cannot add consistency groups or virtual machines to a storage policy protection group if you have
successfully or unsuccessfully run a recovery plan that contains that protection group. Do not add new
consistency groups or virtual machines to a storage policy protection group in the Recovered or Partially
Recovered states. You can add new consistency groups or virtual machines to an existing storage policy
protection group that has never been included in a recovery plan run, or that has only been included in test
recoveries.
When you have run a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group, you must include any
new consistency groups or virtual machines in a new storage policy protection group. Remove new
consistency groups or virtual machines from the recovered storage policy protection group before you add
them to a new storage policy protection group. Site Recovery Manager only supports the protection of an
object in a single protection group.

Protecting Virtual Machine Templates
Datastores that are compliant with protected storage policies should not contain virtual machine templates.

Protecting Virtual Machines with RDM Disks
Datastores that are compliant with protected storage policies should not contain virtual machines with RDM
disks.

Duplicate Tags in Enhanced Linked Mode Environments
In an environment that uses Enhanced Linked Mode, if a temporary network partition occurs between
vCenter Server instances, it is possible to create a tag on one site and to create another tag with the same
name on another site. You might then tag one set of datastores on one site with the first tag, and another set
of datastores on the other site with the second, identical tag. Because Site Recovery Manager looks up tags
by name rather than by ID, when the network partition is removed, the datastores on both sites appear to be
tagged with the same tag. If you delete one of the duplicate tags, Site Recovery Manager might remove
protection from the consistency groups that reside in the datastore that bore that tag. The virtual machines
in those consistency groups lose their protection and the recovery settings for the virtual machines are
deleted.
To avoid this situation, resolve tag conflicts before creating storage policy protection groups and
configuring virtual machine recovery settings. If you encounter this situation after you have already created
storage policy protection groups, shut down the protected site temporarily and resolve the tag conflict.

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Changing Array States Between Recovery and Reprotect
After running a recovery plan but before running reprotect, if you change the state of an array device, for
example to fix issues with reversal of replication, and you initiate a rescan of the storage devices,
Site Recovery Manager can stop unexpectedly. If this occurs, you must recreate the corresponding
protection groups and recovery plans.

Associating Nonreplicated Datastores with Storage Policies
It is possible to associate a nonreplicated datastore with a storage policy that you include in a storage policy
protection group. However, Site Recovery Manager does not protect the virtual machines that reside on a
nonreplicated datastore, even if that datastore is associated with a storage policy that is included in a
storage policy protection group. Any virtual machines that have files on a nonreplicated datastore appear
with errors in the protection group and are not recovered if you run a recovery plan that includes that
protection group.

Datastores Spanning Multiple Consistency Groups
Do not configure datastores to span multiple consistency groups. Site Recovery Manager cannot protect
such datastores or virtual machines that use multiple consistency groups and operations can fail.
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The protection group might skip the consistency group if no other datastores backed by the consistency
group are part of the storage policy.

The protection group might not report problems related to the datastores.

Virtual machines using datastores that span consistency groups are in a nonprotected state even if the
virtual machines use the correct storage policy.

The datastores that span multiple consistency groups will appear to be nonreplicated and are not
protected by the storage policy protection group. Those datastores might disappear when
Site Recovery Manager migrates the protection group to the recovery site.

Protecting the Same Consistency Groups in both Array-Based Replication and
Storage Policy Protection Groups
If you tag a replicated datastore and associate it with a storage policy, you can include the storage policy
and its associated consistency groups in a storage policy protection group. It is also possible to include a
datastore group that contains the tagged datastore in an array-based replication protection group.
Consequently, consistency groups can end up being included in both an array-based replication protection
group and in a storage policy protection group.
When a storage policy protection group and an array-based replication protection group both attempt to
protect the same consistency group, the array-based replication protection group takes the ownership of the
consistency group and the virtual machines that it contains. The storage policy protection group marks the
consistency group and virtual machines in an error state. In this situation, you must remove the consistency
group from one of the protection groups.
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To keep the consistency group in the array-based replication protection group, disassociate the affected
virtual machines from the storage policy. Also disassociate the consistency group from the storage
policy. This removes them from the storage policy protection group.

To keep the consistency group in the storage policy protection group, edit the array-based replication
protection group to remove the datastore and virtual machines. This automatically resolves the error in
the storage policy protection group.

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Storage Policy Protection Groups and Periodic Polling
Storage policy protection groups attempt to protect virtual machines associated with storage policies only
during policy association when Site Recovery Manager Server starts. Site Recovery Manager does not
attempt to periodically protect virtual machines that are already associated with a storage policy.
As a result of the absence of periodic polling of the virtual machines in storage policy protection groups,
some limitations apply to storage policy protection groups.
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If you make modifications to a virtual machine's storage policy associations while
Site Recovery Manager is disconnected from vCenter Server, the changes might not be reflected. This is
also true if you delete a virtual machine and it is automatically disassociated from its storage policy.

If you protect a virtual machine that is associated with two protection groups, where one is a storage
policy protection group, the storage policy protection group does not automatically protect the virtual
machine if you delete the other protection group. You must reapply the storage policy to the virtual
machine for it to be protected by the storage policy protection group.

If you protect a virtual machine that is associated with two protection groups, where one is a storage
policy protection group, the storage policy protection group does not automatically protect the virtual
machine if you reconfigured the other protection group to prevent virtual machine overlap. You must
reapply the storage policy to the virtual machine for it to be protected by the storage policy protection
group.

If you protect a virtual machine that is associated with two storage policy protection groups, migrate
the virtual machine, and update its storage policy to associate it with the newer protection group rather
than with the older one, the protection of the virtual machine might fail.

Storage policy protection groups do not automatically protect some virtual machines in certain
circumstances.
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Virtual machines that are not initially protected due to licensing limits are not protected even after you
modify consistency groups and virtual machines to meet the licensing limit.

Virtual machines that are not initially protected due to licensing limits are not protected even after you
install a license for a larger number of virtual machines.

Virtual machine templates that are not initially protected are not protected even after you convert them
to standard virtual machines.

Virtual machines in vApps that are not initially protected are not protected even after you move them
to a standard resource pool.

To resolve these problems, reassociate the affected virtual machines with their current storage policies or
restart Site Recovery Manager Server.

Storage Policy Protection Groups and Nonprotected Virtual Machines
Your environment, the implementation of your storage policies, and the configuration of the datastores and
virtual machines to protect must meet the prerequisites for storage policy protection groups. If they do not
meet the prerequisites, Site Recovery Manager might not protect all of the virtual machines in a storage
policy protection group.
For the prerequisites that you must satisfy for storage policy protection, see “Prerequisites for Storage Policy
Protection Groups,” on page 49.
For example, virtual machines that are not associated with a storage policy can reside in a tagged datastore
alongside virtual machines that are associated with a storage policy. If you include the storage policy in a
storage policy protection group, because these virtual machines are not associated with that storage policy,
Site Recovery Manager does not protect them.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

Nonprotected virtual machines can appear in storage policy protection groups for reasons other than the
non-association of virtual machines with the correct storage policy. For descriptions of other circumstances
in which nonprotected virtual machines can appear in storage policy protection groups, see “Limitations of
Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50.
Similarly, because Site Recovery Manager does not periodically poll virtual machines in storage policy
protection groups, Site Recovery Manager might fail to protect virtual machines that change or that are
included in more than one storage policy protection group. For information about the limitations of storage
policy protection groups caused by the absence of polling, see “Storage Policy Protection Groups and
Periodic Polling,” on page 52.
If a storage policy protection group includes nonprotected virtual machines, these virtual machines appear
in the Related Objects > Virtual Machines view for the storage policy protection group. The protection
group appears in an error state.
How Site Recovery Manager handles nonprotected virtual machines depends on the type of recovery that
you run.
NOTE You can only attempt to protect nonprotected virtual machines in storage policy protection groups on
which you have never run recovery. If you have successfully or unsuccessfully run recovery on a storage
policy protection group that contains nonprotected virtual machines, you must remove those virtual
machines from the storage policy protection group.
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If you run a test recovery on a storage policy protection group that contains nonprotected virtual
machines, the operation fails with errors. If a test recovery fails due to nonreplicated virtual machines,
run cleanup before you attempt to protect or remove the nonprotected virtual machines, then run the
test again. After you have run cleanup, if you have never run a recovery on this protection group,
attempt to fix the protection of the affected virtual machines, for example by associating them with the
correct storage policy, or by moving virtual machine files from a nonreplicated datastore to a replicated
datastore.

If you run planned migration on a storage policy protection group that contains nonprotected virtual
machines, the operation fails and the recovery plan shows the Incomplete Recovery state. During the
deactivation step of planned migration, nonprotected virtual machines on the protected site can prevent
Site Recovery Manager from making the storage read-only, or virtual machines might lose access to
their data. If a protection group is in the Incomplete Recovery state, you must remove the nonprotected
virtual machines out of the protected datastore and disassociate them from the storage policy.

If you run disaster recovery on a storage policy protection group that contains nonprotected virtual
machines, the operation succeeds but Site Recovery Manager does not recover the nonprotected virtual
machines. When the protected site comes back online and you attempt to run planned migration to
complete the recovery, the planned migration fails if nonprotected virtual machines are still present on
the protected site. If a protection group is in the Incomplete Recovery state, you must remove the
nonprotected virtual machines out of the protected datastore and disassociate them from the storage
policy.

Create Protection Groups
You create protection groups to enable Site Recovery Manager to protect virtual machines.
You can organize protection groups in folders. Different views in the vSphere Web Client display the names
of the protection groups, but they do not display the folder names. If you have two protection groups with
the same name in different folders, it might be difficult to tell them apart in some views in the
vSphere Web Client. Consequently, ensure that protection group names are unique across all folders. In
environments in which not all users have view privileges for all folders, to be sure of the uniqueness of
protection group names, do not place protection groups in folders.

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When you create protection groups, wait to ensure that the operations finish as expected. Make sure that
Site Recovery Manager creates the protection group and that the protection of the virtual machines in the
group is successful.
Prerequisites
Verify that you performed one of the following tasks:
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Included virtual machines in datastores for which you configured array-based replication

Satisfied the requirements in “Prerequisites for Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 49 and
reviewed the “Limitations of Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50.

Configured vSphere Replication on virtual machines

Performed a combination of some or all of the above

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

On the Objects tab, click the icon to create a protection group.

On the Name and location page, enter a name and description for the protection group, select a pair of
sites or a folder, and click Next.

On the Protection group type page, select the direction of protection and the protection group type, and
click Next.

Option

Action

Create an array-based replication
protection group

Select Datastore groups (array-based replication) and select an array pair.

Create a vSphere Replication
protection group

Select Individual VMs (vSphere Replication).

Create a storage policy protection
group

Select Storage Policies (array-based replication).

Select datastore groups, virtual machines, or storage policies to add to the protection group.
Option

Action

Array-based replication protection
groups

Select datastore groups and click Next.
When you select a datastore group, the virtual machines that the group
contains appear in the Virtual machines table.

vSphere Replication protection
groups

Select virtual machines from the list, and click Next.
Only virtual machines that you configured for vSphere Replication and
that are not already in a protection group appear in the list.

Storage policy protection groups

Select storage policies from the list, and click Next.

Review your settings and click Finish.
You can monitor the progress of the creation of the protection group on the Objects tab.

For array-based replication and vSphere Replication protection groups, if Site Recovery Manager
successfully applied inventory mappings to the protected virtual machines, the protection status of
the protection group is OK.

For storage policy protection groups, if Site Recovery Manager successfully protected all of the
virtual machines associated with the storage policy, the protection status of the protection group is
OK.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

For array-based replication and vSphere Replication protection groups, if you did not configure
inventory mappings, or if Site Recovery Manager was unable to apply them, the protection status
of the protection group is Not Configured.

For storage policy protection groups, if Site Recovery Manager could not protect all of the virtual
machines associated with the storage policy, the protection status of the protection group is Not
Configured.

What to do next
For array-based replication and vSphere Replication protection groups, if the protection status of the
protection group is Not Configured, apply inventory mappings to the virtual machines:
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To apply site-wide inventory mappings, or to check that inventory mappings that you have already set
are valid, see Select Inventory Mappings in Site Recovery Manager Installation and Configuration. To apply
these mappings to all of the virtual machines, see “Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a
Protection Group,” on page 57.

To apply inventory mappings to each virtual machine in the protection group individually, see
“Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection Group,” on
page 58.

For storage policy protection groups, if the protection status of the protection group is Not Configured,
verify that you satisfied the prerequisites in “Prerequisites for Storage Policy Protection Groups,”
on page 49, review “Limitations of Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50, modify the storage policy
implementation accordingly, and attempt to recreate the protection group.

Organize Protection Groups in Folders
You can create folders in which to organize protection groups.
Organizing protection groups into folders is useful if you have many protection groups. You can limit the
access to protection groups by placing them in folders and assigning different permissions to the folders for
different users or groups. For information about how to assign permissions to folders, see “Assign Site
Recovery Manager Roles and Permissions,” on page 15.
Procedure
1

In the Home view of the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery.

Expand Inventory Trees and click Protection Groups.

Select the Related Objects tab and click Folders.

Click the Create Folder icon, enter a name for the folder to create, and click OK.

Add new or existing protection groups to the folder.

Option

Description

Create a new protection group

Right-click the folder and select Create Protection Group.

Add an existing protection group

Drag and drop protection groups from the inventory tree into the folder.

(Optional) To rename or delete a folder, right-click the folder and select Rename Folder or Delete
Folder.
You can only delete a folder if it is empty.

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Add or Remove Datastore Groups or Virtual Machines to or from a
Protection Group
You can add or remove datastore groups in an array-based replication protection group, or add or remove
virtual machines in a vSphere Replication protection group. You can also change the name and description
of an array-based or vSphere Replication protection group.
NOTE You cannot edit storage policy protection groups after their initial creation. You add virtual machines
to or remove virtual machines from an existing storage policy protection group by modifying the storage
policy associations of virtual machines in protected datastores. You can only add or remove virtual
machines in a storage policy protection group if recovery has never been run on that protection group. For
more information, see “Limitations of Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50.
Prerequisites
You created an array-based replication protection group or a vSphere Replication protection group.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

Right-click a protection group and select Edit Protection Group.

(Optional) Change the name or description of the protection group and click Next.
You cannot change the Location setting.

Click Next.
You cannot change the Protected Site or Replication Type settings. For array-based replication
protection groups, you cannot change the array pair.

Modify the datastore groups or virtual machines that the protection group contains.
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For array-based protection groups, select or deselect datastore groups to add them to or remove
them from the protection group, and click Next.

For vSphere Replication protection groups, select or deselect virtual machines to add them to or
remove them from the protection group, and click Next.

Review the settings and click Next to apply the settings.
You cannot revert or cancel the changes while Site Recovery Manager updates the protection group.

Click Finish to close the wizard.

If you configured site-wide inventory mappings, Site Recovery Manager applies the mappings to the virtual
machines that you added to the protection group. If successful, the status for the virtual machines is OK.
NOTE When you add datastores or virtual machines to a protection group, inventory mappings only apply
to the new virtual machines. For example, if you change inventory mappings, then add a datastore to a
protection group that is in the OK state, Site Recovery Manager applies the new mappings to the newly
protected virtual machines that reside in the new datastore. The previously protected virtual machines
continue to use the old mappings.
If you have not configured site-wide inventory mappings, the status for the protection group is Not
Configured and the status for the new virtual machines is Mapping Missing.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

What to do next
If the status of the protection group is Not Configured and the status for the new virtual machines is
Mapping Missing, apply inventory mappings to the virtual machines:
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To apply inventory mappings to each virtual machine in the protection group individually, see
“Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection Group,” on
page 58.

Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a Protection Group
If the status of an array-based or vSphere Replication protection group is Not Configured, you can configure
protection for all of the unconfigured virtual machines by using existing site-wide inventory mappings, in
one step.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager applies site-wide inventory mappings to virtual machines in storage policy
protection groups when you run a recovery plan. This information only applies to array-based replication
and vSphere Replication protection groups.
Site Recovery Manager applies site-wide inventory mappings to virtual machines in array-based replication
or vSphere Replication protection groups when you create the protection group. If you change the site-wide
inventory mappings after you create an array-based or vSphere Replication protection group or add virtual
machines to an array-based or vSphere Replication protection group, the virtual machines continue to
recover with the original inventory mappings. To apply new inventory mappings, you must reconfigure
protection on the virtual machines in the protection group.
The status of a protection group can be Not Configured for several reasons:
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You did not configure site-wide inventory mappings before you created the protection group.

You did not configure placeholder datastore mappings before you created the protection group.

You added virtual machines to a protection group after you created it.

Virtual machines lost their protection, possibly because you reconfigured them after you added them to
a protection group. For example, you added or removed virtual disks or devices.

Prerequisites
n

Configure or reconfigure site-wide inventory mappings. To select inventory mappings, see Select
Inventory Mappings in Site Recovery Manager Installation and Configuration.

Configure or reconfigure placeholder datastore mappings. To configure a placeholder datastore, see
Configure a Placeholder Datastore in Site Recovery Manager Installation and Configuration.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

Select a protection group and on the Related Objects tab, click the Virtual Machines tab.

Click the Configure All icon.
At least one virtual machine in the protection group must be in the Not Configured state for the
Configure All button to be activated.

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Click Yes to confirm that you want to apply inventory mappings to all unconfigured virtual machines.
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If Site Recovery Manager successfully applied inventory mappings to the virtual machines, the
status of the protection group is OK.

If Site Recovery Manager was unable to apply some or all of the inventory mappings, the status of
the virtual machines is Not Configured or Mapping Missing.

If Site Recovery Manager applied the inventory mappings, but was unable to create placeholders
for virtual machines, the status of the virtual machines is Placeholder VM creation error.

(Optional) If the status of the virtual machines is Not Configured or Mapping Missing, check the
inventory mappings and click Configure All again.

(Optional) If the status of the virtual machines is Placeholder VM creation error, check the placeholder
datastore mapping and try to recreate the placeholder virtual machines.
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To recreate the placeholder for an individual virtual machine, right-click a virtual machine and
select Recreate Placeholder.

To recreate the placeholder for several virtual machines, right-click the protection group and select
Restore Placeholder VMs.

Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a
Protection Group
You can configure the mappings for the virtual machines in an array-based or vSphere Replication
protection group individually. This ability allows you to use different resources on the recovery site for
different virtual machines.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager applies site-wide inventory mappings to virtual machines in storage policy
protection groups when you run a recovery plan. You cannot configure individual mappings on virtual
machines in storage policy protection groups. This information only applies to array-based replication and
vSphere Replication protection groups.
You can configure individual inventory mappings on virtual machines in an array-based or
vSphere Replication protection group even if you configured site-wide inventory mappings. If you did
configure site-wide inventory mappings, you can remove protection from an individual virtual machine and
configure the folder and resource mappings to override the site-wide mappings. You can change the
network mapping for an individual virtual machine without removing protection.
You cannot specify placeholder datastores for individual virtual machines. You must map datastores on the
protected site to placeholder datastores on the recovery site at the site level. To configure a placeholder
datastore, see Configure a Placeholder Datastore .
Prerequisites
You created an array-based or vSphere Replication protection group.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

Select the protection group that includes the virtual machine to configure.

On the Related Objects tab, click the Virtual Machines tab.

Right-click the virtual machine and select Configure Protection.

Configure inventory mappings by expanding the resources whose status is Not Configured and
selecting resources on the recovery site.
You can only change the folder, resource pool, and network mappings.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

(Optional) To apply these mappings to all protected virtual machines on the site, select the Save as
Inventory Mapping check box for each resource.
If you do not select the check box, the mapping is only applied to this virtual machine.

Click OK.
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If Site Recovery Manager successfully applied inventory mappings to the virtual machine, the
status of the virtual machine is OK.

If Site Recovery Manager was unable to apply some or all of the inventory mappings, the status of
the virtual machine is Not Configured or Mapping Missing.

If Site Recovery Manager applied the inventory mappings but was unable to create a placeholder
virtual machine, the status of the virtual machine is Placeholder VM creation error.

(Optional) If the status of the virtual machine is Not Configured or Mapping Missing, select Configure
Protection again and check the inventory mappings.

(Optional) If the status of the virtual machine is Placeholder VM creation error, check the placeholder
datastore mapping at the site level, right-click the virtual machine, and select Recreate Placeholder.

Modifying the Settings of a Protected Virtual Machine
Modifying the settings of a virtual machine that is included in a protection group, to add or change storage
devices, such as hard disks or DVD drives, can affect the protection of that virtual machine.
NOTE You cannot modify the settings of a virtual machine that you protect in a storage policy protection
group.
If you use array-based replication, adding or changing devices on a protected virtual machine affects
protection depending on how you create the new device.
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If the new device is on a replicated datastore that is not part of a protection group, the protection group
that contains the virtual machine goes into the Not Configured state. Reconfigure the protection group
to add the datastore that contains the new device to the protection group.

If the new device is on a replicated datastore that a different protection group protects, the protection of
the virtual machine is invalid.

If the new device is on an unreplicated datastore, you must replicate the datastore or remove protection
from the device.

If you use Storage vMotion to move a virtual machine to an unreplicated datastore, or to a replicated
datastore on an array for which Site Recovery Manager does not have a storage replication adapter
(SRA), the protection of the virtual machine is invalid. You can use Storage vMotion to move a virtual
machine to a datastore that is part of another protection group.

If you add a device to a virtual machine that you protect by using vSphere Replication, you must
reconfigure vSphere Replication on the virtual machine to select the replication options for the new device.
For information about reconfiguring vSphere Replication settings, see the vSphere Replication
documentation at https://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-replication-pubs.html.
After you modify virtual machines in array-based and vSphere Replication protection groups, you must
reconfigure protection for any virtual machines that have a status of Not Configured, Device Not Found,
Unresolved Devices, or Mapping Missing. See “Apply Inventory Mappings to All Members of a Protection
Group,” on page 57 and “Configure Inventory Mappings for an Individual Virtual Machine in a Protection
Group,” on page 58.

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Remove Protection from a Virtual Machine
You can temporarily remove protection from a replicated virtual machine in an array-based replication or
vSphere Replication protection group without removing it from its protection group.
NOTE You cannot temporarily remove protection from virtual machines in storage policy protection
groups.
Removing protection deletes the placeholder virtual machine on the recovery site. If you remove protection
from a virtual machine in an array-based replication or vSphere Replication protection group, the states of
the virtual machine and the protection group are set to Not Configured. Running a recovery plan that
contains the protection group succeeds for the protected virtual machines, but Site Recovery Manager does
not recover the virtual machines or protection groups that are in the Not Configured state. If you ran
planned migration, the plan enters the Recovery Incomplete state.
In array-based replication, a distinction exists between the Site Recovery Manager protection of a virtual
machine and the Site Recovery Manager storage management for that virtual machine. If you remove
protection from a virtual machine in an array-based replication protection group, Site Recovery Manager no
longer recovers the virtual machine, but it continues to monitor and manage the storage of the virtual
machine files.
You might remove protection from a virtual machine for different reasons:
n

You use vSphere Replication and you want to exclude a protected virtual machine from a protection
group.

You use array-based replication, and someone moves to a replicated datastore a virtual machine that
you do not want to protect. If you remove protection from the virtual machine, the protection group
shows the Not Configured state. Test recovery and planned migration fail for the whole group. Disaster
recovery succeeds, but only for the protected virtual machines in the group and certain operations on
the protected site are skipped. The recovery plan enters the Recovery required state. In this case, move
the virtual machine off the protected datastore.

You use array-based replication and a virtual machine has devices that are stored on an unreplicated
datastore. You can remove protection from the virtual machine so that disaster recovery succeeds for all
of the other virtual machines in the group while you relocate the device files.

Removing protection from a virtual machine affects protection groups differently, according to whether you
use array-based replication or vSphere Replication.
n

If you remove protection from a virtual machine that is part of array-based replication protection
group, you must move the files of that virtual machine to an unprotected datastore. If you leave the
files of an unprotected virtual machine in a datastore that Site Recovery Manager has included in a
datastore group, test recovery and planned migration fail for the entire datastore group. Disaster
recovery succeeds, but only for the protected virtual machines in the datastore group, and you must
move the unprotected virtual machine before you can run planned migration to complete the recovery.

If you disable vSphere Replication on a virtual machine that you included in a protection group,
recovery fails for this virtual machine but succeeds for all of the correctly configured virtual machines
in the protection group. You must remove protection from the virtual machine and remove the virtual
machine from the protection group, either by editing the protection group or by clicking Remove VM.
See “Add or Remove Datastore Groups or Virtual Machines to or from a Protection Group,” on page 56.

Procedure

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

Select an array-based replication or a vSphere Replication protection group and select Related Objects
> Virtual Machines.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

Right-click a virtual machine and select Remove Protection.

Click Yes to confirm the removal of protection from the virtual machine.

Protection Group Status Reference
You can monitor the status of a protection group and determine the operation that is allowed in each state.
Table 5‑1. Protection Group States
State

Description

Appears briefly while the interface is loading until the
protection group status appears.

Group is idle. All virtual machines are in OK state. You can
edit the group.

Not Configured

Group is idle. Some virtual machines might not be in OK
state. You can edit the group.

Testing

Group is used in a plan running a test. You cannot edit the
group.

Test Complete

Group is used in a plan running a test. You cannot edit the
group. Group returns to the OK or Not Configured state
when cleanup is successful.

Cleaning Up

Group is used in a plan that is cleaning up after a test. You
cannot edit the group. Group returns to the OK or Not
Configured state when cleanup is successful. If cleanup
fails, the group goes to the Testing state.

Recovering

Group is used in a plan that is running a recovery. You
cannot edit the group. If recovery succeeds, the group goes
to Recovered state. If recovery fails, group status changes
to Partially Recovered.

Partially Recovered

Group is in a plan that completed a recovery, but recovery
failed for some virtual machines. You can remove virtual
machines, but cannot configure or restore them.

Recovered

Group is in a plan that successfully completed a recovery.
You can remove virtual machines, but cannot configure or
restore them.

Reprotecting

Group is used in a plan running reprotect. You cannot edit
the group. Group returns to OK or Not Configured state
when reprotect is successful. If reprotect fails, the group
goes to Partially Reprotected state.

Partially Reprotected

The group is in a plan that failed a reprotect. You can
remove virtual machines, but cannot configure or restore
them.

Configuring Protection

Protection operations are in progress on virtual machines
in the group.

Removing Protection

Removing protection from virtual machines in the group is
in progress.

Restoring Placeholders

Creation of placeholders is in progress for virtual machines
in the group.

Operations in Progress

A combination of at least one Configure Protection and one
Remove Protection operations are in progress in the group.

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Virtual Machine Protection Status Reference
You can monitor the status of a virtual machine in a protection group and determine the operation that is
allowed in each state.
Table 5‑2. Virtual Machine Protection States

State

Description

Placeholder VM Not Found

You deleted the placeholder virtual machine. The Restore
Placeholder icon is enabled.

Original protected VM not found

You deleted the original production virtual machine after
failover and before reprotect. The Restore Placeholder icon
is enabled.

Datastore name used by VM is missing from group

The virtual machine requires a datastore that is not in the
protection group. Edit the protection group to include the
datastore.

Datastore name used by VM is protected in a different
group

The virtual machine requires a datastore that is in a
different protection group. Remove the datastore from the
other protection group and edit the current protection
group to include the datastore. You cannot include a
datastore in two protection groups.

Device not found: device name

You added an unreplicated disk or device to a protected
virtual machine. You must edit the replication of the virtual
machine to either include or remove the device from
protection.

Mapping missing: Folder name; Network name ; Resource
pool name

Folder, resource pool, or network mappings are not
configured for this VM. Fix the inventory mappings for the
site or manually configure the virtual machine.

Placeholder VM creation error: error string from server

Error during placeholder virtual machine creation.

The protected virtual machine exists, and both provider
and placeholder status are clean.

Invalid: error

The virtual machine is not valid because the home
datastore is not replicated or the virtual machine has been
deleted. The error string from the server contains the
details. Remove protection from the virtual machine
manually.

Not configured

You added a new virtual machine after creating the
protection group. Use Configure All to configure
protection on the virtual machine.

Error: error

Error can be one of the following:
n Recovery site resource pool, folder, or network are not
in the same datacenter.
n Placeholder datastore not found.
n Any vCenter Server error that occurred when creating
placeholder, such as connection or permission
problems.

Configuring protection

Virtual machine operation.

Removing protection

Virtual machine operation.

Restoring placeholder

Virtual machine operation.

Appears briefly while the interface is loading until the
virtual machine status appears.

Mapping Conflict

Site Recovery Manager Server reported an inventory
conflict. The resource pool and folder of the virtual
machine are in different datacenters.

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Chapter 5 Creating and Managing Protection Groups

Table 5‑2. Virtual Machine Protection States (Continued)
State

Description

Replication Error

vSphere Replication reports an error about the virtual
machine.

Replication Warning

vSphere Replication reports a warning about the virtual
machine.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

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Creating, Testing, and Running
Site Recovery Manager Recovery
Plans

After you configure Site Recovery Manager at the protected and recovery sites, you can create, test, and run
a recovery plan.
A recovery plan is like an automated run book. It controls every step of the recovery process, including the
order in which Site Recovery Manager powers on and powers off virtual machines, the network addresses
that recovered virtual machines use, and so on. Recovery plans are flexible and customizable.
A recovery plan includes one or more protection groups. You can include a protection group in more than
one recovery plan. For example, you can create one recovery plan to handle a planned migration of services
from the protected site to the recovery site, and another plan to handle an unplanned event such as a power
failure or natural disaster. In this example, having these different recovery plans referencing one protection
group allows you to decide how to perform recovery.
You can run only one recovery plan at a time to recover a particular protection group. If you simultaneously
test or run multiple recovery plans that specify the same protection group, only one recovery plan can
operate on the protection group. Other running recovery plans that specify the same protection group
report warnings for that protection group and the virtual machines it contains. The warnings explain that
the virtual machines were recovered, but do not report other protection groups that the other recovery plans
cover.
n

Testing a Recovery Plan on page 66
When you create or modify a recovery plan, test it before you try to use it for planned migration or for
disaster recovery.

Performing a Planned Migration or Disaster Recovery By Running a Recovery Plan on page 67
You can run a recovery plan under planned circumstances to migrate virtual machines from the
protected site to the recovery site. You can also run a recovery plan under unplanned circumstances if
the protected site suffers an unforeseen event that might result in data loss.

Differences Between Testing and Running a Recovery Plan on page 69
Testing a recovery plan has no lasting effects on either the protected site or the recovery site, but
running a recovery plan has significant effects on both sites.

Performing Test Recovery of Virtual Machines Across Multiple Hosts on the Recovery Site on
page 70
You can create recovery plans that recover virtual machines across multiple recovery site hosts in a
quarantined test network.

Create, Test, and Run a Recovery Plan on page 70
You perform several sets of tasks to create, test, and run a recovery plan.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Export Recovery Plan Steps on page 76
You can export the steps of a recovery plan in various formats for future reference, or to keep a hard
copy backup of your plans.

View and Export a Recovery Plan History on page 77
You can view and export reports about each run of a recovery plan, test of a recovery plan, or test
cleanup.

Delete a Recovery Plan on page 77
You can delete a recovery plan if you do not need it.

Recovery Plan Status Reference on page 77
You can monitor the status of a recovery plan and determine the operation that is allowed in each
state. The state of a recovery plan is determined by the states of the protection groups within the plan.

Testing a Recovery Plan
When you create or modify a recovery plan, test it before you try to use it for planned migration or for
disaster recovery.
By testing a recovery plan, you ensure that the virtual machines that the plan protects recover correctly to
the recovery site. If you do not test recovery plans, an actual disaster recovery situation might not recover all
virtual machines, resulting in data loss.
Testing a recovery plan exercises nearly every aspect of a recovery plan, although Site Recovery Manager
makes several concessions to avoid disrupting ongoing operations on the protected and recovery sites.
Recovery plans that suspend local virtual machines do so for tests as well as for actual recoveries. With this
exception, running a test recovery does not disrupt replication or ongoing activities at either site.
If you use vSphere Replication, when you test a recovery plan, the virtual machine on the protected site can
still synchronize with the replica virtual machine disk files on the recovery site. The vSphere Replication
server creates redo logs on the virtual machine disk files on the recovery site, so that synchronization can
continue normally. When you perform cleanup after running a test, the vSphere Replication server removes
the redo logs from the disks on the recovery site and persists the changes accumulated in the logs to VM
disks.
If you use array-based replication, when you test a recovery plan, the virtual machines on the protected site
are still replicated to the replica virtual machines' disk files on the recovery site. During test recovery, the
array creates a snapshot of the volumes hosting the virtual machines' disk files on the recovery site. Array
replication continues normally while the test is in progress. When you perform cleanup after running a test,
the array removes the snapshots that were created earlier as part of test recovery workflow.
You can run test recoveries as often as necessary. You can cancel a recovery plan test at any time.
Before running a failover or another test, you must successfully run a cleanup operation. See “Clean Up
After Testing a Recovery Plan,” on page 73.
Permission to test a recovery plan does not include permission to run a recovery plan. Permission to run a
recovery plan does not include permission to test a recovery plan. You must assign each permission
separately. See “Assign Site Recovery Manager Roles and Permissions,” on page 15.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

Test Networks and Datacenter Networks
When you test a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager can create a test network that it uses to connect
recovered virtual machines. Creating a test network allows the test to run without potentially disrupting
virtual machines in the production environment.
The test network is managed by its own virtual switch, and in most cases recovered virtual machines can
use the network without having to change network properties such as IP address, gateway, and so on. You
use the test network by selecting Auto when you configure the test network settings while creating a
recovery plan. A test network does not span hosts. You must configure a test network for every network
that a recovery plan uses during recovery.
You must recover any virtual machines that must interact with each other to the same test network. For
example, if a Web server accesses information on a database, those Web server and database virtual
machines should recover together to the same network.
A datacenter network is a network that typically supports existing virtual machines at the recovery site. You
can select a datacenter network for use as a test network. To use it, recovered virtual machines must
conform to its network address availability rules. These virtual machines must use a network address that
the network's switch can serve and route, must use the correct gateway and DNS host, and so on. Recovered
virtual machines that use DHCP can connect to this network without additional customization. Other
virtual machines require IP customization and additional recovery plan steps to apply the customization.

Performing a Planned Migration or Disaster Recovery By Running a
Recovery Plan
You can run a recovery plan under planned circumstances to migrate virtual machines from the protected
site to the recovery site. You can also run a recovery plan under unplanned circumstances if the protected
site suffers an unforeseen event that might result in data loss.
During a planned migration, Site Recovery Manager synchronizes the virtual machine data on the recovery
site with the virtual machines on the protected site. Site Recovery Manager attempts to gracefully shut down
the protected machines and performs a final synchronization to prevent data loss, then powers on the
virtual machines on the recovery site. If errors occur during a planned migration, the plan stops so that you
can resolve the errors and rerun the plan. You can reprotect the virtual machines after the recovery.
During disaster recoveries, Site Recovery Manager first attempts a storage synchronization. If it succeeds,
Site Recovery Manager uses the synchronized storage state to recover virtual machines on the recovery site
to their most recent available state, according to the recovery point objective (RPO) that you set when you
configure your replication technology. When you run a recovery plan to perform a disaster recovery,
Site Recovery Manager attempts to shut down the virtual machines on the protected site. If
Site Recovery Manager cannot shut down the virtual machines, Site Recovery Manager still starts the copies
at the recovery site. In case the protected site comes back online after disaster recovery, the recovery plan
goes into an inconsistent state where production virtual machines are running on both sites, known as a
split-brain scenario. Site Recovery Manager detects this state and allows you to run the plan once more to
power off the virtual machines on the protected site. Then the recovery plan goes back to consistent state
and you can run reprotect.
If Site Recovery Manager detects that a datastore on the protected site is in the all paths down (APD) state
and is preventing a virtual machine from shutting down, Site Recovery Manager waits for a period before
attempting to shut down the virtual machine again. The APD state is usually transient, so by waiting for a
datastore in the APD state to come back online, Site Recovery Manager can gracefully shut down the
protected virtual machines on that datastore.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Site Recovery Manager uses VMware Tools heartbeat to discover when a virtual machine is running on the
recovery site. In this way, Site Recovery Manager can ensure that all virtual machines are running on the
recovery site. For this reason, VMware recommends that you install VMware Tools on protected virtual
machines. If you do not or cannot install VMware Tools on the protected virtual machines, you must
configure Site Recovery Manager not to wait for VMware Tools to start in the recovered virtual machines
and to skip the guest operating system shutdown step. See “Change Recovery Settings,” on page 137.
After Site Recovery Manager completes the final replication, Site Recovery Manager makes changes at both
sites that require significant time and effort to reverse. Because of this time and effort, you must assign the
privilege to test a recovery plan and the privilege to run a recovery plan separately.

Running a Recovery with Forced Recovery
If the protected site is offline and Site Recovery Manager cannot perform its usual tasks in a timely manner
which increases the RTO to an unacceptable level, you can run the recovery with the forced recovery option.
Forced recovery starts the virtual machines on the recovery site without performing any operations on the
protected site.
CAUTION Only use forced recovery in cases where the recovery time objective (RTO) is severely affected by
a lack of connectivity to the protection site.
Forced recovery is for use in cases where infrastructure fails at the protected site and, as a result, protected
virtual machines are unmanageable and cannot be shut down, powered off, or unregistered. In such a case,
the system state cannot be changed for extended periods. To resolve this situation, you can force recovery.
Forcing recovery does not complete the process of shutting down the virtual machines at the protected site.
As a result, a split-brain scenario occurs, but the recovery might complete more quickly.
Running disaster recovery with array-based replication when the protected site storage array is offline or
unavailable can affect the mirroring between the protected and the recovery storage arrays. After you run
forced recovery, you must check that mirroring is set up correctly between the protected array and the
recovery array before you can perform further replication operations. If mirroring is not set up correctly,
you must repair the mirroring by using the storage array software.
When running disaster recovery using vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager prepares
vSphere Replication storage for reprotect and you do not have to verify mirroring as you do with arraybased replication.
When you enable forced recovery when the protected site storage is still available, any outstanding changes
on the protection site are not replicated to the recovery site before the sequence begins. Replication of the
changes occurs according to the recovery point objective (RPO) period of the storage array. If a new virtual
machine or template is added on the protection site and recovery is initiated before the storage RPO period
has elapsed, the new virtual machine or template does not appear on the replicated datastore and is lost. To
avoid losing the new virtual machine or template, wait until the end of the RPO period before running the
recovery plan with forced recovery.
To select forced recovery when running disaster recovery, you must enable the option

recovery.forceRecovery in Advanced Settings on the Site Recovery Manager Server on the recovery site. In

the Run Recovery Plan wizard, you can only select the forced recovery option in disaster recovery mode. It
is not available for planned migration.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

After the forced recovery completes and you have verified the mirroring of the storage arrays, you can
resolve the issue that necessitated the forced recovery. After you resolve the underlying issue, run planned
migration on the recovery plan again, resolve any problems that occur, and rerun the plan until it finishes
successfully. Running the recovery plan again does not affect the recovered virtual machines at the recovery
site.
NOTE When you run planned migration after running a forced recovery, virtual machines on the protected
site might fail to shut down if the underlying datastores are read only or unavailable. In this case, log into
vCenter Server on the protected site and power off the virtual machines manually. After you have powered
off the virtual machines, run planned migration again.

Differences Between Testing and Running a Recovery Plan
Testing a recovery plan has no lasting effects on either the protected site or the recovery site, but running a
recovery plan has significant effects on both sites.
You need different privileges when testing and running a recovery plan.
Table 6‑1. How Testing a Recovery Plan Differs from Running a Recovery Plan
Area of Difference

Test a Recovery Plan

Run a Recovery Plan

Required privileges

Requires Site Recovery
Manager.Recovery Plans.Test
permission.

Requires Site Recovery
Manager.Recovery Plans.Recovery
permission.

Effect on virtual machines at
protected site

None

Site Recovery Manager shuts down
virtual machines in reverse priority order
and restores any virtual machines that are
suspended at the protected site.

Effect on virtual machines at
recovery site

Site Recovery Manager suspends
local virtual machines if the recovery
plan requires this.
Site Recovery Manager restarts
suspended virtual machines after
cleaning up the test.

Site Recovery Manager suspends local
virtual machines if the recovery plan
requires this.

Effect on replication

Site Recovery Manager creates
temporary snapshots of replicated
storage at the recovery site. For
array-based replication,
Site Recovery Manager rescans the
arrays to discover them.

During a planned migration,
Site Recovery Manager synchronizes
replicated datastores, then stops
replication, then makes the target devices
at the recovery site writable. During a
disaster recovery, Site Recovery Manager
attempts the same steps, but if they do not
succeed, Site Recovery Manager ignores
protected site errors.

Network

If you explicitly assign test networks,
Site Recovery Manager connects
recovered virtual machines to a test
network. If virtual machine network
assignment is Auto,
Site Recovery Manager assigns
virtual machines to temporary
networks that are not connected to
any physical network.

Site Recovery Manager connects
recovered virtual machines to the userspecified datacenter network.

Interruption of recovery plan

You can cancel a test at any time.

You can cancel the recovery at any time.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Performing Test Recovery of Virtual Machines Across Multiple Hosts
on the Recovery Site
You can create recovery plans that recover virtual machines across multiple recovery site hosts in a
quarantined test network.
With Site Recovery Manager, the vSwitches can be DVS based and span hosts. If you accept the default test
network configured as Auto, then virtual machines that are recovered across hosts are placed in their own
test network during recovery plan tests. Each test switch is isolated between hosts. As a result, virtual
machines in the same recovery plan are isolated when the test recovery finishes. To allow the virtual
machines to communicate, establish and select DVS switches or VLANs. With an isolated VLAN that
connects all hosts to each other but not to a production network, you can more realistically test a recovery.
To achieve connectivity among recovery hosts, but maintain isolation from the production network, follow
these recommendations:
n

Create DVS switches that are connected to an isolated VLAN that is private. Such a VLAN allows hosts
and virtual machines to be connected, but to be isolated from production virtual machines. Use a
naming convention that clearly designates that the DVS is for testing use, and select this DVS in the
recovery plan test network column in the recovery plan editor.

Create test VLANs on a physical network, providing no route back to the protected site. Trunk test
VLANs to recovery site vSphere clusters and create virtual switches for test VLAN IDs. Use a clear
naming convention to identify that these switches are for testing. Select these switches from the test
recovery network column in the recovery plan editor.

Create, Test, and Run a Recovery Plan
You perform several sets of tasks to create, test, and run a recovery plan.
Procedure
1

Create a Recovery Plan on page 71
You create a recovery plan to establish how Site Recovery Manager recovers virtual machines.

Organize Recovery Plans in Folders on page 71
You can create folders in which to organize recovery plans.

Edit a Recovery Plan on page 72
You can edit a recovery plan to change the properties that you specified when you created it. You can
edit recovery plans from the protected site or from the recovery site.

Test a Recovery Plan on page 72
When you test a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager runs the virtual machines of the recovery plan
on a test network and on a temporary snapshot of replicated data at the recovery site.
Site Recovery Manager does not disrupt operations at the protected site.

Clean Up After Testing a Recovery Plan on page 73
After you test a recovery plan, you can return the recovery plan to the Ready state by running a
cleanup operation. You must complete the cleanup operation before you can run a failover or another
test.

Run a Recovery Plan on page 74
When you run a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager migrates all virtual machines in the recovery
plan to the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager attempts to shut down the corresponding virtual
machines on the protected site.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

Recover a Point-in-Time Snapshot of a Virtual Machine on page 75
With vSphere Replication, you can retain point-in-time snapshots of a virtual machine. You can
configure Site Recovery Manager to recover a number of point-in-time (PIT) snapshots of a virtual
machine when you run a recovery plan.

Cancel a Test or Recovery on page 76
You can cancel a recovery plan test whenever the status is test in progress or failover in progress.

Create a Recovery Plan
You create a recovery plan to establish how Site Recovery Manager recovers virtual machines.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

On the Objects tab, click the icon to create a recovery plan.

Enter a name and description for the plan, select a folder, then click Next.

Select the recovery site and click Next.

Select the group type from the menu.
Option

Description

VM protection groups

Select this option to create a recovery plan that contains array-based
replication and vSphere Replication protection groups.

Storage policy protection groups

Select this option to create a recovery plan that contains storage policy
protection groups.

The default is VM protection groups.
NOTE If using stretched storage, select Storage policy protection groups for the group type.
6

Select one or more protection groups for the plan to recover, and click Next.

Click the Test Network value, select a network to use during test recovery, and click Next.
The default option is to create an isolated network automatically.

Review the summary information and click Finish to create the recovery plan.

Organize Recovery Plans in Folders
You can create folders in which to organize recovery plans.
Organizing recovery plans into folders is useful if you have many recovery plans. You can limit the access to
recovery plans by placing them in folders and assigning different permissions to the folders for different
users or groups. For information about how to assign permissions to folders, see “Assign Site Recovery
Manager Roles and Permissions,” on page 15.
Procedure
1

In the Home view of the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery.

Expand Inventory Trees and click Recovery Plans.

Select the Related Objects tab and click Folders.

Click the Create Folder icon, enter a name for the folder to create, and click OK.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Add new or existing recovery plans to the folder.
Option

Description

Create a new recovery plan

Right-click the folder and select Create Recovery Plan.

Add an existing recovery plan

Drag and drop recovery plans from the inventory tree into the folder.

(Optional) To rename or delete a folder, right-click the folder and select Rename Folder or Delete
Folder.
You can only delete a folder if it is empty.

Edit a Recovery Plan
You can edit a recovery plan to change the properties that you specified when you created it. You can edit
recovery plans from the protected site or from the recovery site.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

Right-click a recovery plan, and select Edit Plan.
You can also edit a recovery plan by clicking the Edit recovery plan icon in the Recovery Steps view in
the Monitor tab.

(Optional) Change the name or description of the plan in the Recovery Plan Name text box, and click
Next.

On the Recovery site page, click Next.
You cannot change the recovery site.

(Optional) Select or deselect one or more protection groups to add them to or remove them from the
plan, and click Next.

(Optional) Click the test network to select a different test network on the recovery site, and click Next.

Review the summary information and click Finish to make the specified changes to the recovery plan.
You can monitor the update of the plan in the Recent Tasks view.

Test a Recovery Plan
When you test a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager runs the virtual machines of the recovery plan on a
test network and on a temporary snapshot of replicated data at the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager
does not disrupt operations at the protected site.
Testing a recovery plan runs all the steps in the plan, except for powering down virtual machines at the
protected site and forcing devices at the recovery site to assume mastership of replicated data. If the plan
requires the suspension of local virtual machines at the recovery site, Site Recovery Manager suspends those
virtual machines during the test. Running a test of a recovery plan makes no other changes to the
production environment at either site.
Testing a recovery plan creates a snapshot on the recovery site of all of the disk files of the virtual machines
in the recovery plan. The creation of the snapshots adds to the I/O latency on the storage. If you notice
slower response times when you test recovery plans and you are using VMware Virtual SAN storage,
monitor the I/O latency by using the monitoring tool in the Virtual SAN interface.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

Right-click the plan and select Test.
You can also run a test by clicking the Test recovery plan icon in the Recovery Steps view in the
Monitor tab.

(Optional) Select Replicate recent changes to recovery site.
Selecting this option ensures that the recovery site has the latest copy of protected virtual machines, but
means that the synchronization might take more time.

Click Next.

Review the test information and click Finish.

Click the Recovery Steps in the Monitor tab to monitor the progress of the test and respond to
messages.
The Recovery Steps tab displays the progress of individual steps. The Test task in Recent Tasks tracks
overall progress.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager runs recovery steps in the prescribed order, except that it does not wait
for the Prepare Storage step to finish for all protection groups before continuing to the next steps.

What to do next
Run a cleanup operation after the recovery plan test finishes to restore the recovery plan to its original state
from before the test.

Clean Up After Testing a Recovery Plan
After you test a recovery plan, you can return the recovery plan to the Ready state by running a cleanup
operation. You must complete the cleanup operation before you can run a failover or another test.
Site Recovery Manager performs several cleanup operations after a test.
n

Powers off the recovered virtual machines.

Replaces recovered virtual machines with placeholders, preserving their identity and configuration
information.

Cleans up replicated storage snapshots that the recovered virtual machines used during the test.

Prerequisites
Verify that you tested a recovery plan.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

Right-click the recovery plan and select Cleanup.
You can also run cleanup by clicking the cleanup icon in the Recovery Steps view in the Monitor tab.

Review the cleanup information and click Next.

Click Finish.

After the cleanup finishes, if it reports errors, run the cleanup again, selecting the Force Cleanup
option.
The Force Cleanup option forces the removal of virtual machines, ignoring any errors, and returns the
plan to the Ready state. If necessary, run cleanup several times with the Force Cleanup option, until the
cleanup succeeds.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Run a Recovery Plan
When you run a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager migrates all virtual machines in the recovery plan to
the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager attempts to shut down the corresponding virtual machines on the
protected site.
CAUTION A recovery plan makes significant alterations in the configurations of the protected and recovery
sites and it stops replication. Do not run any recovery plan that you have not tested. Reversing these
changes might cost significant time and effort and can result in prolonged service downtime.
Prerequisites
n

To use forced recovery, you must first enable this function. You enable forced recovery by enabling the
recovery.forceRecovery setting as described in “Change Recovery Settings,” on page 137.

Ensure that you have configured full inventory mappings. If you have only configured temporary
placeholder inventory mappings and you run a planned migration with the Enable vMotion of eligible
VMs option, planned migration fails, even though both sites are running.

To use the Enable vMotion of eligible VMs option with planned migration, enable vMotion on the
virtual machines. For instructions about enabling vMotion on virtual machines, see “Enable vSphere
vMotion for Planned Migration,” on page 89.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

Right-click the recovery plan and select Run.

Review the information in the confirmation prompt, and select I understand that this process will
permanently alter the virtual machines and infrastructure of both the protected and recovery
datacenters.

Select the type of recovery to run.

Option

Description

Planned Migration

Recovers virtual machines to the recovery site when both sites are running.
If errors occur on the protected site during a planned migration, the
planned migration operation fails. If your array supports stretched storage,
select the Enable vMotion of eligible VMs check box.

Disaster Recovery

Recovers virtual machines to the recovery site if the protected site
experiences a problem. If errors occur on the protected site during a
disaster recovery, the disaster recovery continues and does not fail.

(Optional) Select the Forced Recovery - recovery site operations only check box.
This option is available if you enabled the forced recovery function and you selected Disaster Recovery.

Click Next.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

Review the recovery information and click Finish.
When you run planned migration of a recovery plan that contains a storage policy protection group,
Site Recovery Manager checks that the protection groups are synchronized on both of the protected and
recovery sites before it runs the recovery plan. This check happens when you click Finish. If the
protection group is synchronized on both sites, the planned migration begins. If the protection group is
not synchronized at both sites, you see the error The peer site has not finished synchronizing
changes to protection group.

If you see this error, dismiss the error message and click Finish again. If the synchronization has
completed, the planned migration begins.

If the error persists, cancel the planned migration, wait a short time, and attempt to run the
planned migration again.

Click the Monitor tab and click Recovery Steps.
The Recovery Steps tab displays the progress of individual steps. The Recent Tasks area reports the
progress of the overall plan.

Recover a Point-in-Time Snapshot of a Virtual Machine
With vSphere Replication, you can retain point-in-time snapshots of a virtual machine. You can configure
Site Recovery Manager to recover a number of point-in-time (PIT) snapshots of a virtual machine when you
run a recovery plan.
You configure the retention of PIT snapshots when you configure vSphere Replication on a virtual machine.
For more information about PIT snapshots, see “Replicating a Virtual Machine and Enabling Multiple Point
in Time Instances,” on page 29.
To enable PIT snapshots, configure replication of a virtual machine by using the vSphere Replication
interface in the vSphere Web Client.
Site Recovery Manager only recovers the most recent PIT snapshot during a recovery. To recover older
snapshots, you must enable the vrReplication > preserveMpitImagesAsSnapshots option in Advanced
Settings in the Site Recovery Manager interface. If you recover a PIT snapshot of a virtual machine for which
you have configured IP customization, Site Recovery Manager only applies the customization to the most
recent PIT snapshot. If you recover a virtual machine with IP customization and revert to an older PIT
snapshot, you must configure the IP settings manually.
Point-in-time recovery is not available with array-based replication.
Procedure
1

Configure Site Recovery Manager to retain older PIT snapshots by setting the vrReplication >
preserveMpitImagesAsSnapshots option.

Use the vSphere Replication interface to configure replication of a virtual machine, selecting the option
to retain a number of PIT snapshots.

In the Site Recovery Manager interface, add the virtual machine to a vSphere Replication protection
group.

Include the vSphere Replication protection group in a recovery plan.

Run the recovery plan.
When the recovery plan is finished, the virtual machine is recovered to the recovery site, with the
number of PIT snapshots that you configured.

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In the VMs and Templates view, right-click the recovered virtual machine and select Snapshot >
Snapshot Manager.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Select one of the PIT snapshots of this virtual machine and click Go to.
The recovered virtual machine reverts to the PIT snapshot that you selected.

(Optional) If you have configured the virtual machine for IP customization, and if you select an older
PIT snapshot than the most recent one, manually configure the IP settings on the recovered virtual
machine.

Cancel a Test or Recovery
You can cancel a recovery plan test whenever the status is test in progress or failover in progress.
When you cancel a test or recovery, Site Recovery Manager does not start processes, and uses certain rules
to stop processes that are in progress. Canceling a failover requires you to re-run the failover.
n

Processes that cannot be stopped, such as powering on or waiting for a heartbeat, run to completion
before the cancellation finishes.

Processes that add or remove storage devices are undone by cleanup operations if you cancel.

The time it takes to cancel a test or recovery depends on the type and number of processes that are currently
in progress.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

Right-click the recovery plan and select Cancel. You can also cancel the plan from the Recovery Steps
tab.

What to do next
Run a cleanup after canceling a test.

Export Recovery Plan Steps
You can export the steps of a recovery plan in various formats for future reference, or to keep a hard copy
backup of your plans.
You cannot export the recovery plan steps while a test recovery or a real recovery is in progress.
Prerequisites
Verify that you have a recovery plan.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

In the Monitor tab, click Recovery Steps.

Click the Export Recovery Plan Steps icon.
You can save the recovery plan steps as HTML, XML, CSV, or MS Excel or Word document.

Click Generate Report.

Click Download Report and close the window.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

View and Export a Recovery Plan History
You can view and export reports about each run of a recovery plan, test of a recovery plan, or test cleanup.
Recovery plan histories provide information about each run, test, or cleanup of a recovery plan. The history
contains information about the result and the start and end times for the whole plan and for each step in the
plan. You can export history at any time, but history always contains entries only for completed operations.
If an operation is in progress, the history appears after the operation completes.
SRM preserves history for deleted recovery plans. You can export history reports for existing and deleted
plans. To export a history report for a deleted plan, select a site, then select Monitor > Recovery Plans
History.
To export a history report for an existing plan, follow this procedure.
Prerequisites
You ran or tested a recovery plan, or cleaned up after a test.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Monitor tab, click History.

(Optional) Click the Export icon for the recovery plan history for a specific time period, recovery plan
run, test, or cleanup operation.
You can save the recovery plan history as HTML, XML, CSV, or MS Excel or Word document.

Delete a Recovery Plan
You can delete a recovery plan if you do not need it.
The recovery plan must be a consistent state before you can delete it.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

(Optional) On the Monitor tab, click History, and click Export History Report to download the history
of the plan.
You can view the history for deleted plans in History.

Right-click the recovery plan to delete and select Delete Recovery Plan.

Recovery Plan Status Reference
You can monitor the status of a recovery plan and determine the operation that is allowed in each state. The
state of a recovery plan is determined by the states of the protection groups within the plan.
Table 6‑2. Recovery States
State

Description

Ready

Recovery steps are cleared.
For Storage Policy Protection Groups, Recovery steps do
not show virtual machines and consistency groups when a
recovery plan is in this state.
You can verify protected virtual machines in a recovery
plan in the Related Objects tab.

Test in progress

Canceling a test moves plan to Cancel in Progress state.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Table 6‑2. Recovery States (Continued)

State

Description

Test complete

Test completed with or without errors. If a failure occurs
during the test, plan goes to Test Interrupted state.

Test interrupted

Server failed while a test was running.

Cleanup in progress

After successful cleanup, plan state goes to Ready.
If cleanup is incomplete, state goes to Cleanup Incomplete.
If you set the Force Cleanup option, state goes to Ready
after an error.
If a failure occurs during cleanup, state goes to Cleanup
Incomplete.

Cleanup incomplete

Errors occurred during cleanup.
You can run the cleanup again.
When running cleanup from this state, the cleanup wizard
provides an option to ignore errors.

Cleanup interrupted

Site Recovery Manager failed during cleanup.
You cannot change recovery options.

Recovery in progress

If you cancel recovery, the state goes to Cancel in progress.

Disaster recovery complete

During recovery at the protected site, VM shutdown
enountered errors, possibly because the sites were not
connected, the step before split brain.
System prompt warns of split brain and to run recovery
again when sites reconnect.
When sites are connected, state goes to Recovery Required
(split brain)

Recovery started

A recovery started on the peer site, but if the sites are not
connected, the exact state is unknown.
Log in to the recovery site or reconnect the sites to get the
current state.

Recovery required (split brain)

Sites were disconnected during recovery. Split brain
scenario detected when sites reconnect.
System prompts you to run recovery again to synchronize
the sites.
For Storage Policy Protection Groups, Recovery steps do
not show virtual machines and consistency groups when a
recovery plan is in this state.
You can verify protected virtual machines in a recovery
plan in the Related Objects tab.

Recovery complete

If errors, VMs are all recovered but with errors. Running
recovery again does not fix the errors.
Plan goes to this state after the split brain recovery is
resolved.
You can see the recover steps of the last recovery run.
For Storage Policy Protection Groups, Recovery steps do
not show virtual machines and consistency groups when a
recovery plan is in this state.
You can verify protected virtual machines in a recovery
plan in the Related Objects tab.

Recovery complete (2)

Sites were disconnected during recovery. The connection
status is the only property that triggers this state.
If errors, VMs are all recovered but with errors. Running
recovery again does not fix the errors.
Plan goes to this state after the split brain recovery is
resolved.

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Chapter 6 Creating, Testing, and Running Site Recovery Manager Recovery Plans

Table 6‑2. Recovery States (Continued)
State

Description

Incomplete recovery

Canceled recovery or datastore error. Run recovery again.
You need to either resolve errors and rerun recovery, or
remove protection for VMs in error. The plan detects the
resolution of errors in either of these ways and updates
state to Recovery Complete.

Partial recovery

Some but not all protection groups are recovered by an
overlapping plan.

Recovery interrupted

A failure during recovery causes the recovery to pause.
Click Recovery to continue. You cannot change recovery
options.

Cancel in progress

Canceling a test results in Test Complete with last result
canceled.
Canceling a recovery results in Incomplete Recovery with
last result canceled.
If the operation is canceled early enough, may result in a
Ready state.

Reprotect in progress

If the server fails during this state, it goes to Reprotect
Interrupted.

Partial reprotect

Overlapping plan was reprotected.
The already reprotected groups go to Ready state, but this
is valid, since the other groups are in the Recovered state.

Incomplete reprotect

Reprotect did not complete the storage operations. Sites
must be connected for the reportect to succeed on the new
run.

Incomplete reprotect (2)

Reprotect completed the storage operations but did not
complete creating shadow virtual machines. You can run
reprotect again even if the site running the virtual
machines is disconnected, then proceed to recovery
immediately after.

Reprotect interrupted

If the Site Recovery Manager Server fails during reprotect,
run reprotect again to continue and properly clean up the
state.

Waiting for user input during test

Test is paused. Dismiss the prompt to resume the test.

Waiting for user input during recovery

Recovery is paused. Dismiss the prompt to resume
recovery.

Protection groups in use

Plan contains groups that are being used for a test by
another plan. This state also occurs when the other plan
has completed a Test operation on the groups, but has not
run Cleanup.
Wait for the other plan to complete the test or cleanup or
edit the plan to remove the groups.

Direction error

Groups are in a mixed state, which is an invalid state. Some
groups are Ready in both directions: a site is protected and
a site is recovered within a particular group. Remove some
protection groups.
For this error to occur, overlapping plans have run and
reprotected all the groups in the plan already.

Deleting

Plan enters this brief state while waiting for deletion of a
peer plan. Plan automatically completes when the other
plan is deleted.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Table 6‑2. Recovery States (Continued)

State

Description

Plan out of sync

This state can occur under different circumstances:
n Between a successful test recovery and a cleanup
operation. You cannot edit the plan when it is in this
state. Run cleanup to return the plan to the Ready state.
If the plan remains in the Plan Out of Sync state, edit
the plan.
n During regular operation You can edit the plan.
Opening the plan for editing causes Site Recovery Manager
to force synchronization of Site Recovery Manager internal
data about the plan between protection and recovery
Site Recovery Manager servers, which clears the Plan Out
Of Sync status .

No protection groups

The plan contains no protection groups and the plan
cannot run.
You can edit the plan including the recovery site.
You can create empty plans through the API or UI, or by
deleting protection groups.

Internal error

A protection group with an unknown state is in the plan, or
some other unexpected error occurred.
You cannot run the plan but you can delete it.

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Configuring a Recovery Plan

You can configure a recovery plan to run commands on Site Recovery Manager Server or on a virtual
machine, display messages that require a response when the plan runs on the Site Recovery Manager Server
or in the guest OS, suspend non-essential virtual machines during recovery, configure dependencies
between virtual machines, customize virtual machine network settings, and change the recovery priority of
protected virtual machines.
A simple recovery plan that specifies only a test network to which the recovered virtual machines connect
and timeout values for waiting for virtual machines to power on and be customized can provide an effective
way to test a Site Recovery Manager configuration. Most recovery plans require configuration for use in
production. For example, a recovery plan for an emergency at the protected site might be different from a
recovery plan for the planned migration of services from one site to another.
NOTE A recovery plan always reflects the current state of the protection groups that it recovers. If any
members of a protection group show a status other than OK, you must correct the problems before you can
make any changes to the recovery plan. When a recovery plan is running, its state reflects the state of the
recovery plan run, rather than the state of the protection groups that it contains.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“Recovery Plan Steps,” on page 81

“Creating Custom Recovery Steps,” on page 82

“Suspend Virtual Machines When a Recovery Plan Runs,” on page 87

“Specify the Recovery Priority of a Virtual Machine,” on page 88

“Configure Virtual Machine Dependencies,” on page 88

“Enable vSphere vMotion for Planned Migration,” on page 89

“Configure Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown Options,” on page 90

“Limitations to Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines,” on page 91

Recovery Plan Steps
A recovery plan runs a series of steps that must be performed in a specific order for a given workflow such
as a planned migration or reprotect. You cannot change the order or purpose of the steps, but you can insert
your own steps that display messages and run commands.
Site Recovery Manager runs different recovery plan steps in different ways.
n

Some steps run during all recoveries.

Some steps run only during test recoveries.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Some steps are always skipped during test recoveries.

Some steps run only with stretched storage.

Understanding recovery steps, their order, and the context in which they run is important when you
customize a recovery plan.

Recovery Order
When you run a recovery plan, it starts by powering off the virtual machines at the protected site.
Site Recovery Manager powers off virtual machines according to the priority that you set, with high-priority
machines powering off last. Site Recovery Manager omits this step when you test a recovery plan.
Site Recovery Manager powers on groups of virtual machines on the recovery site according to the priority
that you set. Before a priority group starts, all of the virtual machines in the next-higher priority group must
recover or fail to recover. Dependencies between virtual machines within different priority groups are
ignored. If dependencies exist between virtual machines in the same priority group, Site Recovery Manager
first powers on the virtual machines on which other virtual machines depend. If Site Recovery Manager can
meet the virtual machine dependencies, Site Recovery Manager attempts to power on as many virtual
machines in parallel as vCenter Server supports.

Recovery Plan Timeouts and Pauses
Several types of timeouts can occur during the running of recovery plan steps. Timeouts cause the plan to
pause for a specified interval to allow the step time to finish.
Message steps force the plan to pause until the user acknowledges the message. Before you add a message
step to a recovery plan, make sure that it is necessary. Before you test or run a recovery plan that contains
message steps, make sure that a user can monitor the progress of the plan and respond to the messages as
needed.

Recovery Steps for Stretched Storage
The recovery plan wizard provides an option to use Cross vCenter Server vMotion to perform failover for
all protected, powered on virtual machines residing on stretched storage at the protected site. When this
option is selected, two additional steps occur during recovery immediately prior to powering off the
protected site virtual machines.
n

Preparing storage for VM migration. Site Recovery Manager changes the preference to the recovery
site for each consistency group.

Migrating VMs. If the production virtual machine is not powered on, the step fails. If the production
virtual machine is powered on, Site Recovery Manager initiates Cross vCenter Server vMotion to
migrate the virtual machine to the recovery site.

NOTE Virtual machines eligible for migration will not be migrated if they are at a lower priority than virtual
machines that are not eligible or that have dependencies on virtual machines that are not eligible.

Creating Custom Recovery Steps
You can create custom recovery steps that run commands or present messages to the user during a recovery.
Site Recovery Manager can run custom steps either on the Site Recovery Manager Server or in a virtual
machine that is part of the recovery plan. You cannot run custom steps on virtual machines that are to be
suspended.
During reprotect, Site Recovery Manager preserves all custom recovery steps in the recovery plan. If you
perform a recovery or test after a reprotect, custom recovery steps are run on the new recovery site, which
was the original protected site.

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Chapter 7 Configuring a Recovery Plan

After reprotect, you can usually use custom recovery steps that show messages directly without
modifications. You might need to modify some custom recovery steps after a reprotect, if these steps run
commands that contain site-specific information, such as network configurations.
You can configure commands and prompts in recovery plan steps that signify completion of a particular
operation. You cannot add commands and prompts before the Configure Test networks step.
You cannot add commands and prompts to these top-level steps relevant to storage policy protection
groups:
n

Test VMs Recovery complete

Test Consistency Groups recovery complete

Protection Groups test failover complete

VMs Recovery complete

Consistency Groups recovery complete

Protection Groups recovery complete

Protection Groups migration complete

Types of Custom Recovery Steps
You can create different types of custom recovery steps to include in recovery plans.
Custom recovery steps are either command recovery steps or message prompt steps.

Command Recovery Steps
Command recovery steps contain either top-level commands or per-virtual machine commands.
Top-Level Commands

Run on the Site Recovery Manager Server. For example, you might use these
commands to power on physical devices or to redirect network traffic.

Per-Virtual Machine
Commands

Site Recovery Manager associates per-virtual machine commands with
newly recovered virtual machines during the recovery process. You can use
these commands to complete configuration tasks after powering on a virtual
machine. You can run the commands either before or after powering on a
virtual machine. Commands that you configure to run after the virtual
machine is powered on can run either on the Site Recovery Manager Server
or in the newly recovered virtual machine. Commands that run on the newly
recovered virtual machine are run in the context of the user account that
VMware Tools uses on the recovered virtual machine. Depending on the
function of the command that you write, you might need to change the user
account that VMware Tools uses on the recovered virtual machine.

Message Prompt Recovery Steps
Present a message in the Site Recovery Manager user interface during the recovery. You can use this
message to pause the recovery and provide information to the user running the recovery plan. For example,
the message can instruct users to perform a manual recovery task or to verify steps. The only action users
can take in direct response to a prompt is to dismiss the message, which allows the recovery to continue.

Execution of Commands and Prompt Steps
For storage policy protection groups, if you add a command or prompt before the first priority virtual
machines, Site Recovery Manager executes the command or prompt after the step Apply VM policies
completes for all virtual machines.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

For array-based replication protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups, the first
command or prompt (or custom) step added between Create Writeable Storage Snapshot and the first nonempty VM priority group starts in parallel with the step Create Writeable Storage Snapshot to address
restart failure scenarios.

How Site Recovery Manager Handles Custom Recovery Step Failures
Site Recovery Manager handles custom recovery step failures differently based on the type of recovery step.
Site Recovery Manager attempts to complete all custom recovery steps, but some command recovery steps
might fail to finish.

Command Recovery Steps
By default, Site Recovery Manager waits for 5 minutes for command recovery steps to finish. You can
configure the timeout for each command. If a command finishes within this timeout period, the next
recovery step in the recovery plan runs. How Site Recovery Manager handles failures of custom commands
depends on the type of command.
Type of
Command

Description

Top-level
commands

If a recovery step fails, Site Recovery Manager logs the failure and shows a warning on the
Recovery Steps tab. Subsequent custom recovery steps continue to run.

Per-virtual
machine
commands

Run in batches either before or after a virtual machine powers on. If a command fails, the
remaining per-virtual machine commands in the batch do not run. For example, if you add five
commands to run before power on and five commands to run after power on, and the third
command in the batch before power on fails, the remaining two commands to run before power on
do not run. Site Recovery Manager does not power on the virtual machine and so cannot run any
post-power on commands.

Message Prompt Recovery Steps
Custom recovery steps that issue a message prompt cannot fail. The recovery plan pauses until the user
dismisses the prompt.

Create Top-Level Message Prompts or Command Steps
You can add top-level recovery steps anywhere in the recovery plan. Top-level command steps are
commands or scripts that you run on Site Recovery Manager Server during a recovery. You can also add
steps that display message prompts that a user must acknowledge during a recovery.
Prerequisites
n

You have a recovery plan to which to add custom steps.

For information about writing the commands to add to command steps, see “Guidelines for Writing
Command Steps,” on page 86 and “Environment Variables for Command Steps,” on page 86.

Procedure

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Monitor tab, click Recovery Steps.

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Chapter 7 Configuring a Recovery Plan

Use the View drop-down menu to select the type of recovery plan run to which to add a step.
Option

Description

Test Steps

Add a step to run when you test a recovery plan.

Recovery Steps

Add a step to run when you perform planned migration or disaster
recovery

You cannot add steps in the cleanup or reprotect operations.
4

To add a step before a step, right click the step and select Add Step Before. To add a step after the last
step, right click the last step and select Add Step After.

Select Command on SRM Server or Prompt.

In the Name text box, enter a name for the step.
The step name appears in the list of steps in the Recovery Steps view.

In the Content text box, enter a command, script, or message prompt.
n

If you selected Command on SRM Server, enter the command or script to run.

If you selected Prompt, enter the text of the message to display during the recovery plan run.

(Optional) Modify the Timeout setting for the command to run on Site Recovery Manager Server.
This option is not available if you create a prompt step.

Click OK to add the step to the recovery plan.

What to do next
You can right click the newly created step and select options to edit, delete or add steps before and after it.

Create Message Prompts or Command Steps for Individual Virtual Machines
You can create custom recovery steps to prompt users to perform tasks or for Site Recovery Manager to
perform tasks on a virtual machine before or after Site Recovery Manager powers it on.
Site Recovery Manager associates command steps with a protected or recovered virtual machine in the same
way as customization information. If multiple recovery plans contain the same virtual machine,
Site Recovery Manager includes the commands and prompts in all of the recovery plans .
Prerequisites
n

You have a recovery plan to which to add custom steps.

For information about writing the commands to add to command steps, see “Guidelines for Writing
Command Steps,” on page 86 and “Environment Variables for Command Steps,” on page 86.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and click Configure Recovery.

On the Recovery Properties tab, click Pre-Power On Steps or Post-Power On Steps.

Click the plus icon to add a step.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Select the type of step to create.
Option

Description

Prompt

Prompts users to perform a task or to provide information that the user
must acknowledge before the plan continues to the next step. This option
is available for both pre-power on steps and post-power on steps.

Command on SRM Server

Runs a command on Site Recovery Manager Server. This option is
available for both pre-power on steps and post-power on steps.

Command on Recovered VM

Runs a command on the recovered virtual machine. This option is only
available for post-power on steps.

In the Name text box, enter a name for the step.
The step name appears in the list of steps in the Recovery Steps view.

In the Content text box, enter a command, script, or message prompt.
n

If you selected Command on SRM Server or Command on Recovered VM, enter the command or
script to run.

If you selected Prompt, enter the text of the message to display during the recovery plan run.

(Optional) Modify the Timeout setting for the command to run on Site Recovery Manager Server.
This option is not available if you create a prompt step.

Click OK to add the step to the recovery plan.

Click OK to reconfigure the virtual machine to run the command before or after it powers on.

Guidelines for Writing Command Steps
All batch files or commands for custom recovery steps that you add to a recovery plan must meet certain
requirements.
When you create a command step to add to a recovery plan, make sure that it takes into account the
environment in which it must run. Errors in a command step affect the integrity of a recovery plan. Test the
command on Site Recovery Manager Server on the recovery site before you add it to the plan.
n

You must start the Windows command shell using its full path on the local host. For example, to run a
script located in c:\alarmscript.bat, use the following command line:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c c:\alarmscript.bat

You must install batch files and commands on the Site Recovery Manager Server at the recovery site.

Batch files and commands must finish within 300 seconds. Otherwise, the recovery plan terminates
with an error. To change this limit, see “Change Recovery Settings,” on page 137.

Batch files or commands that produce output that contains characters with ASCII values greater than
127 must use UTF-8 encoding. Site Recovery Manager records only the final 4KB of script output in log
files and in the recovery history. Scripts that produce more output should redirect the output to a file
rather than sending it to the standard output to be logged.

Environment Variables for Command Steps
Site Recovery Manager makes environment variables available that you can use in commands for custom
recovery steps.
Command steps run with the identity of the LocalSystem account on the Site Recovery Manager Server host
at the recovery site. When a command step runs, Site Recovery Manager makes environment variables
available for it to use.

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Chapter 7 Configuring a Recovery Plan

Table 7‑1. Environment Variables Available to All Command Steps
Name

Value

Example

VMware_RecoveryName

Name of the recovery plan that is
running.

Plan A

VMware_RecoveryMode

Recovery mode.

Test or recovery

VMware_VC_Host

Host name of the vCenter Server at
the recovery site.

vc_hostname.example.com

VMware_VC_Port

Network port used to contact
vCenter Server.

443

Site Recovery Manager makes additional environment variables available for per-virtual machine command
steps that run either on Site Recovery Manager Server or on the recovered virtual machine.
Table 7‑2. Environment Variables Available to Per-Virtual Machine Command Steps
Name

Value

Example

VMware_VM_Uuid

UUID used by vCenter to uniquely identify
this virtual machine.

4212145a-eeae-a02c-e525-ebba70b0d4f3

VMware_VM_Name

Name of this virtual machine, as set at the
protected site.

My New Virtual Machine

VMware_VM_Ref

Managed object ID of the virtual machine.

vm-1199

VMware_VM_GuestName

Name of the guest OS as defined by the VIM
API.

otherGuest

VMware_VM_GuestIp

IP address of the virtual machine, if known.

192.168.0.103

VMware_VM_Path

Path to this VMDK of this virtual machine.

[datastore-123] jquser-vm2/jquservm2.vmdk

Suspend Virtual Machines When a Recovery Plan Runs
Site Recovery Manager can suspend virtual machines on the recovery site during a recovery and a test
recovery.
Suspending virtual machines on the recovery site is useful in active-active datacenter environments and
where non-critical workloads run on recovery sites. By suspending any virtual machines that host noncritical workloads on the recovery site, Site Recovery Manager frees capacity for the recovered virtual
machines. Site Recovery Manager resumes virtual machines that are suspended during a failover operation
when the failover runs in the opposite direction.
You can only add virtual machines to suspend at the recovery site.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

In the Monitor tab, click Recovery Steps.

Right-click Suspend Non-critical VMs at Recovery Site and select Add Non-Critical VM.

Select virtual machines on the recovery site to suspend during a recovery.

Click OK.

Site Recovery Manager suspends the virtual machines on the recovery site when the recovery plan runs.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Specify the Recovery Priority of a Virtual Machine
By default, Site Recovery Manager sets all virtual machines in a new recovery plan to recovery priority level
3. You can increase or decrease the recovery priority of a virtual machine. The recovery priority specifies the
shutdown and power on order of virtual machines.
If you change the priority of a virtual machine, Site Recovery Manager applies the new priority to all
recovery plans that contain this virtual machine.
Site Recovery Manager starts virtual machines on the recovery site according to the priority that you set.
Site Recovery Manager starts priority 1 virtual machines first, then priority 2 virtual machines second, and
so on. Site Recovery Manager uses VMware Tools heartbeat to discover when a virtual machine is running
on the recovery site. In this way, Site Recovery Manager can ensure that all virtual machines of a given
priority are running before it starts the virtual machines of the next priority. For this reason, you must install
VMware Tools on protected virtual machines.
NOTE If a virtual machine that is eligible for stretched storage migration has a lower priority than a virtual
machine that is not eligible for stretched storage migration, the eligible virtual machine will not be migrated.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and select All Priority Actions.

Select a new priority for the virtual machine.
The highest priority is 1. The lowest priority is 5.

Click Yes to confirm the change of priority.

Configure Virtual Machine Dependencies
If a virtual machine depends on services that run on another virtual machine in the same protection group,
you can configure a dependency between the virtual machines. By configuring a dependency, you can
ensure that the virtual machines start on the recovery site in the correct order. Dependencies are only valid
if the virtual machines have the same priority.
NOTE Virtual machines eligible for stretched storage migration cannot be dependent on virtual machines
that are not eligible for stretched storage migration or they will not be migrated.
When a recovery plan runs, Site Recovery Manager starts the virtual machines that other virtual machines
depend on before it starts the virtual machines with the dependencies. If Site Recovery Manager cannot start
a virtual machine that another virtual machine depends on, the recovery plan continues with a warning.
You can only configure dependencies between virtual machines that are in the same recovery priority
group. If you configure a virtual machine to be dependent on a virtual machine that is in a lower priority
group, Site Recovery Manager overrides the dependency and first starts the virtual machine that is in the
higher priority group.
If you remove a protection group that contains the dependent virtual machine from the recovery plan the
status of the protection group is set to Not in this Plan in the dependencies for the virtual machine with
the dependency. If the configured virtual machine has a different priority than the virtual machine that it
depends on, the status of the dependent virtual machine is set to Lower Priority or Higher Priority.
Prerequisites
n

Verify that the virtual machine with the dependency and the virtual machine that it depends on are in
the same recovery plan.

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Chapter 7 Configuring a Recovery Plan

Verify that the virtual machine with the dependency and the virtual machine that it depends on are in
the same recovery priority group.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine that depends on one or more other virtual machines and select Configure
Recovery.

Expand VM Dependencies.

Click Configure to add a new virtual machine dependency.
A dialog opens listing all virtual machines in the selected recovery plan.

Select one or more virtual machines from the list and click OK.
The selected virtual machines are added to the list of dependencies.

Verify the virtual machines in the VM Dependencies list are on and verify the status of the
dependencies is OK.

(Optional) To remove a dependency, select a virtual machine from the list of virtual machines that this
virtual machine depends on and click Remove.

Click OK.

Enable vSphere vMotion for Planned Migration
vSphere vMotion migration of a virtual machine is available only for a planned migration. You can enable
or disable vSphere vMotion from the Recovery Properties dialog.
Prerequisites
n

Before performing a vSphere vMotion migration, confirm that the VM belongs to a storage policy
protection group, is placed on stretched storage, and is powered on.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and select Configure Recovery.
Select Use vMotion for planned migration (VM should be powered on).

Click OK.

There is no power cycle during the planned migration. Configured shutdown or startup actions or steps
configured before power on are ignored. Steps configured after power on are executed.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Configure Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown Options
You can configure how a virtual machine starts up and shuts down on the recovery site during a recovery.
You can configure whether to shut down the guest operating system of a virtual machine before it powers
off on the protected site. You can configure whether to power on a virtual machine on the recovery site. You
can also configure delays after powering on a virtual machine to allow VMware Tools or other applications
to start on the recovered virtual machine before the recovery plan continues.
Prerequisites
You created a recovery plan.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and select Configure Recovery.

Expand Shutdown Action and select the shutdown method for this virtual machine.

Option

Description

Shutdown guest OS before power
off

Gracefully shuts down the virtual machine before powering it off. You can
set a timeout period for the shutdown operation. Setting the timeout
period to 0 is equivalent to the Power off option. This option requires that
VMware Tools are running on the virtual machine.
NOTE The virtual machine powers off when the timeout expires. If the OS
of the virtual machine has not completed its shutdown tasks when the
timeout expires, data loss might result. For a large virtual machine that
requires a long time to shut down gracefully, set an appropriately long
power-off timeout.

Power off

Powers off the virtual machine without shutting down the guest operating
system.

Expand Startup Action and select whether to power on the virtual machine after a recovery.
Option

Description

Power on

Powers on the virtual machine on the recovery site.

Do not power on

Recovers the virtual machine but does not power it on.

(Optional) Select or deselect the Wait for VMware tools check box.
This option is only available if you selected Power on in Step 5.
If you select Wait for VMware tools, Site Recovery Manager waits until VMware Tools starts after
powering on the virtual machine before the recovery plan continues to the next step. You can set a
timeout period for VMware Tools to start.

(Optional) Select or deselect the Additional Delay before running Post Power On steps and starting
dependent VMs check box and specify the time for the additional delay.
This option is only available if you selected Power on in Step 5.
For example, you might specify an additional delay after powering on a virtual machine to allow
applications to start up that another virtual machine depends on.

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Chapter 7 Configuring a Recovery Plan

Limitations to Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines
The protection and recovery by Site Recovery Manager of virtual machines is subject to limitations.

Protection and Recovery of Suspended Virtual Machines
When you suspend a virtual machine, vSphere creates and saves its memory state. When the virtual
machine resumes, vSphere restores the saved memory state to allow the virtual machine to continue without
any disruption to the applications and guest operating systems that it is running.

Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines with Snapshots
Array-based replication supports the protection and recovery of virtual machines with snapshots, but with
limitations.
You can specify a custom location for storing snapshot delta files by setting the workingDir parameter in
VMX files. Site Recovery Manager does not support the use of the workingDir parameter.
Limitations also apply if you are running versions of ESX or ESXi Server older than version 4.1.
n

If the virtual machine has multiple VMDK disk files, all the disk files must be contained in the same
folder as the VMX file itself.

If a virtual machine is attached to a Raw Disk Mapping (RDM) disk device, you must store the mapping
file in the same folder as the VMX file. RDM snapshots are only available if you create the RDM
mapping using Virtual Compatibility Mode.

If you are running a ESX or ESXi Server 4.1 or later, these limitations do not apply.
vSphere Replication supports the protection of virtual machines with snapshots, but you can only recover
the latest snapshot. vSphere Replication erases the snapshot information in the recovered virtual machine.
As a consequence, snapshots are no longer available after recovery, unless you configure
vSphere Replication to retain multiple point-in-time snapshots. For information about recovering older
snapshots by using multiple point-in-time snapshots with vSphere Replication, see “Replicating a Virtual
Machine and Enabling Multiple Point in Time Instances,” on page 29.

Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines with Memory State Snapshots
When protecting virtual machines with memory state snapshots, the ESXi hosts at the protection and
recovery sites must have compatible CPUs, as defined in the VMware knowledge base articles VMotion
CPU Compatibility Requirements for Intel Processors and VMotion CPU Compatibility Requirements for
AMD Processors. The hosts must also have the same BIOS features enabled. If the BIOS configurations of the
servers do not match, they show a compatibility error message even if they are otherwise identical. The two
most common features to check are Non-Execute Memory Protection (NX / XD) and Virtualization
Technology (VT / AMD-V).

Protection and Recovery of Linked Clone Virtual Machines
vSphere Replication does not support the protection and recovery of virtual machines that are linked clones.
Array-based replication supports the protection and recovery of virtual machines that are linked clones if all
the nodes in the snapshot tree are replicated.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines with Reservations, Affinity Rules,
or Limits
When Site Recovery Manager recovers a virtual machine to the recovery site, it does not preserve any
reservations, affinity rules, or limits that you have placed on the virtual machine. Site Recovery Manager
does not preserve reservations, affinity rules, and limits on the recovery site because the recovery site might
have different resource requirements to the protected site.
You can set reservations, affinity rules, and limits for recovered virtual machines by configuring
reservations and limits on the resource pools on the recovery site and setting up the resource pool mapping
accordingly. Alternatively, you can set reservations, affinity rules, or limits manually on the placeholder
virtual machines on the recovery site.

Protection and Recovery of Virtual Machines with Components on Multiple
Arrays
Array-based replication in Site Recovery Manager depends on the concept of an array pair.
Site Recovery Manager defines groups of datastores that it recovers as units. As a consequence, limitations
apply to how you can store the components of virutal machines that you protect using array-based
replication.
n

Site Recovery Manager does not support storing virtual machine components on multiple arrays on the
protected site that replicate to a single array on the recovery site.

Site Recovery Manager does not support storing virtual machine components on multiple arrays on the
protected site that replicate to mulitple arrays on the recovery site, if the virtual machine components
span both arrrays.

If you replicate virtual machine components from multiple arrays to a single array or to a span of arrays on
the recovery site, the VMX configurations of the UUID of the datastores on the protected site do not match
the configurations on the recovery site.
The location of the VMX file of a virtual machine determines which array pair a virtual machine belongs to.
A virtual machine cannot belong to two array pairs, so if it has more than one disk and if one of those disks
is in an array that is not part of the array pair to which the virtual machine belongs, Site Recovery Manager
cannot protect the whole virtual machine. Site Recovery Manager handles the disk that is not on the same
array pair as the virtual machine as an unreplicated device.
As a consequence, store all the virtual disks, swap files, RDM devices, and the working directory for the
virtual machine on LUNs in the same array so that Site Recovery Manager can protect all the components of
the virtual machine.

VMware, Inc.

Customizing IP Properties for Virtual
Machines

You can customize IP settings for virtual machines for the protected site and the recovery site. Customizing
the IP properties of a virtual machine overrides the default IP settings when the recovered virtual machine
starts at the destination site.
If you do not customize the IP properties of a virtual machine, Site Recovery Manager uses the IP settings
for the recovery site during a recovery or a test from the protection site to the recovery site.
Site Recovery Manager uses the IP settings for the protection site after reprotect during the recovery or a test
from the original recovery site to the original protection site.
Site Recovery Manager supports different types of IP customization.
n

Use IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

Configure different IP customizations for each site.

Use DHCP, Static IPv4, or Static IPv6 addresses.

Customize addresses of Windows and Linux virtual machines.

Customize multiple NICs for each virtual machine.
NOTE You only configure one IP address per NIC.

For the list of guest operating systems for which Site Recovery Manager supports IP customization, see the
Compatibility Matrixes for Site Recovery Manager 6.1 at https://www.vmware.com/support/srm/srm-compatmatrix-6-1.html.
You associate customization settings with protected virtual machines. As a result, if the same protected
virtual machine is a part of multiple recovery plans, then all recovery plans use a single copy of the
customization settings. You configure IP customization as part of the process of configuring the recovery
properties of a virtual machine.
If you do not customize a NIC on the recovery site, the NIC continues to use the IP settings from the
protected site, and vice versa, and Site Recovery Manager does not apply IP customization to the virtual
machine during recovery.
You can apply IP customizations to individual or to multiple virtual machines.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

If you configure IP customization on virtual machines, Site Recovery Manager adds recovery steps to those
virtual machines.
Guest OS Startup

The Guest Startup process happens in parallel for all virtual machines for
which you configure IP customization.

Customize IP

Site Recovery Manager pushes the IP customizations to the virtual machine.

Guest OS Shutdown

Site Recovery Manager shuts down the virtual machine and reboots it to
ensure that the changes take effect and that the guest operating system
services apply them when the virtual machine restarts.

After the IP customization process finishes, virtual machines power on according to the priority groups and
any dependencies that you set.
NOTE To customize the IP properties of a virtual machine, you must install VMware Tools or the VMware
Operating System Specific Packages (OSP) on the virtual machine. See
http://www.vmware.com/download/packages.html.
n

Manually Customize IP Properties For an Individual Virtual Machine on page 94
You can customize IP settings manually for individual virtual machines for both the protected site and
the recovery site.

Customizing IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines on page 95
You can customize the IP properties for multiple virtual machines on the protected and recovery sites
by using the DR IP Customizer tool and by defining subnet-level IP mapping rules.

Manually Customize IP Properties For an Individual Virtual Machine
You can customize IP settings manually for individual virtual machines for both the protected site and the
recovery site.
NOTE If you are using Storage Policy Protection Groups you must have a client connection to the virtual
machine's protected site in order to do manual IP customization.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans, and select a recovery plan.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and click Configure Recovery.

Click the IP Customization tab and select Manual IP customization.

Select the NIC for which you want to modify IP Settings.

Click Configure Protection or Configure Recovery, depending on whether you want to configure IP
settings on the protected site or on the recovery site.

Click the IPv4 tab to configure IPv4 settings, and select DHCP, or for static addresses, enter an IP
address, subnet information, and gateway server addresses.
Alternately, if the virtual machine is powered on and has VMware Tools installed, you can click
Retrieve to import current settings configured on the virtual machine.

Click the IPv6 tab to configure IPv6 settings, and select DHCP, or for static addresses, enter an IP
address, subnet information, and gateway server addresses.
Alternately, if the virtual machine is powered on and has VMware Tools installed, you can click
Retrieve to import current settings configured on the virtual machine.

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Click the DNS tab to configure DNS settings.
a

Choose how DNS servers are found.
You can use DHCP to find DNS servers or you can specify primary and alternate DNS servers.

Enter a DNS suffix and click Add or select an existing DNS suffix and click Remove, Move Up, or
Move Down.
Alternately, if the virtual machine is powered on and has VMware Tools installed, you can click
Retrieve to import current settings configured on the virtual machine.

Click the WINS tab to enter primary and secondary WINS addresses.
The WINS tab is available only when configuring DHCP or IPv4 addresses for Windows virtual
machines.

Repeat Step 6 through Step 9 to configure recovery site or protected site settings, if required.
For example, if you configured IP settings for the recovery site, you might want to configure IP settings
for the protected site. Recovery site settings are applied during recovery. Protected site settings are
applied during failback.

Repeat the configuration process for other NICs, as required.

NOTE Virtual machines with manually defined IP customization are not subject to the IP Mapping Rule
evaluation during recovery. Manually-specified IP configuration takes precedence over IP mapping rules.

Customizing IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines
You can customize the IP properties for multiple virtual machines on the protected and recovery sites by
using the DR IP Customizer tool and by defining subnet-level IP mapping rules.
In previous releases of Site Recovery Manager, you customized IP properties for multiple virtual machines
by using the DR IP Customizer tool. In addition to DR IP Customizer, you can customize IP properties for
multiple virtual machines by defining subnet-level IP customization rules.
You can use subnet-level IP customization rules in combination with DR IP Customizer.
n

Using DR IP Customizer is a fast way to define explicit IP customization settings for multiple virtual
machines by using a CSV file.

You apply subnet-level IP customization rules to virtual machines by using the vSphere Web Client.

Virtual machines that you configure by using DR IP Customizer are not subject to subnet-level IP
customization rules. You can achieve the same IP customization results by using either DR IP Customizer or
IP subnet rules.

Customizing IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines By Using the DR IP
Customizer Tool
The DR IP Customizer tool allows you to define explicit IP customization settings for multiple protected
virtual machines on the protected and recovery sites.
In addition to defining subnet IP mapping rules, you can use the DR IP Customizer tool to apply
customized networking settings to virtual machines when they start on the recovery site. You provide the
customized IP settings to the DR IP Customizer tool in a comma-separated value (CSV) file.

VMware, Inc.

Site Recovery Manager Administration

Rather than manually creating a CSV file, you can use the DR IP Customizer tool to export a CSV file that
contains information about the networking configurations of the protected virtual machines. You can use
this file as a template for the CSV file to apply on the recovery site by customizing the values in the file.
1

Run DR IP Customizer to generate a CSV file that contains the networking information for the
protected virtual machines.

Modify the generated CSV file with networking information that is relevant to the recovery site.

Run DR IP Customizer again to apply the CSV with the modified networking configurations to apply
when the virtual machines start up on the recovery site.

You can run the DR IP Customizer tool on either the protected site or on the recovery site. Virtual machine
IDs for protected virtual machines are different at each site, so whichever site you use when you run the DR
IP Customizer tool to generate the CSV file, you must use the same site when you run DR IP Customizer
again to apply the settings.
You can customize the IP settings for the protected and the recovery sites so that Site Recovery Manager
uses the correct configurations during reprotect operations.
For the list of guest operating systems for which Site Recovery Manager supports IP customization, see the
Compatibility Matrixes for Site Recovery Manager 6.1 at https://www.vmware.com/support/srm/srm-compatmatrix-6-1.html.
n

Report IP Address Mappings for Recovery Plans on page 96
The IP address map reporter generates an XML document describing the IP properties of protected
virtual machines and their placeholders, grouped by site and recovery plan. This information can help
you understand the network requirements of a recovery plan.

Syntax of the DR IP Customizer Tool on page 97
The DR IP Customizer tool includes options that you can use to gather networking information about
the virtual machines that Site Recovery Manager protects. You can also use the options to apply
customizations to virtual machines when they start up on the recovery site.

Structure of the DR IP Customizer CSV File on page 99
The DR IP Customizer comma-separated value (CSV) file consists of a header row that defines the
meaning of each column in the file, and one or more rows for each placeholder virtual machine in a
recovery plan.

Modifying the DR IP Customizer CSV File on page 102
You modify the DR IP Customizer comma-separated value (CSV) file to apply customized networking
settings to virtual machines when they start on the recovery site.

Run DR IP Customizer to Customize IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines on page 107
You can use the DR IP Customizer tool to customize the IP properties for multiple virtual machines
that Site Recovery Manager protects.

Report IP Address Mappings for Recovery Plans
The IP address map reporter generates an XML document describing the IP properties of protected virtual
machines and their placeholders, grouped by site and recovery plan. This information can help you
understand the network requirements of a recovery plan.
Because the IP address mapping reporter must connect to both sites, you can run the command at either site.
You are prompted to supply the vCenter login credentials for each site when the command runs.
Procedure
1

Open a command shell on the Site Recovery Manager Server host at either the protected or recovery
site.

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Change to the C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\bin directory.

Run the dr-ip-reporter.exe command.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller with a single vCenter Server instance, run the following
command:
dr-ip-reporter.exe --cfg ..\config\vmware-dr.xml
--out path_to_report_file.xml
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk

This example points dr-ip-reporter.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and generates the report file for the vCenter Server instance that is
associated with the Platform Services Controller at https://Platform_Services_Controller_address.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller that includes multiple vCenter Server instances, you
must specify the vCenter Server ID in the --vcid parameter.
dr-ip-reporter.exe --cfg ..\config\vmware-dr.xml
--out path_to_report_file.xml
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk
--vcid vCenter_Server_ID

This example points dr-ip-reporter.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and generates the report file for the vCenter Server instance with the
ID vCenter_Server_ID.
NOTE The vCenter Server ID is not the same as the vCenter Server name.
n

To restrict the list of networks to just the ones that a specific recovery plan requires, include the
-plan option on the command line:
dr-ip-reporter.exe --cfg ..\config\vmware-dr.xml
--out path_to_report_file.xml
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk
--plan recovery_plan_name

Syntax of the DR IP Customizer Tool
The DR IP Customizer tool includes options that you can use to gather networking information about the
virtual machines that Site Recovery Manager protects. You can also use the options to apply customizations
to virtual machines when they start up on the recovery site.
NOTE This release of Site Recovery Manager allows you to define subnet-level IP mapping rules to
customize IP settings on virtual machines, as well as by using the DR IP Customizer tool. You can use
subnet-level IP mapping rules in combination with DR IP Customizer. For information about how you can
use subnet-level IP mapping rules and DR IP Customizer together, see “Customizing IP Properties for
Multiple Virtual Machines,” on page 95.
You find the dr-ip-customizer.exe executable file in C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site
Recovery Manager\bin on the Site Recovery Manager Server host machine. When you run dr-ipcustomizer.exe, you specify different options depending on whether you are generating or applying a
comma-separated value (CSV) file.
dr-ip-customizer.exe
--cfg SRM Server configuration XML
--cmd apply/drop/generate
[--csv Name of existing CSV File]
[--out Name of new CSV file to generate]
--uri https://host[:port]/lookupservice/sdk

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

--vcid UUID
[--ignore-thumbprint]
[--extra-dns-columns]
[--verbose]

Description

Mandatory

-h [ --help ]

Displays usage information about
dr-ip-customizer.exe.

--cfg arg

Path to the application XML
configuration file, vmware-dr.xml.

Yes

--cmd arg

You specify different commands to
run DR IP Customizer in different
modes.

Yes

The apply command applies the
network customization settings
from an existing CSV file to the
recovery plans on the
Site Recovery Manager Server
instances.

The generate command
generates a basic CSV file for all
virtual machines that
Site Recovery Manager protects
for a vCenter Server instance.

The drop command removes the
recovery settings from virtual
machines specified by the input
CSV file.
Always provide the same
vCenter Server instance for the apply
and drop commands as the one that
you used to generate the CSV file.
n

--csv arg

Path to the CSV file.

Yes, when running the apply and
drop commands.

-o [ --out ] arg

Name of the new CSV output file that
the generate command creates. If
you provide the name of an existing
CSV file, the generate command
overwrites its current contents.

Yes, when you run the generate
command.

--uri arg

Lookup Service URL on the Platform
Service Controller with the form
https://host[:port]/lookupserv
ice/sdk. Specify the port if it is not
443 . The Site Recovery Manager
instance associates this address with
the primary site's infranode.
Use the same vCenter Server instance
for the apply and drop commands as
the one that you used to generate the
CSV file.

Yes

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Table 8‑1. DR IP Customizer Options (Continued)
Option

Description

Mandatory

--vcid arg

The primary sitevCenter Server
instance UUID.

Optional, unless the primary site
infrastructure contains more than one
vCenter Server instance.

-i [ --ignore-thumbprint ]

Ignore the vCenter Server
thumbprint confirmation prompt.

-e [ --extra-dns-columns ]

Must be specified if the input CSV
file contains extra columns for DNS
information.

-v [ --verbose ]

Enable verbose output. You can
include a --verbose option on any
dr-ip-customizer.exe command
line to log additional diagnostic
messages.

The tool can print the UUID to the Lookup Service whenever the --vcid value is unspecified as in this
example:
dr-ip-customizer.exe --cfg testConfig.xml -i --cmd generate -o c: \tmp\x.csv --uri
https://service.company.com:443/lookupservice/sdk --vcid ?
ERROR: Failed to locate VC instance. Use one of the following known VC instances: e07c907ecd41-4fe7-b38a-f4c0e677a18c vc.company.com

The result is the vCenter Server instance UUID followed by the vCenter Server DNS hostname for each
vCenter Server registered with the Lookup Service.

Structure of the DR IP Customizer CSV File
The DR IP Customizer comma-separated value (CSV) file consists of a header row that defines the meaning
of each column in the file, and one or more rows for each placeholder virtual machine in a recovery plan.
NOTE This release of Site Recovery Manager allows you to define subnet-level IP mapping rules to
customize IP settings on virtual machines, as well as by using the DR IP Customizer tool. You can use
subnet-level IP mapping rules in combination with DR IP Customizer. For information about how you can
use subnet-level IP mapping rules and DR IP Customizer together, see “Customizing IP Properties for
Multiple Virtual Machines,” on page 95.
Configuring IP settings for both sites is optional. You can provide settings for only the protected site, or
settings for only the recovery site, or settings for both sites. You can configure each site to use a different set
of network adapters in a completely different way.
Certain fields in the CSV file must be completed for every row. Other fields can be left blank if no
customized setting is required.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Table 8‑2. Columns of the DR IP Customizer CSV File

100

Column

Description

Customization Rules

VM ID

Unique identifier that DR IP
Customizer uses to collect
information from multiple rows for
application to a single virtual
machine. This ID is internal to DR IP
Customizer and is not the same as
the virtual machine ID that
vCenter Server uses.

Not customizable. Cannot be blank.

VM Name

The human-readable name of the
virtual machine as it appears in the
vCenter Server inventory.

Not customizable. Cannot be blank.

vCenter Server

Address of a vCenter Server instance
on either the protected site or the
recovery site. You set the IP settings
for a virtual machine on each site in
the vCenter Server column.

Not customizable. Cannot be blank.
This column can contain both
vCenter Server instances. Each
vCenter Server instance requires its
own row. You can configure one set of
IP settings to use on one site and
another set of IP settings to use on the
other site. You can also provide IP
settings to be used on both sites, for
reprotect operations.

Adapter ID

ID of the adapter to customize.
Adapter ID 0 sets global settings on
all adapters for a virtual machine.
Setting values on Adapter ID 1, 2, 3,
and so on, configures settings for
specific NICs on a virtual machine.

Customizable. Cannot be left blank.
The only fields that you can modify for
a row in which the Adapter ID is 0 are
DNS Server(s) and DNS Suffix(es).
These values, if specified, are inherited
by all other adapters in use by that VM
ID.
You can include multiple DNS servers
on multiple lines in the CSV file. For
example, if you require two global
DNS hosts, you include two lines for
Adapter ID 0.
n One line that contains all the
virtual machine information plus
one DNS host.
n One line that contains only the
second DNS host.
To add another DNS server to a
specific adapter, add the DNS server to
the appropriate Adapter line. For
example, add the DNS server to
Adapter ID 1.

DNS Domain

DNS domain for this adapter.

Customizable. Can be left blank.
If you do enter a value, it must be in
the format example.company.com.

Net BIOS

Select whether to activate NetBIOS
on this adapter.

Customizable. Can be left blank.
If not left empty, this column must
contain one of the following strings:
disableNetBIOS, enableNetBIOS, or
enableNetBIOSViaDhcp.

Primary WINS

DR IP Customizer validates that
WINS settings are applied only to
Windows virtual machines, but it
does not validate NetBIOS settings.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Table 8‑2. Columns of the DR IP Customizer CSV File (Continued)
Column

Description

Customization Rules

Secondary WINS

DR IP Customizer validates that
WINS settings are applied only to
Windows virtual machines, but it
does not validate NetBIOS settings.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

IP Address

IPv4 address for this virtual machine.

Customizable. Cannot be blank.
Virtual machines can have multiple
virtual network adapters. You can
configure each virtual network adapter
with one static IPv4 address. If the
field is not set to a specific static
address you must set it to DHCP.

Subnet Mask

Subnet mask for this virtual machine.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

Gateway(s)

IPv4 gateway or gateways for this
virtual machine.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

IPv6 Address

IPv6 address for this virtual machine.

Customizable. Can be left blank if you
do not use IPv6.
Virtual machines can have multiple
virtual network adapters.You can
configure each virtual network adapter
with one static IPv6 address. If the
field is not set to a specific static
address you must set it to DHCP.
If you run
Site Recovery Manager Server on
Windows Server 2003 and you
customize IPv6 addresses for a virtual
machine, you must enable IPv6 on the
Site Recovery Manager Server
instances. Site Recovery Manager
performs validation of IP addresses
during customization, which requires
IPv6 to be enabled on the
Site Recovery Manager Server if you
are customizing IPv6 addresses. Later
versions of Windows Server have IPv6
enabled by default.

IPv6 Subnet Prefix length

Ipv6 subnet prefix length to use.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

IPv6 Gateway(s)

IPv4 gateway or gateways for this
adapter.

Customizable. Can be left blank.

DNS Server(s)

Address of the DNS server or servers.

Customizable. Can be left blank.
If you enter this setting in an Adapter
ID 0 row, it is treated as a global
setting. On Windows virtual machines,
this setting applies for each adapter if
you set it in the Adapter ID rows other
than Adapter ID 0.
On Linux virtual machines, this is
always a global setting for all adapters.
This column can contain one or more
IPv4 or IPv6 DNS servers for each
NIC.

DNS Suffix(es)

Suffix or suffixes for DNS servers.

Customizable. Can be left blank.
These are global settings for all
adapters on both Windows and Linux
virtual machines.

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Modifying the DR IP Customizer CSV File
You modify the DR IP Customizer comma-separated value (CSV) file to apply customized networking
settings to virtual machines when they start on the recovery site.
NOTE This release of Site Recovery Manager allows you to define subnet-level IP mapping rules to
customize IP settings on virtual machines, as well as by using the DR IP Customizer tool. You can use
subnet-level IP mapping rules in combination with DR IP Customizer. For information about how you can
use subnet-level IP mapping rules and DR IP Customizer together, see “Customizing IP Properties for
Multiple Virtual Machines,” on page 95.
One challenge of representing virtual machine network configurations in a CSV file is that virtual machine
configurations include hierarchical information. For example, a single virtual machine might contain
multiple adapters, and each adapter might have multiple listings for elements such as gateways. The CSV
format does not provide a system for hierarchical representations. As a result, each row in the CSV file that
the DR IP Customizer generates might provide some or all of the information for a specific virtual machine.
For a virtual machine with a simple network configuration, all the information can be included in a single
row. In the case of a more complicated virtual machine, multiple rows might be required. Virtual machines
with multiple network cards or multiple gateways require multiple rows. Each row in the CSV file includes
identification information that describes to which virtual machine and adapter the information applies.
Information is aggregated to be applied to the appropriate virtual machine.
Follow these guidelines when you modify the DR IP Customizer CSV file.
n

Omit values if a setting is not required.

Use the minimum number of rows possible for each adapter.

Do not use commas in any field.

Specify Adapter ID settings as needed. DR IP Customizer applies settings that you specify on Adapter
ID 0 to all NICs. To apply settings to individual NICs, specify the values in the Adapter ID 1, 2, ..., n
fields.

To specify more than one value for a column, create an additional row for that adapter and include the
value in the column in that row. To ensure that the additional row is associated with the intended
virtual machine, copy the VM ID, VM Name, vCenter Server, and Adapter ID column values.

To specify an IP address for a network adapter on each of the protected and recovery sites, or to specify
multiple DNS server addresses, add a new row for each address. Copy the VM ID, VM Name, and
Adapter ID values to each row.

Examples of DR IP Customizer CSV Files
You obtain a CSV file that contains the networking information for the protected virtual machines on the
vCenter Server by running dr-ip-customizer.exe with the --cmd generate command. You edit the CSV file
to customize the IP settings of the protected virtual machines.
You can download a bundle of the example CSV files that this section describes.
NOTE This release of Site Recovery Manager allows you to define subnet-level IP mapping rules to
customize IP settings on virtual machines, as well as by using the DR IP Customizer tool. You can use
subnet-level IP mapping rules in combination with DR IP Customizer. For information about how you can
use subnet-level IP mapping rules and DR IP Customizer together, see “Customizing IP Properties for
Multiple Virtual Machines,” on page 95.

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Example: A Generated DR IP Customizer CSV File
For a simple setup with only two protected virtual machines, the generated CSV file might contain only the
virtual machine ID, the virtual machine name, the names of the vCenter Server instances on both sites, and a
single adapter.
VM ID,VM Name,vCenter Server,Adapter ID,DNS Domain,Net BIOS,
Primary WINS,Secondary WINS,IP Address,Subnet Mask,Gateway(s),
IPv6 Address,IPv6 Subnet Prefix length,IPv6 Gateway(s),
DNS Server(s),DNS Suffix(es)
protected-vm-10301,vm-3-win,vcenter-server-site-B,0,,,,,,,,,,,,
protected-vm-10301,vm-3-win,vcenter-server-site-A,0,,,,,,,,,,,,
protected-vm-20175,vm-1-linux,vcenter-server-site-B,0,,,,,,,,,,,,
protected-vm-20175,vm-1-linux,vcenter-server-site-A,0,,,,,,,,,,,,

This generated CSV file shows two virtual machines, vm-3-win and vm-1-linux. The virtual machines are
present on the protected site and on the recovery site, vcenter-server-site-B, and vcenter-server-site-A. DR IP
Customizer generates an entry for each virtual machine and each site with Adapter ID 0. You can add
additional lines to customize each NIC, once you are aware of how many NICs are on each virtual machine.
Example: Setting Static IPv4 Addresses
You can modify the generated CSV file to assign two network adapters with static IPv4 addresses to one of
the virtual machines, vm-3-win, on the protected site and the recovery site.
For readability, the example CSV file in the following table omits empty columns. The DNS Domain,
NetBIOS, IPv6 Address, IPv6 Subnet Prefix length, and IPv6 Gateway(s) columns are all omitted.
Table 8‑3. Setting Static IPv4 Addresses in a Modified CSV File

VM ID

VM
Name

vCent
er
Server

Adapt
er ID

Primar
y
WINS

Secon
dary
WINS

IP
Address

Subnet
Mask

Gatewa
y(s)

DNS
Server(s
)

DNS
Suffix(es)

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-B

example.c
om

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-B

eng.exam
ple.com

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-B

2.2.3.4

2.2.3.5

192.168.1
.21

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.1
.1

1.1.1.1

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-B

2.2.3.4

2.2.3.5

192.168.1
.22

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.1
.1

1.1.1.2

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-A

1.1.0.1

example.c
om

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-A

1.1.0.2

eng.exam
ple.com

VMware, Inc.

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Table 8‑3. Setting Static IPv4 Addresses in a Modified CSV File (Continued)

VM ID

VM
Name

vCent
er
Server

Adapt
er ID

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-A

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-A

Primar
y
WINS

1.2.3.4

Secon
dary
WINS

1.2.3.5

IP
Address

Subnet
Mask

Gatewa
y(s)

192.168.0
.21

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.0
.1

192.168.0
.22

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.0
.1

DNS
Server(s
)

DNS
Suffix(es)

The information in this CSV file applies different static IPv4 settings to vm-3-win on the protected site and
on the recovery site.
n

On the vcenter-server-site-B site:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, a static
IPv4 address 192.168.1.21, and DNS server 1.1.1.1.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, a static
IPv4 address 192.168.1.22, and DNS server 1.1.1.2.

On the vcenter-server-site-A site:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Sets the DNS servers 1.1.0.1 and 1.1.0.2 for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, with a static IPv4 address 192.168.0.21.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 1.2.3.4 and 1.2.3.5 and a
static IPv4 address 192.168.0.22.

Example: Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 Addresses
You can modify the generated CSV file to assign multiple NICs to one of the virtual machines, vm-3-win,
that use a combination of static and DHCP IPv4 addresses. The settings can be different on the protected site
and the recovery site.
For readability, the example CSV file in the following table omits empty columns. The DNS Domain,
NetBIOS, IPv6 Address, IPv6 Subnet Prefix length, and IPv6 Gateway(s) columns are all omitted.
Table 8‑4. Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 Addresses in a Modified CSV File

VM ID

104

VM
Name

vCent
er
Server

Adapt
er ID

Primar
y
WINS

Secon
dary
WINS

IP
Address

Subnet
Mask

Gatewa
y(s)

DNS
Server(s
)

DNS
Suffix(es)

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-B

example.c
om

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-B

eng.exam
ple.com

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Table 8‑4. Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 Addresses in a Modified CSV File (Continued)

VM ID

VM
Name

vCent
er
Server

Adapt
er ID

Primar
y
WINS

Secon
dary
WINS

IP
Address

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-B

2.2.3.4

2.2.3.5

dhcp

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-B

2.2.3.4

2.2.3.5

192.168.1
.22

Subnet
Mask

Gatewa
y(s)

DNS
Server(s
)

DNS
Suffix(es)

1.1.1.1

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.1
.1

1.1.1.2

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-A

1.1.0.1

example.c
om

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vm-3win

vcenter
serversite-A

1.1.0.2

eng.exam
ple.com

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-A

protecte
dvm-1030
1

vcenter
serversite-A

dhcp

1.2.3.4

1.2.3.5

192.168.0
.22

255.255.2
55.0

192.168.0
.1

The information in this CSV file applies different static and dynamic IPv4 settings to vm-3-win on the
protected site and on the recovery site.
n

On site vcenter-server-site-B:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, that uses
DHCP to obtain an IP address and sets the static DNS server 1.1.1.1.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, with a
static IPv4 address 192.168.1.22 and DNS server 1.1.1.2.

On site vcenter-server-site-A:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes to example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Sets the DNS servers 1.1.0.1 and 1.1.0.2 for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, that uses DHCP to obtain an IPv4 address and the globally assigned
DNS server information.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 1.2.3.4 and 1.2.3.5, and a
static IPv4 address 192.168.0.22.

Example: Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 and IPv6 Addresses
You can modify the generated CSV file to assign multiple NICs to vm-3-win, one of the virtual machines.
The NICs can use a combination of static and DHCP IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. The settings can be different
on both the protected site and the recovery site.
For readability, the example CSV file in the following table omits empty columns. The DNS Domain and
NetBIOS columns are omitted.

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Table 8‑5. Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 and IPv6 Addresses in a Modified CSV File

VM ID

vCe
nter
Serv
er

Ada
pter
ID

Prim
ary
WIN
S

IP
Addr
ess

Subn
et
Mask

Gate
way(s
)

IPv6
Addr
ess

IPv6
Subn
et
Prefix
lengt
h

IPv6
Gate
way(s
)

DNS
Serve
r(s)

DNS
Suffix(
es)

protec
tedvm-10
301

vm3win

vcen
terserv
ersiteB

exampl
e.com

protec
tedvm-10
301

vm3win

vcen
terserv
ersiteB

eng.exa
mple.co
m

protec
tedvm-10
301

vcen
terserv
ersiteB

2.2.3.
4

2.2.3.
5

192.16
8.1.21

protec
tedvm-10
301

vcen
terserv
ersiteB

2.2.3.
4

2.2.3.
5

dhcp

255.25
5.255.
0

192.16
8.1.1

dhcp

::ffff:
192.16
8.1.22

1.1.1.1

::ffff:
192.16
8.1.1

1.1.1.2

protec
tedvm-10
301

vm3win

vcen
terserv
ersiteA

exampl
e.com

protec
tedvm-10
301

vm3win

vcen
terserv
ersiteA

eng.exa
mple.co
m

vcen
terserv
ersiteA

protec
tedvm-10
301

106

VM
Nam
e

Sec
ond
ary
WIN
S

dhcp

::ffff:
192.16
8.0.22

::ffff:
192.16
8.0.1

::ffff:
192.16
8.0.25
0

VMware, Inc.

Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

Table 8‑5. Setting Static and DHCP IPv4 and IPv6 Addresses in a Modified CSV File (Continued)

VM ID

VM
Nam
e

vCe
nter
Serv
er

Ada
pter
ID

protec
tedvm-10
301

vcen
terserv
ersiteA

protec
tedvm-10
301

vcen
terserv
ersiteA

Prim
ary
WIN
S

Sec
ond
ary
WIN
S

IP
Addr
ess

Subn
et
Mask

Gate
way(s
)

IPv6
Addr
ess

IPv6
Subn
et
Prefix
lengt
h

IPv6
Gate
way(s
)

DNS
Serve
r(s)

DNS
Suffix(
es)

::ffff:
192.16
8.0.25
1

1.2.3.
4

1.2.3.
5

192.16
8.0.22

255.25
5.255.
0

192.16
8.0.1

1.1.1.1

The information in this CSV file applies different IP settings to vm-3-win on the protected site and on the
recovery site.
n

On site vcenter-server-site-B:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, that sets a
static IPv4 address 192.168.1.21, uses DHCP to obtain an IPv6 address, and uses DNS server 1.1.1.1.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 2.2.3.4 and 2.2.3.5, that uses
DHCP to obtain an IPv4 address, sets a static IPv6 address ::ffff:192.168.1.22, and uses DNS server
1.1.1.2.

On site vcenter-server-site-A:
n

Sets the DNS suffixes to example.com and eng.example.com for all NICs for this virtual machine.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 1, that uses DHCP to obtain an IPv4 address and sets a static IPv6
address ::ffff:192.168.1.22. Adapter ID 1 uses static IPv6 DNS servers ::ffff:192.168.0.250 and ::ffff:
192.168.0.251.

Adds a NIC, Adapter ID 2, with primary and secondary WINS servers 1.2.3.4 and 1.2.3.5, a static
IPv4 address 192.168.0.22, and DNS server 1.1.1.1. By leaving the IPv6 column blank, Adapter ID 2
uses DHCP for IPv6 addresses.

Run DR IP Customizer to Customize IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines
You can use the DR IP Customizer tool to customize the IP properties for multiple virtual machines that
Site Recovery Manager protects.
NOTE This release of Site Recovery Manager allows you to define subnet-level IP mapping rules to
customize IP settings on virtual machines, as well as by using the DR IP Customizer tool. You can use
subnet-level IP mapping rules in combination with DR IP Customizer. For information about how you can
use subnet-level IP mapping rules and DR IP Customizer together, see “Customizing IP Properties for
Multiple Virtual Machines,” on page 95.
Prerequisites
n

VMware, Inc.

Use the DR IP Customizer tool on a computer with access to vCenter Server instances in your
environment.

107

Site Recovery Manager Administration

The user account that you use to run the DR IP Customizer tool requires at least the Site Recovery
Manager Recovery Plans Administrator role.

Procedure
1

Open a command shell on the Site Recovery Manager Server host.

Change directory to C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\bin.

Run the dr-ip-customizer.exe command to generate a comma-separated value (CSV) file that contains
information about the protected virtual machines.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller with a single vCenter Server instance, run the following
command:
dr-ip-customizer.exe --cfg SRM_install_dir\config\vmware-dr.xml
--cmd generate --out "path_to_CSV_file.csv"
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk

This example points dr-ip-customizer.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and generates the CSV file for the vCenter Server instance that is
associated with the Platform Services Controller at https://Platform_Services_Controller_address.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller that includes multiple vCenter Server instances, you
must specify the vCenter Server ID in the --vcid parameter. If you do not specify --vcid, or if you
provide an incorrect ID, the tool lists all available vCenter Server instances.
dr-ip-customizer.exe --cfg SRM_install_dir\config\vmware-dr.xml
--cmd generate --out "path_to_CSV_file.csv"
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk
--vcid vCenter_Server_ID

This example points dr-ip-customizer.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and generates the CSV file for the vCenter Server instance with the
ID vCenter_Server_ID.
NOTE The vCenter Server ID is not the same as the vCenter Server name.
4

(Optional) Check the vCenter Server thumbprint and enter y to confirm that you trust this
vCenter Server instance.
If you specified the --ignore-thumbprint option, you are not prompted to check the thumbprint.

Enter the login credentials for the vCenter Server instance.
You might be prompted again to confirm that you trust this vCenter Server instance.

Edit the generated CSV file to customize the IP properties for the virtual machines in the recovery plan.
You can use a spread sheet application to edit the CSV file. Save the modified CSV file under a new
name.

Run dr-ip-customizer.exe to apply the customized IP properties from the modified CSV file.
You can run the DR IP Customizer tool on either the protected site or on the recovery site. Virtual
machine IDs for protected virtual machines are different at each site, so whichever site you use when
you run the DR IP Customizer tool to generate the CSV file, you must use the same site when you run
DR IP Customizer again to apply the settings.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller with a single vCenter Server instance, run the following
command:
dr-ip-customizer.exe --cfg SRM_install_dir\config\vmware-dr.xml
--cmd apply --csv "path_to_CSV_file.csv"
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk

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Chapter 8 Customizing IP Properties for Virtual Machines

This example points dr-ip-customizer.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and applies the customizations in the CSV file to the vCenter Server
that is associated with the Platform Services Controller at
https://Platform_Services_Controller_address.
n

If you have a Platform Services Controller that includes multiple vCenter Server instances, you
must specify the vCenter Server ID in the --vcid parameter.
dr-ip-customizer.exe --cfg SRM_install_dir\config\vmware-dr.xml
--cmd apply --csv "path_to_CSV_file.csv"
--uri https://Platform_Services_Controller_address[:port]/lookupservice/sdk
--vcid vCenter_Server_ID

This example points dr-ip-customizer.exe to the vmware-dr.xml file of the
Site Recovery Manager Server and applies the customizations in the CSV file to the vCenter Server
instance with the ID vCenter_Server_ID.
The specified customizations are applied to all of the virtual machines named in the CSV file during a
recovery. You do not need to manually configure IP settings for these machines when you edit their
recovery plan properties.

Customize IP Properties for Multiple Virtual Machines by Defining IP
Customization Rules
You can specify a single subnet-level IP mapping rule for a selected configured virtual network mapping on
the protected and recovery sites.
Subnet-level mapping eliminates the need to define exact adapter-level IP mapping. Instead, you specify an
IP customization rule that Site Recovery Manager applies to relevant adapters. The IP customization rule is
used for test and recovery workflows. You cannot reuse IP customization rules between different network
mappings.
IMPORTANT
n

IP subnet mapping rules support IPv4 only.

Rule-based IPv6 customization is not supported in Site Recovery Manager.

When you apply IP subnet mapping rules to Windows virtual machines with IPv6 enabled, the IPv6
settings, DHCP or static, remain unaffected after recovery. For Linux virtual machines, IPv6 settings are
reset to DHCP.

Site Recovery Manager does not evaluate IP mapping rules for virtual machines configured to use
manual IP customization.

The IP customization rule applies to virtual machines failing over from a protected site IPv4 subnet to a
recovery site IPv4 subnet, for example, from 10.17.23.0/24 to 10.18.22.0/24. The IP customization rule states
that during recovery Site Recovery Manager evaluates the existing IP configuration of the recovered virtual
machine's NICs and reconfigures static NICs found on the 10.17.23.0/24 subnet for the 10.18.22.0/24 subnet.
If the rule matches, Site Recovery Manager derives the new static IPv4 address from the old one by
preserving the host bits of the original IPv4 address and placing it to the target subnet. For example, if the
original protected site address is 10.17.23.55/24, the new address is 10.18.22.55/24.
If the default gateway text box is empty, Site Recovery Manager derives the new gateway parameter from
the original one by preserving the host bits of the original IPv4 address and placing it in the target subnet.
For example, if the original protected site gateway is 10.17.23.1, the new gateway is 10.18.22.1. If you specify
an explicit gateway parameter, Site Recovery Manager checks that the IPv4 address syntax is correct and
applies it exactly.

VMware, Inc.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Site Recovery Manager applies DNS and other parameters as specified. DHCP-enabled NICs are not subject
to customization as their network configuration remains unchanged during recovery.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, select Network Mappings.

Select a network mapping for which to define a customization rule.

To define a rule, click Add IP Customization Rule.

Enter a name for the rule.

Specify the subnet IP ranges that map to the protected and recovery sites.

Specify the network settings for the recovery site network.

Click OK to save your changes.

Apply IP Customization Rules to a Virtual Machine
You can apply an IP customization rule to the recovery settings of a protected virtual machine.
When you apply an IP customization rule, you specify a single subnet IP mapping rule for each network
mapping.
If you set the advanced setting option recovery.useIpMapperAutomatically to True and configure the IP
mapping rule for virtual networks, then Site Recovery Manager evaluates the subnet IP mapping rules
during recovery to customize the virtual machines. If you set this option to False, Site Recovery Manager
does not evaluate the IP mapping rules during recovery. You can override the effect of this option for each
virtual machine by using the IP Customization option.
The recovery.useIpMapperAutomatically default option is True. If you set it to Auto, Site Recovery Manager
customizes the virtual machine by using the IP Customization rule.
Prerequisites
For the list of guest operating systems for which Site Recovery Manager supports IP customization, see the
Compatibility Matrixes for Site Recovery Manager 6.1 at https://www.vmware.com/support/srm/srm-compatmatrix-6-1.html.
Procedure

110

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and click Configure Recovery.

Click IP Customization.

From the IP customization mode list, select Use IP customization rules if applicable and click OK.

VMware, Inc.

Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a
Recovery

After a recovery, the recovery site becomes the primary site, but the virtual machines are not protected yet.
If the original protected site is operational, you can reverse the direction of protection to use the original
protected site as a new recovery site to protect the new protected site.
Manually reestablishing protection in the opposite direction by recreating all protection groups and
recovery plans is time consuming and prone to errors. Site Recovery Manager provides the reprotect
function, which is an automated way to reverse protection.
After Site Recovery Manager performs a recovery, the virtual machines start up on the recovery site. By
running reprotect when the protected site comes back online, you reverse the direction of replication to
protect the recovered virtual machines on the recovery site back to the original protected site.
Reprotect uses the protection information that you established before a recovery to reverse the direction of
protection. You can initiate the reprotect process only after recovery finishes without any errors. If the
recovery finishes with errors, you must fix all errors and rerun the recovery, repeating this process until no
errors occur.
You can conduct tests after a reprotect operation completes, to confirm that the new configuration of the
protected and recovery sites is valid.
You can perform reprotect on recovery plans that contain array-based replication protection groups,
vSphere Replication protection groups, and storage policy protection groups.

Example: Performing a Reprotect Operation
Site A is the protected site and site B is the recovery site. If site A goes offline, run the disaster recovery
workflow on the recovery plan to bring the virtual machines online on site B. After the recovery, the
protected virtual machines from site A start up on site B without protection.
When site A comes back online, complete recovery by doing a planned migration because site A virtual
machines and datastores need to be powered down and unmounted before reversing protection. Then
initiate a reprotect operation to protect the recovered virtual machines on site B. Site B becomes the
protected site, and site A becomes the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
replication from site B to site A.

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Figure 9‑1. Site Recovery Manager Reprotect Process
Site A

Site B

Protected site
becomes recovery

Recovery site becomes
protected site

Replica
virtual
machines
power off

apps

Protection
group

Direction of replication is reversed after a planned migration

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Array Based Replication on page 112
In the reprotect process with array based replication, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
protection, then forces synchronization of the storage from the new protected site to the new recovery
site.

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with vSphere Replication on page 113
In the reprotect process using vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
protection, then forces synchronization of the storage from the new protected site to the new recovery
site.

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage Policy Protection on page 113
In the reprotect process using storage policy protection, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction
of replication and protects the virtual machines that are associated with the relevant storage policies
on what was previously the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager reestablishes vSphere entity
protection and monitoring on the new protected site.

Preconditions for Performing Reprotect on page 114
You can perform reprotect only if you meet certain preconditions.

Reprotect Virtual Machines on page 115
Reprotect results in the reconfiguration of Site Recovery Manager protection groups and recovery
plans to work in the opposite direction. After a reprotect operation, you can recover virtual machines
back to the original site using a planned migration workflow.

Reprotect States on page 115
The reprotect process passes through several states that you can observe in the recovery plan in the
Site Recovery Manager plug-in in the vSphere Web Client.

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Array
Based Replication
In the reprotect process with array based replication, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
protection, then forces synchronization of the storage from the new protected site to the new recovery site.
When you initiate the reprotect process, Site Recovery Manager instructs the underlying storage arrays to
reverse the direction of replication. After reversing the replication, Site Recovery Manager creates
placeholder virtual machines at the new recovery site, which was the original protected site before the
reprotect.

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When creating placeholder virtual machines on the new protected site, Site Recovery Manager uses the
location of the original protected virtual machine to determine where to create the placeholder virtual
machine. Site Recovery Manager uses the identity of the original protected virtual machine to create the
placeholder. If the original protected virtual machines are no longer available, Site Recovery Manager uses
the inventory mappings from the original recovery site to the original protected site to determine the
resource pools and folders for the placeholder virtual machines. You must configure inventory mappings on
both sites before running the reprotect process, or the process might fail.
When reprotecting virtual machines with array-based replication, Site Recovery Manager places the files for
the placeholder virtual machines in the placeholder datastore for the original protected site, not in the
datastore that held the original protected virtual machines.
Forcing synchronization of data from the new protection site to the new recovery site ensures that the
recovery site has a current copy of the protected virtual machines running at the protection site. Forcing this
synchronization ensures that recovery is possible immediately after the reprotect process finishes.
For information about how Site Recovery Manager reprotects virtual machines with vSphere Replication,
see “How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with vSphere Replication,” on page 113.
For information about how Site Recovery Manager reprotects virtual machines with storage policy
protection, see “How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage Policy Protection,”
on page 113.

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with
vSphere Replication
In the reprotect process using vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
protection, then forces synchronization of the storage from the new protected site to the new recovery site.
When performing reprotection with vSphere Replication, Site Recovery Manager uses the original VMDK
files as initial copies during synchronization. The full synchronization that appears in the recovery steps
mostly performs checksums, and only a small amount of data is transferred through the network.
Forcing synchronization of data from the new protection site to the new recovery site ensures that the
recovery site has a current copy of the protected virtual machines running at the protection site. Forcing this
synchronization ensures that recovery is possible immediately after the reprotect process finishes.
If you want to manually set up reverse replication on a vSphere Replication protected virtual machine, use
vSphere Replication in the vSphere Web Client to force stop the incoming replication group on the old
recovery site, which is the new protected site. If you just delete the virtual machine on the original protected
site, the reprotect will fail.

How Site Recovery Manager Reprotects Virtual Machines with Storage
Policy Protection
In the reprotect process using storage policy protection, Site Recovery Manager reverses the direction of
replication and protects the virtual machines that are associated with the relevant storage policies on what
was previously the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager reestablishes vSphere entity protection and
monitoring on the new protected site.
Reversing the replication of a storage policy protection group is the same as reversing the replication of an
array-based replication protection group because it only affects the underlying storage. When you perform
reprotect on a recovery plan that includes a storage policy protection group, the replication technology that
your storage arrays provide reverses the replication of all of the consistency groups that are associated with
the storage policies that the protection group contains.

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If the storage arrays fail to reverse replication for any consistency groups in the protection group, the
recovery plan goes into the Incomplete Reprotect state. In this state, you must resolve the storage issues and
run reprotect again. Rerunning reprotect on a storage policy protection group only affects the direction of
replication of consistency groups for which a previous reprotect operation did not complete successfully.
When the storage arrays have reversed the direction of replication, Site Recovery Manager reestablishes
vSphere entity protection and monitoring. The conditions for reestablishment of vSphere entity protection
and monitoring during reprotect are less strict than the conditions for establishing vSphere entity protection
and monitoring during the creation of a storage policy protection group:
n

Site Recovery Manager checks the storage policies on the new protected site for compliance. If storage
policies on the new protected site are non-compliant, reprotect does not fail but Site Recovery Manager
cannot protect the virtual machines that are associated with that storage policy. For information about
compliance, see “Prerequisites for Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 49 and “Limitations of
Storage Policy Protection Groups,” on page 50.

Site Recovery Manager restarts vSphere entity monitoring on the new protected site.

Site Recovery Manager starts protecting all compliant virtual machines. This might not be the same set
of virtual machines as was recovered when you ran the recovery plan initially because you or another
user might have associated more virtual machines with the storage policy on the new protected site.
Reprotect does not fail if Site Recovery Manager fails to protect a virtual machine on the new protected
site.

The storage policy protection group is ready for recovery from the new protected site to the new
recovery site.

Preconditions for Performing Reprotect
You can perform reprotect only if you meet certain preconditions.
You can perform reprotect on recovery plans that contain array-based replication protection groups,
vSphere Replication protection groups, and storage policy protection groups.
Before you can run reprotect, you must satisfy the preconditions.
1

Run a planned migration and make sure that all steps of the recovery plan finish successfully. If errors
occur during the recovery, resolve the problems that caused the errors and rerun the recovery. When
you rerun a recovery, operations that succeeded previously are skipped. For example, successfully
recovered virtual machines are not recovered again and continue running without interruption.

The original protected site must be available. The vCenter Server instances, ESXi Servers,
Site Recovery Manager Server instances, and corresponding databases must all be recoverable.

If you performed a disaster recovery operation, you must perform a planned migration when both sites
are running again. If errors occur during the attempted planned migration, you must resolve the errors
and rerun the planned migration until it succeeds.

Reprotect is not available under certain circumstances.

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Recovery plans cannot finish without errors. For reprotect to be available, all steps of the recovery plan
must finish successfully.

You cannot restore the original site, for example if a physical catastrophe destroys the original site. To
unpair and recreate the pairing of protected and recovery sites, both sites must be available. If you
cannot restore the original protected site, you must reinstall Site Recovery Manager on the protected
and recovery sites.

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Chapter 9 Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery

Reprotect Virtual Machines
Reprotect results in the reconfiguration of Site Recovery Manager protection groups and recovery plans to
work in the opposite direction. After a reprotect operation, you can recover virtual machines back to the
original site using a planned migration workflow.
Prerequisites
See “Preconditions for Performing Reprotect,” on page 114.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

Right-click a recovery plan and select Reprotect.

Select the check box to confirm that you understand that the reprotect operation is irreversible.

(Optional) Select the Force Cleanup check box to ignore errors during the cleanup operation on the
recovery site, and click Next.
The Force Cleanup option is only available after you have performed an initial reprotect operation that
has experienced errors.

Review the reprotect information and click Finish.

Select the recovery plan and click Monitor > Recovery Steps tab to monitor the progress of the
reprotect operation.

When the reprotect operation finishes, select the recovery plan, click Monitor > History, and click the
Export report for selected history item button.
The recovery plan can return to the ready state even if errors occurred during the reprotect operation.
Check the history report for the reprotect operation to make sure that no errors occurred. If errors did
occur during reprotect, attempt to fix the errors and run a test recovery to make sure that the errors are
fixed. If you do not fix errors that occurred during reprotect and you subsequently attempt to run
planned migration or disaster recovery without fixing them, some virtual machines might fail to
recover.

Site Recovery Manager reverses the recovery site and protected sites. Site Recovery Manager creates
placeholder copies of virtual machines from the new protected site at the new recovery site.

Reprotect States
The reprotect process passes through several states that you can observe in the recovery plan in the
Site Recovery Manager plug-in in the vSphere Web Client.
If reprotect fails, or succeeds partially, you can perform remedial actions to complete the reprotect.
Table 9‑1. Reprotect States
State

Description

Remedial Action

Reprotect In Progress

Site Recovery Manager is
running reprotect.

None

Partial Reprotect

Occurs if multiple recovery
plans share the same protection
groups and reprotect succeeds
for some groups in some plans,
but not for others.

Run reprotect again on the partially reprotected
plans.

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Table 9‑1. Reprotect States (Continued)
State

Description

Remedial Action

Incomplete Reprotect

Occurs because of failures
during reprotect. For example,
this state might occur because
of a failure to synchronize
storage or a failure to create
placeholder virtual machines.

Reprotect Interrupted

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Occurs if one of the
Site Recovery Manager Servers
stops unexpectedly during the
reprotect process.

If a reprotect operation fails to synchronize
storage, make sure that sites are connected,
review the reprotect progress in the
vSphere Web Client, resolve the storage
issues, and start the reprotect task again. If
reprotect still does not succeed, run the
reprotect task with the Force Cleanup option.
If Site Recovery Manager fails to create
placeholder virtual machines, recovery is still
possible. Review the reprotect steps in the
vSphere Web Client, resolve any open issues,
and run reprotect again.

Ensure that both Site Recovery Manager Servers
are running and start the reprotect task again.

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Restoring the Pre-Recovery Site
Configuration By Performing
Failback

To restore the original configuration of the protected and recovery sites after a recovery, you can perform a
sequence of optional procedures known as failback.
After a planned migration or a disaster recovery, the former recovery site becomes the protected site.
Immediately after the recovery, the new protected site has no recovery site to which to recover. If you run
reprotect, the new protected site is protected by the original protection site, reversing the original direction
of protection. See Chapter 9, “Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery,” on page 111 for information
about reprotect.
To restore the configuration of the protected and recovery sites to their inital configuration before the
recovery, you perform failback.
To perform failback, you run a sequence of reprotect and planned migration operations.
1

Perform a reprotect. The recovery site becomes the protected site. The former protected site becomes the
recovery site.

Perform a planned migration to shut down the virtual machines on the protected site and start up the
virtual machines on the recovery site. To avoid interruptions in virtual machine availability, you might
want to run a test before you start the planned migration. If the test identifies errors, you can resolve
them before you perform the planned migration.

Perform a second reprotect, to revert the protected and recovery sites to their original configuration
before the recovery.

You can configure and run a failback when you are ready to restore services to the original protected site,
after you have brought it back online after an incident.

Example: Performing a Failback Operation
Site A is the protected site and B is the recovery site. A recovery occurs, migrating the virtual machines from
site A to site B. To restore site A as the protected site, you perform a failback.
1

Virtual machines replicate from site A to site B.

Perform a reprotect. Site B, the former recovery site, becomes the protected site. Site Recovery Manager
uses the protection information to establish the protection of site B. Site A becomes the recovery site.

Perform a planned migration to recover the protected virtual machines on site B to site A.

Perform a second reprotect. Site A becomes the protected site and site B becomes the recovery site.

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Figure 10‑1. Site Recovery Manager Failback Process
2. Reprotect–Recovery site becomes protected site

1. Planned Migration
Site A

Site B

Site A

Site B

Protected site becomes Recovery site becomes
recovery site
protected site

Protected
virtual
machines
power off

apps

Replica
virtual
machines
power on

Replica
virtual
machines
power off

Virtual machines replicate from site A to site B

Replica
virtual
machines
power on

apps

Protected
virtual
machines
power on

Direction of replication is reversed
4. Reprotect again– original protected and
recovery site configuration restored

3. Planned Migration
Site A

apps

Site B

Site A

Site B

apps

Protected
virtual
machines
power off

Migrate virtual machines from protected to recovery site

Protected
virtual
machines
power on

apps

Replica
virtual
machines
power off

Protection and recovery sites and direction of replication
are restored to pre-migration condition

Perform a Failback
After Site Recovery Manager performs a recovery, you can perform a failback to restore the original
configuration of the protected and recovery sites.
To aid comprehension, the original protected site from before a recovery is site A. The original recovery site
is site B. After a recovery from site A to site B, the recovered virtual machines are running on site B without
protection.
Prerequisites
Verify that the following conditions are in place.
n

You have performed a recovery, either as part of a planned migration or as part of a disaster recovery.

The original protected site, site A, is running.

If you performed a disaster recovery, you must perform a planned migration recovery when the hosts
and datastores on the original protected site, site A, are running again.

You did not run reprotect since the recovery.

Procedure

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In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

Right-click a recovery plan and select Reprotect.

Select the check box to confirm that you understand that the reprotect operation is irreversible and click
Next.

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Chapter 10 Restoring the Pre-Recovery Site Configuration By Performing Failback

Determine whether to enable Force Cleanup and click Next.
This option is only available after you have run reprotect once and errors occured. Enabling this option
forces the removal of virtual machines, ignoring errors, and returns the recovery plan to the ready state.

Review the reprotect information and click Finish.

In the Monitor tab, click Recovery Steps to monitor the reprotect operation until it finishes.

(Optional) If necessary, rerun reprotect until it finishes without errors.
At the end of the reprotect operation, Site Recovery Manager has reversed replication, so that the
original recovery site, site B, is now the protected site.

(Optional) After the test completes, right-click the recovery plan and select Cleanup to clean up the
recovery plan.

Right-click the recovery plan and select Recovery to run the recovery plan as a planned migration.

In the Monitor tab, click Recovery Steps to monitor the planned migration until it finishes.
The planned migration shuts down the virtual machines on the new protected site, site B, and starts up
the virtual machines on the new recovery site, site A. If necessary, rerun the planned migration until it
finishes without errors.
When the planned migration completes, the virtual machines are running on the original protected site,
site A, but the virtual machines are not protected. The virtual machines on the original recovery site,
site B, are powered off.

Right-click the recovery plan and select Reprotect and follow the instructions of the wizard to perform
a second reprotect operation.
Running reprotect again reestablishes protection in the original direction from before the recovery.

You restored the protected and recovery sites to their original configuration before the recovery. The
protected site is site A, and the recovery site is site B.

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Interoperability of
Site Recovery Manager with Other
Software

Site Recovery Manager Server operates as an extension to the vCenter Server at a site.
Site Recovery Manager is compatible with other VMware solutions, and with third-party software.
You can run other VMware solutions such as vCenter Update Manager, vCenter Server Heartbeat, VMware
Fault Tolerance, vSphere Storage vMotion, and vSphere Storage DRS in deployments that you protect using
Site Recovery Manager. Use caution before you connect other VMware solutions to the vCenter Server
instance to which the Site Recovery Manager Server is connected. Connecting other VMware solutions to the
same vCenter Server instance as Site Recovery Manager might cause problems when you upgrade
Site Recovery Manager or vSphere. Check the compatibility and interoperability of the versions of these
solutions with your version of Site Recovery Manager by consulting VMware Product Interoperability
Matrixes.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“Site Recovery Manager and vCenter Server,” on page 122

“Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware Virtual SAN Storage and vSphere Replication,” on
page 122

“How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with DPM and DRS During Recovery,” on page 123

“How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Storage DRS or Storage vMotion,” on page 123

“How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with vSphere High Availability,” on page 125

“How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Stretched Storage,” on page 125

“Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware NSX,” on page 127

“Site Recovery Manager and vSphere PowerCLI,” on page 127

“Site Recovery Manager and vRealize Orchestrator,” on page 128

“Protecting Microsoft Cluster Server and Fault Tolerant Virtual Machines,” on page 130

“Using Site Recovery Manager with SIOC Datastores,” on page 131

“Using Site Recovery Manager with Admission Control Clusters,” on page 131

“Site Recovery Manager and Virtual Machines Attached to RDM Disk Devices,” on page 132

“Site Recovery Manager and Active Directory Domain Controllers,” on page 132

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Site Recovery Manager and vCenter Server
Site Recovery Manager takes advantage of vCenter Server services, such as storage management,
authentication, authorization, and guest customization. Site Recovery Manager also uses the standard set of
vSphere administrative tools to manage these services.
Because the Site Recovery Manager Server depends on vCenter Server for some services, you must install
and configure vCenter Server at a site before you install Site Recovery Manager.
You can use Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication with the vCenter Server Appliance or with a
standard vCenter Server installation. You can have vCenter Server Appliance on one site and a standard
vCenter Server installation on the other.

How Changes to vCenter Server Inventory Affect Site Recovery Manager
Because Site Recovery Manager protection groups apply to a subset of the vCenter Server inventory,
changes to the protected inventory made by vCenter Server administrators and users can affect the integrity
of Site Recovery Manager protection and recovery. Site Recovery Manager depends on the availability of
certain objects, such as virtual machines, folders, resource pools, and networks, in the vCenter Server
inventory at the protected and recovery sites. Deletion of resources such as folders or networks that are
referenced by recovery plans can invalidate the plan. Renaming or relocating objects in the vCenter Server
inventory does not affect Site Recovery Manager, unless it causes resources to become inaccessible during
test or recovery.
In the case of ABR and VR, Site Recovery Manager can tolerate certain changes at the protected site without
disruption.
n

Deleting protected virtual machines.

Deleting an object for which an inventory mapping exists.

Site Recovery Manager can tolerate certain changes at the recovery site without disruption.
n

Moving placeholder virtual machines to a different folder or resource pool.

Deleting an object for which an inventory map exists.

NOTE Storage Policy Protection Groups handle changes differently. See “Inventory Mappings for Storage
Policy Protection Groups,” on page 34.

Site Recovery Manager and the vCenter Server Database
If you update the vCenter Server installation that Site Recovery Manager extends, do not reinitialize the
vCenter Server database during the update. Site Recovery Manager stores identification information about
all vCenter Server objects in the Site Recovery Manager database. If you reinitialize the vCenter Server
database, the identification data that Site Recovery Manager has stored no longer matches identification
information in the new vCenter Server instance and objects are not found.

Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware Virtual SAN Storage and
vSphere Replication
You can use VMware Virtual SAN storage with Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication.
Site Recovery Manager 6.1 supports vSphere Replication 6.1 with Virtual SAN 6.1. You cannot use Virtual
SAN storage with array-based replication.
For information about using vSphere Replication with Virtual SAN, see Using vSphere Replication with
Virtual SAN Storage in vSphere Replication Administration.

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How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with DPM and DRS During
Recovery
Distributed Power Management (DPM) and Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) are not mandatory, but
Site Recovery Manager supports both services and enabling them provides certain benefits when you use
Site Recovery Manager.
DPM is a VMware feature that manages power consumption by ESX hosts. DRS is a VMware facility that
manages the assignment of virtual machines to ESX hosts.
Site Recovery Manager temporarily disables DPM for the clusters on the recovery site and ensures that all
hosts in the cluster are powered on when recovery or test recovery starts. This allows for sufficient host
capacity while recovering virtual machines. After the recovery or test is finished, Site Recovery Manager
restores the DPM settings on the cluster on the recovery site to their original values.
For planned migration and reprotect operations, Site Recovery Manager also disables DPM on the affected
clusters on the protected site and ensures that all of the hosts in the cluster are powered on. This allows
Site Recovery Manager to complete host level operations, for example unmounting datastores or cleaning
up storage after a reprotect operation. After the planned migration or reprotect operation has finished,
Site Recovery Manager restores the DPM settings on the cluster on the protected site to their original values.
The hosts in the cluster are left in the running state so that DPM can power them down as needed.
Site Recovery Manager registers virtual machines across the available ESX hosts in a round-robin order, to
distribute the potential load as evenly as possible. Site Recovery Manager always uses DRS placement to
balance the load intelligently across hosts before it powers on recovered virtual machines on the recovery
site, even if DRS is disabled on the cluster.
If DRS is enabled and in fully automatic mode, DRS might move other virtual machines to further balance
the load across the cluster while Site Recovery Manager is powering on the recovered virtual machines. DRS
continues to balance all virtual machines across the cluster after Site Recovery Manager has powered on the
recovered virtual machines.

How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Storage DRS or Storage
vMotion
You can use Site Recovery Manager when protecting virtual machines on sites that are configured for
Storage DRS or Storage vMotion if you follow certain guidelines.
The behavior of Storage DRS or Storage vMotion depends on whether you use Site Recovery Manager with
array-based replication or with vSphere Replication.
For information about how Site Recovery Manager handles datastore tagging for Storage DRS, see
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2108196.

Using Site Recovery Manager with Array-Based Replication on Sites with
Storage DRS or Storage vMotion
You must follow the guidelines if you use array-based replication to protect virtual machines on sites that
use Storage DRS or Storage vMotion.
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Storage DRS considers the protection and the replication status of datastores while calculating
placement recommendations to perform automatic or manual migration. Storage DRS checks if the
datastore is replicated or not, part of a consistency group or protection group, then tags the datastore
accordingly. For more information on how Site Recovery Manager handles datastore tagging, see
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2108196.

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Site Recovery Manager supports Storage DRS clusters containing datastores from different consistency
groups. If you migrate a virtual machine to a datastore that is not part of a protection group, then you
have to reconfigure the protection group to include that datastore.

Site Recovery Manager supports Storage vMotion without limitation between non-replicated datastores
and between replicated datastores in the same consistency group. In those cases, Storage DRS can
perform automatic Storage vMotion in clusters in automatic mode, or issue recommendations for
Storage vMotion in clusters in manual mode.

Special considerations apply to Storage vMotion between a replicated and a non-replicated datastore, or
between replicated datastores in different consistency groups. In those cases, Storage DRS does not
automatically initiate or recommend Storage vMotion. Manually initiated Storage vMotion results in a
warning detailing the possible impact.

Do not use Storage DRS or Storage vMotion to move virtual machines regularly. Do not accept
recommendations to manually move virtual machines regularly. You can move virtual machines
occasionally, but excessive movement of virtual machines can cause problems. Moving virtual
machines requires the array to replicate virtual machines over the network, which takes time and
consumes bandwidth. When Storage DRS or Storage vMotion moves virtual machines, you might
encounter problems during a recovery:

If Storage DRS or Storage vMotion moves a virtual machine to a different consistency group within
the same protection group, there is a short period between Site Recovery Manager propagating the
new location of the virtual machine to the recovery site and the array replicating the changes to the
recovery site. In addition, there is another period during which the arrays replicate the source and
target consistency groups to a consistent state on the recovery site. While the array is propagating
all of the changes to the recovery site, disaster recovery of this virtual machine might fail.

If Storage DRS or Storage vMotion moves a virtual machine to a different protection group,
Site Recovery Manager generates a protection error for this virtual machine. You must unconfigure
protection of the virtual machine in the old protection group and configure protection of the virtual
machine in the new protection group. Until you configure protection in the new protection group,
planned migration or disaster recovery of this virtual machine fails.

Adding a disk to a protected virtual machine results in the same problems as for moving an entire
virtual machine. Site Recovery Manager does not prevent you from doing this, but if a virtual machine
contains an unreplicated disk and you do not exclude the disk from protection, powering on the virtual
machine fails after the move.

Using Site Recovery Manager with vSphere Replication on Sites with Storage
DRS or Storage vMotion
Follow the guidelines if you use vSphere Replication to protect or recover virtual machines on sites that use
Storage DRS or Storage vMotion.

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vSphere Replication is compatible with vSphere Storage vMotion and vSphere Storage DRS on both
protected and recovery sites. You can use Storage vMotion and Storage DRS to move replica disk files
of a virtual machine that vSphere Replication protects, with no impact on replication.
Site Recovery Manager detects the changes and fails over the virtual machine successfully.

Site Recovery Manager supports Storage DRS clusters on the recovery site with datastores containing
the vSphere Replication replica disks.

vSphere Replication is compatible with Storage vMotion and saves the state of a disk or virtual machine
when the home directory of a disk or virtual machine moves. Replication of the disk or virtual machine
continues normally after the move.

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Chapter 11 Interoperability of Site Recovery Manager with Other Software

A full sync causes Storage DRS to trigger Storage vMotion only if you set the Storage DRS rules to be
very aggressive, or if a large number of virtual machines perform a full sync at the same time. The
default I/O latency threshold for Storage DRS is 15ms. By default, Storage DRS performs loading
balancing operations every 8 hours. Storage DRS also waits until it has collected sufficient statistics
about the I/O load before it generates Storage vMotion recommendations. Consequently, a full sync
only affects Storage DRS recommendations if the full sync lasts for a long time and if, during that time,
the additional I/O that the full sync generates causes the latency to exceed the I/O latency threshold.

When you use Storage DRS in manual mode on protected virtual machine datastores, stale
recommendations might exist after a failover. After reprotecting the failed over virtual machines to the
original site, if you apply these stale Storage DRS recommendations, the Site Recovery Manager
placeholder VM becomes corrupted, causing a subsequent recovery to the original site to fail for the
VMs for which the Storage DRS recommendations were applied. If you apply stale updates, unregister
the placeholder VM and use the Site Recovery Manager repair operation to recreate a valid placeholder.
To avoid this issue, clear any stale recommendations from a prior failover from that site by regenerating
Storage DRS recommendations for the affected Storage DRS storage cluster after reprotect successfully
completes.

How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with vSphere High Availability
You can use Site Recovery Manager to protect virtual machines on which vSphere High Availability (HA) is
enabled.
HA protects virtual machines from ESXi host failures by restarting virtual machines from hosts that fail on
new hosts within the same site. Site Recovery Manager protects virtual machines against full site failures by
restarting the virtual machines at the recovery site. The key difference between HA and
Site Recovery Manager is that HA operates on individual virtual machines and restarts the virtual machines
automatically. Site Recovery Manager operates at the recovery plan level and requires a user to initiate a
recovery manually.
To transfer the HA settings for a virtual machine onto the recovery site, you must set the HA settings on the
placeholder virtual machine before performing recovery, at any time after you have configured the
protection of the virtual machine.
You can replicate HA virtual machines by using array-based replication or vSphere Replication. If HA
restarts a protected virtual machine on another host on the protected site, vSphere Replication will perform
a full sync after the virtual machine restarts.
Site Recovery Manager does not require HA as a prerequisite for protecting virtual machines. Similarly, HA
does not require Site Recovery Manager.

How Site Recovery Manager Interacts with Stretched Storage
Stretched storage support is available for array-based replication.
Site Recovery Manager supports active-active stretched storage between protected and recovery sites by
using Cross vCenter Server vMotion to perform planned migrations, eliminating service downtime. Disaster
recovery and test recovery continue to use the existing LUN-based recovery functionality.
IMPORTANT Stretched storage is supported only on vCenter Single Sign-On Enhanced Linked Mode
environments. Planned migration with Cross vCenter Server vMotion fails if the sites are not Enhanced
Linked Mode. Stretched storage is required when using Cross vCenter Server vMotion during a planned
migration.

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Protection Groups
IMPORTANT Protection groups for stretched storage must be created as storage policy protection groups. You
must create and use storage profiles to protect and recover stretched storage devices.
n

Protection groups with stretched devices must have a preferred direction from the protected site to the
recovery site. The preferred direction must match the site preference that the array maintains for the
corresponding devices. If the array supports site preference, then the protected site must have the site
preference.

Stretched and nonstretched virtual machines and consistency groups can be in the same protection
groups and the same recovery plan.

The stretched virtual machines must be on a stretched datastore and must be powered on at the
protected site.

You cannot create two protection groups in opposite directions by using the same stretched device pair,
but you can place virtual machines on the stretched devices at the recovery site that correspond to
protected devices at the protected site. You cannot protect these virtual machines, but they are
automatically protected during the reprotect process.

Planned Migration
n

The Run Recovery Plan wizard has an option to use Cross vCenter Server vMotion to perform a
planned migration. If the option is selected, Cross vCenter Server vMotion is used for all protected,
powered-on virtual machines on the stretched storage at the protected site. If the option is not selected,
the regular recovery workflow is used for replicated LUNs, including stretched storage.

If Cross vCenter Server vMotion fails for any reason, the recovery plan stops at the "Migrating VMs"
step and does not continue. If you cannot resolve the problem that is preventing Site Recovery Manager
from using Cross vCenter Server vMotion, rerun the recovery plan with the vSphere vMotion option
turned off. The migration can then use the regular recovery workflow for replicated LUNs.

During the deactivate step the stretched devices stay mounted at the protected site even if vMotion is
not used. Site Recovery Manager ignores non-protected replica virtual machines on the stretched
devices at the protected site and does not unregister them.

Test Recovery
n

Test recovery is performed by using the regular test recovery workflow for replicated devices,
including stretched devices. vMotion compatibility checks are performed for each virtual machine on
the stretched devices.

If the array does not support creating read-write snapshots for stretched devices,
Site Recovery Manager does not allow you to perform a test recovery for these devices.

Cross vCenter Server vMotion
Cross vCenter Server vMotion is not supported for migration from a vSphere Distributed Switch port group
to a standard switch network. In this instance, attempting to Cross vCenter Server vMotion a virtual
machine results in these error messages.
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126

Unable to find a host in the cluster that is compatible with the
Cross vCenter Server vMotion of the virtual machine from the protection group .

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Currently connected network interface cannot use network ,
because the type of the destination network is not supported for vMotion based on the source network
type.

Cross vCenter Server vMotion does not work in these situations.
n

If the distributed resource scheduler is disabled for the cluster

If the virtual machine has snapshots

If the virtual machine is a linked clone

Cross vCenter Server vMotion requirements in vSphere are discussed in Cross vCenter Server vMotion
requirements in VMware vSphere 6.0 (2106952)

Using Site Recovery Manager with VMware NSX
Site Recovery Manager can protect virtual machines that are attached to NSX networks present on the
protected and recovery site without having to configure inventory mappings.
VMware NSX 6.2 supports Universal Logical Switches which allow for the creation of layer-2 networks that
span vCenter Server boundaries. When utilizing Universal Logical Switches with NSX, there will be a
virtual port group at both the protected and recovery site that connect to the same layer-2 network. This
means that when using storage policy protection groups and a Universal Logical Switch, you do not need to
specify any network mapping. Site Recovery Manager works with VMware NSX to automatically map the
virtual machine to the correct network at the recovery site.
You can override auto-mapping by manually configuring network mappings on stretched networks.
Enhanced Linked Mode and non- Enhanced Linked Mode topologies are supported.
Limitations
n

Auto-mapping for NSX universal wires is only supported with storage policy protection groups, NSX
6.2, and Universal Logical Switches.

For virtual machine protection groups, you must explicity configure network mapping between the two
ends of the universal wire to ensure that the virtual machines recover on the same universal wire.

This feature is only supported for a full recovery. Test failover must be done manually.

See “Configure Inventory Mappings,” on page 37 for details.

Site Recovery Manager and vSphere PowerCLI
VMware vSphere PowerCLI provides a Windows PowerShell interface for command-line access to
Site Recovery Manager tasks.
vSphere PowerCLI exposes the Site Recovery Manager APIs. You can use vSphere PowerCLI to
administrate Site Recovery Manager or to create scripts that automate Site Recovery Manager tasks.
For information about how to manage Site Recovery Manager by using vSphere PowerCLI, see the vSphere
PowerCLI documentation at https://www.vmware.com/support/developer/PowerCLI/.

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Site Recovery Manager and vRealize Orchestrator
The vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager allows you to automate certain
Site Recovery Manager operations by including them in vRealize Orchestrator workflows.
The vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager includes actions and workflows that run
Site Recovery Manager operations. If you are a vRealize Orchestrator administrator, you can create
workflows that include the actions and workflows from the Site Recovery Manager plug-in. By including
Site Recovery Manager actions and workflows in vRealize Orchestrator workflows, you can combine
Site Recovery Manager operations with the automated operations that other vRealize Orchestrator plug-ins
provide.
For example, you can create a workflow that uses the actions and workflows of the vRealize Orchestrator
plug-in for vCenter Server to create and configure virtual machines and register them with vCenter Server.
In the same workflow, you can use the actions and workflows from the Site Recovery Manager plug-in to
create protection groups and protect the virtual machines as soon as they are created. You can also use
Site Recovery Manager actions and workflows to configure some of the recovery settings for the protected
virtual machines. Combining the vCenter Server and Site Recovery Manager actions and workflows in a
vRealize Orchestrator workflow thus allows you to automate the process of creating and protecting virtual
machines.
You can use the vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager in a shared recovery site
configuration, in which you connect multiple Site Recovery Manager instances to a single vCenter Server
instance. You can also use the vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager with multiple
Site Recovery Manager instances on multiple vCenter Server instances that are connected to the same
vCenter Single Sign-On server.
For information about creating workflows by using vRealize Orchestrator, see the vRealize Orchestrator
documentation.
For information about how to use the vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager, see the
vRealize Orchestrator Plug-Ins Documentation.

Automated Operations That the vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for
Site Recovery Manager Provides
With the vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager, you can automate the creation of your
Site Recovery Manager infrastructure to add virtual machines to protection groups and configure recovery
settings of virtual machines.
With the vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager you can protect virtual machines by
adding them to array-based replication or to vSphere Replication protection groups. The plug-in does not
automate the configuration of vSphere Replication on virtual machines. You can use the
vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for vSphere Replication to configure vSphere Replication on virtual machines,
or configure vSphere Replication manually. For information about the vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for
vSphere Replication, see the vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for vSphere Replication 6.0 Release Notes.
The vRealize Orchestrator plug-in for Site Recovery Manager includes vRealize Orchestrator actions,
workflows, policy templates to trigger actions when certain events occur, and scripting objects to expose
selected elements of the Site Recovery Manager API to workflows.
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128

The plug-in provides actions and workflows that create a Site Recovery Manager infrastructure:
n

Create array-based protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups

Create inventory mappings between matching objects

Add protection groups to existing recovery plans

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The plug-in provides actions and workflows that protect virtual machines:
n

Protect a virtual machine by using an existing array-based replication protection group

Protect a virtual machine by using an existing vSphere Replication protection group

The plug-in provides actions and workflows that configure recovery settings on virtual machines:
n

Set the recovery priority

Configure virtual machine recovery settings

Create per-virtual machine recovery steps

Set the final power state of a recovered virtual machine

The plug-in provides actions and workflows that orchestrate recovery of virtual machines:
n

Start test, cleanup, failover, and reprotect a recovery plan

Cancel the currently running recovery plan

NOTE The plugin starts test, cleanup, failover, reprotect, and cancel and immediately finishes the
workflow. You can monitor the plan progress in the vSphere Web Client.
n

The plug-in provides actions and workflows that obtain information from
Site Recovery Manager Server:
n

List protected datastores

List protection groups and recovery plans

Find array-based protection groups by datastore

Get unassigned replication datastores and recovery plan states

The plug-in provides a workflow to configure a local site:
n

Search the local site's LookupService for the local Site Recovery Manager URL

Connect to the local Site Recovery Manager Server and retrieve the local Site Recovery Manager
certificate

Prompt you to examine and import the Site Recovery Manager certificate into the
vRealize Orchestrator trust store or not import if the certificate is incorrect

The plug-in provides a workflow to configure a remote site:
n

Obtain the RemoteSite LookupService URL from the local Site Recovery Manager extapi

Retrieve the remote site LookupService's SSL certificate

Prompt you to examine, import, or reject the LookupService certificate

After accepting the remote LookupService SSL certificate, search the remote site LookupService for
the remote vCenter Server URL

Connect to the remote VC and retrieve its SSL certificate

Examine and import or reject this certificate

NOTE The workflows to configure local and remote sites assume that the vRealize Orchestrator trust store
already contains the local site infrastructure node's SSL certificate and the local sitevCenter Server SSL
certificate. In an embedded configuration, the vRealize Orchestrator trust store contains only one certificate.
You must rerun the appropriate workflows if an administrator updates any of the SSL certificates.

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Protecting Microsoft Cluster Server and Fault Tolerant Virtual
Machines
You can use Site Recovery Manager to protect Microsoft Cluster Server (MSCS) and fault tolerant virtual
machines, with certain limitations.
To use Site Recovery Manager to protect MSCS and fault tolerant virtual machines, you might need to
change your environment.

General Limitations to Protecting MSCS and Fault Tolerant Virtual Machines
Protecting MSCS and fault tolerant virtual machines is subject to the following limitations.
n

You can use array-based replication only to protect MSCS virtual machines. Protecting MSCS virtual
machines with vSphere Replication is not supported.

Reprotect of MSCS or fault tolerant virtual machines requires VMware High Availability (HA) and
VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS). When you move MSCS or fault tolerant virtual
machines across their primary and secondary sites during reprotect, you must enable HA and DRS, and
set the affinity and antiaffinity rules as appropriate. See “DRS Requirements for Protection of MSCS
Virtual Machines,” on page 130.

Site Recovery Manager does not support multiple vCPU fault tolerance (SMP-FT) virtual machines.

ESXi Host Requirements for Protection of MSCS Virtual Machines
To protect MSCS or fault tolerant virtual machines, the ESXi host machines on which the virtual machines
run must meet certain criteria.
n

You must run a fault tolerant virtual machine and its shadow on two separate ESXi Server instances.

You can run a cluster of MSCS virtual machines in the following possible configurations.
Cluster-in-a-box

The MSCS virtual machines in the cluster run on a single ESXi Server.
You can have a maximum of five MSCS nodes on one ESXi Server.

Cluster-across-boxes

You can spread the MSCS cluster across a maximum of five ESXi Server
instances. You can protect only one virtual machine node of any MSCS
cluster on a single ESXi Server instance. You can have multiple MSCS
node virtual machines running on an ESXi host, as long as they do not
participate in the same MSCS cluster. This configuration requires shared
storage on a Fibre Channel SAN for the quorum disk.

DRS Requirements for Protection of MSCS Virtual Machines
To use DRS on sites that contain MSCS virtual machines, you must configure the DRS rules to allow
Site Recovery Manager to protect the virtual machines. By following the guidelines, you can protect MSCS
virtual machines on sites that run DRS if the placeholder virtual machines are in either a cluster-acrossboxes MSCS deployment or in a cluster-in-a-box MSCS deployment.

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Because vSphere does not support vSphere vMotion for MSCS virtual machines, you must set the VM to
Host DRS rule so that DRS does not perform vMotion on MSCS nodes. Set the VM to Host rule for the
virtual machines on the protected site and for the shadow virtual machines on the recovery site.

Set the DRS rules on the virtual machines on the protected site before you configure MSCS in the guest
operating systems. Set the DRS rules immediately after you deploy, configure, or power on the virtual
machines.

Set the DRS rules on the virtual machines on the recovery site immediately after you create a protection
group of MSCS nodes, as soon as the placeholder virtual machines appear on the recovery site.

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DRS rules that you set on the protected site are not transferred to the recovery site after a recovery. For
this reason, you must set the DRS rules on the placeholder virtual machines on the recovery site.

Do not run a test recovery or a real recovery before you set the DRS rules on the recovery site.

If you do not follow the guidelines on either the protected site or on the recovery site, vSphere vMotion
might move MSCS virtual machines to a configuration that Site Recovery Manager does not support.
n

In a cluster-in-a-box deployment on either the protected or recovery site, vSphere vMotion might move
MSCS virtual machines to different ESXi hosts.

In a cluster-in-a-box deployment on either the protected or recovery site, vSphere vMotion might move
some or all of the MSCS virtual machines to a single ESXi host.

Using Site Recovery Manager with SIOC Datastores
Site Recovery Manager fully supports storage I/O control (SIOC).

Planned Migration of Virtual Machines on Datastores that Use SIOC
In previous releases of Site Recovery Manager you had to disable storage I/O control (SIOC) on datastores
that you included in a recovery plan before you ran a planned migration. This release of
Site Recovery Manager fully supports SIOC, so you do not have to disable SIOC before you run a planned
migration.

Disaster Recovery and Reprotect of Virtual Machines on Datastores that Use
SIOC
In previous releases of Site Recovery Manager, if you ran a disaster recovery with SIOC enabled, the
recovery would succeed with errors. After the recovery, you had to manually disable SIOC on the protected
site and run a planned migration recovery again. You could not run reprotect until you successfully ran a
planned migration. This release of Site Recovery Manager fully supports SIOC, so recovery succeeds
without errors and you can run planned migration and reprotect after a disaster recovery without disabling
SIOC.

Using Site Recovery Manager with Admission Control Clusters
You can use Admission Control on a cluster to reserve resources on the recovery site.
However, using Admission Control can affect disaster recovery by preventing Site Recovery Manager from
powering on virtual machines when running a recovery plan. Admission Control can prevent virtual
machines from powering on if powering them on would violate the relevant Admission Control constraints.
You can add a command step to a recovery plan to run a PowerCLI script that disables Admission Control
during the recovery. See “Creating Custom Recovery Steps,” on page 82 for information about creating
command steps.
1

Create a pre-power on command step in the recovery plan that runs a PowerCLI script to disable
Admission Control.
Get-Cluster cluster_name | Set-Cluster -HAAdmissionControlEnabled:$false

Create a post-power on command step in the recovery plan to reenable Admission Control after the
virtual machine powers on.
Get-Cluster cluster_name | Set-Cluster -HAAdmissionControlEnabled:$true

If you disable Admission Control during recovery, you must manually reenable Admission Control after
you perform cleanup following a test recovery. Disabling Admission Control might affect the ability of High
Availability to restart virtual machines on the recovery site. Do not disable Admission Control for
prolonged periods.

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Site Recovery Manager and Virtual Machines Attached to RDM Disk
Devices
Protection and recovery of virtual machines that are attached to a raw disk mapping (RDM) disk device is
subject to different support depending on whether you use array-based replication or vSphere Replication.
NOTE Site Recovery Manager does not support the protection of virtual machines attached to RDM devices
in storage policy protection groups.
n

Array-based replication supports RDM devices in physical compatibility mode and in virtual
compatibility mode. If you use Site Recovery Manager with array-based repliction, you can protect and
recover virtual machines that use RDM in either physical compatibility mode or virtual compatibility
mode.

vSphere Replication supports RDM devices in virtual mode only, for both the source and target device.
If you use vSphere Replication, you cannot protect and recover virtual machines that use RDM in
physical compatibility mode.

If you use both array-based replication and vSphere Replication, you can only protect and recover
virtual machines that use RDM in physical compatibility mode by using array-based replication. You
can protect and recover virtual machines that use RDM in virtual compatibility mode by using either
array-based replication or vSphere Replication.

Site Recovery Manager and Active Directory Domain Controllers
Active Directory provides its own replication technology and restore mode.
Do not use Site Recovery Manager to protect Active Directory domain controllers. Use the Active Directory
replication technology and restore mode technologies to handle disaster recovery situations.

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Advanced Site Recovery Manager
Configuration

The Site Recovery Manager default configuration enables some simple recovery scenarios. Advanced users
can customize Site Recovery Manager to support a broader range of site recovery requirements.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“Reconfigure Site Recovery Manager Settings,” on page 133

“Modify Settings to Run Large Site Recovery Manager Environments,” on page 147

Reconfigure Site Recovery Manager Settings
Using the Advanced Settings, you can view or change many custom settings for the Site Recovery Manager
service. Advanced Settings provide a way for a user with adequate privileges to change default values that
affect the operation of various Site Recovery Manager features.
IMPORTANT During an upgrade, Site Recovery Manager does not retain any advanced settings that you
configured in the previous installation. This is by design. Due to changes in default values or improvements
in performance, advanced settings that you set in a previous version of Site Recovery Manager might not be
required by or compatible with the new version. Similarly, if you uninstall then reinstall the same version of
Site Recovery Manager, reusing the database from the previous installation, advanced settings are not
retained.

Change Connections Settings
Site Recovery Manager communicates with other services.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Connections.

Click Edit to change the settings.

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Option

Action

Change the number of failed pings
before raising a site down event.
The default value is 5.

Enter a new value in the connections.hmsPanicDelay text box.

Change the number of status
checks (pings) to try before
declaring the check a failure. The
default value is 2.

Enter a new value in the connections.hmsPingFailedDelay text box.

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Option

Action

Change the number of failed pings
before raising a site down event.
The default value is 5.

Enter a new value in the connections.qsPanicDelay text box.

Change the number of status
checks (pings) to try before
declaring the check a failure. The
default value is 2.

Enter a new value in the connections.qsPingFailedDelay text box.

Change the timeout value for the
VIX service connection to the virtual
machine. The default value is 120
seconds.

Enter a new value in the connections.vixOpenVmTimeout text box.

Change the timeout value for the
wait time for updates from servers.
The default value is 900 seconds.

Enter a new value in the connections.waitForUpdatesTimeout text box.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change Site Recovery Manager History Report Collection Setting
Site Recovery Manager history reports are useful to diagnose Site Recovery Manager Server behavior before
and after a failure. You can change the number of history reports to export.
When you run failover, test, cleanup, and reprotect operations with site A as the protected site and site B as
recovery site, you can export history reports for these operations when you collect a support bundle for Site
B, the recovery site. The most recent history is fetched directly from the Site Recovery Manager database.
After reprotect occurs, site A is the new recovery site and site B is the protected site. When you run failover,
test, cleanup, and reprotect operations, you can export history reports when you collect a support bundle for
site A, the recovery site.
Prerequisites
n

Verify that you have Administrator credentials.

Site Recovery Manager must be connected to a Site Recovery Manager database that you can access
with valid database credentials.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Select Export History and click Edit.

Change the value for exportHistory.numReports as needed.
You can enter a value from 0 to 50. The default value is 5.

To choose not to export reports, change the value to zero (0).

Click OK to save your changes.

Change Local Site Settings
Site Recovery Manager monitors consumption of resources on the Site Recovery Manager Server host and
raises an alarm if a resource threshold is reached. You can change the thresholds and the way that
Site Recovery Manager raises the alarms.
Procedure
1

134

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

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On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Local Site Status.

Click Edit to change the settings.

Option

Action

Change the time difference at which
Site Recovery Manager checks the
CPU usage, disk space, and free
memory at the local site. The
default value is 60 seconds.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus.checkInterval text box.

Change the timeout during which
Site Recovery Manager waits
between raising alarms about CPU
usage, disk space, and free memory
at the local site. The default value is
600 seconds.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus.eventFrequency text box.

Change the maximum allowed time
difference between server clocks.
The default is 20 seconds.

Enter a new value in thelocalSiteStatus.maxClockSkew textbox. If the
detected server clock time is off by more than the set number of seconds to
the Site Recovery Manager Server clock, Site Recovery Manager raises an
event.

Change the percentage of CPU
usage that causes
Site Recovery Manager to raise a
high CPU usage event. The default
value is 70.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus.maxCpuUsage text box.

Change the number of days before
the Site Recovery Manager
certificate expires before raising a
certificate expiring event. The
default value is 30 days.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus. minCertRemainingTime text
box.

Change the percentage of free disk
space that causes
Site Recovery Manager to raise a
low disk space event. The default
value is 100 Mb.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus.minDiskSpace text box.

Change the amount of free memory
that causes Site Recovery Manager
to raise a low memory event. The
default value is 32 MB.

Enter a new value in the localSiteStatus.minMemory text box.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change Logging Settings
You can change the levels of logging that Site Recovery Manager provides for the
Site Recovery Manager Server components.
Site Recovery Manager Server operates log rotation. When you restart Site Recovery Manager Server, or
when a log file becomes large, Site Recovery Manager Server creates a new log file and writes subsequent
log messages to the new log file. When Site Recovery Manager Server creates new log files, it compresses the
old log files to save space.
You might reduce the logging levels for some Site Recovery Manager Server components because log files
become too large too quickly. You might increase logging levels for certain components to help diagnose
problems. The list of available logging levels is the same for all Site Recovery Manager Server components.
none

Turns off logging.

quiet

Records minimal log entries.

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panic

Records only panic log entries. Panic messages occur in cases of complete
failure.

error

Records panic and error log entries. Error messages occur in cases of
problems that might or might not result in a failure.

warning

Records panic, error, and warning log entries. Warning messages occur for
behavior that is undesirable but that might be part of the expected course of
operation.

info

Records panic, error, warning, and information log entries. Information
messages provide information about normal operation.

verbose

Records panic, error, warning, information, and verbose log entries. Verbose
messages provide more detailed information than information messages.

trivia

Records panic, error, warning, information, verbose, and trivia log entries.
Trivia messages provide all available information. This level of logging is
useful for debugging but it can produce so much data that it might affect
performance.
NOTE Set this logging level only when instructed by VMware Support to
help resolve a problem.

Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Log Manager.

Click Edit to modify the logging settings.
By default, all components record verbose level logs, unless stated otherwise in the description of the
logging level.

136

Option

Description

Set logging level for all components
that do not have an entry in
logManager. The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Default drop-down menu.

Set logging level for the external
API module. The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.ExternalAPI drop-down menu.

Set logging level for
vSphere Replication. The default is
verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.HbrProvider drop-down
menu.

Set logging level for the IP
Customizer tool. The default is
verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.IPCustomizer drop-down
menu.

Set logging level for inventory
mapping. The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.InventoryMapper drop-down
menu.

Set logging level for licensing
issues. The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Licensing drop-down menu.

Set logging level for persistence
issues. The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Persistence drop-down menu.

Set logging level for recovery
operations. The default is trivia.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Recovery drop-down menu.
By default, recovery logging is set to trivia.

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Option

Description

Set logging level for recovery
configuration operations. The
default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.RecoveryConfig drop-down
menu.

Set logging level for array-based
replication operations. The default
is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Replication drop-down menu.

Set logging level for authorization
issues between
Site Recovery Manager Server and
vCenter Server. The default is
verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.ServerAuthorization dropdown menu.

Set logging level for session
management. The default is
verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.SessionManager drop-down
menu.

Set logging level for the SOAP Web
Services adapter. The default is
info.

Select a logging level from the logManager.SoapAdapter drop-down
menu. Due to the levels of traffic that the SOAP adapter generates, setting
the logging level to trivia might affect performance. By default, SOAP
adapter logging is set to info.

Set logging level for storage issues.
The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.Storage drop-down menu.

Set logging level for messages from
the array-based storage provider.
The default is verbose.

Select a logging level from the logManager.StorageProvider drop-down
menu.

Click OK to save your changes.
The new logging levels apply as soon as you click OK. You do not need to restart the
Site Recovery Manager service. If you restart Site Recovery Manager Server, logging remains set to the
level that you chose.

Change Recovery Settings
You can adjust default values for timeouts that occur when you test or run a recovery plan. You might
adjust default values if tasks fail to finish because of timeouts.
Several types of timeouts can occur when recovery plan steps run. These timeouts cause the plan to pause
for a specified interval to give the step time to finish.
Site Recovery Manager applies some advanced settings to a virtual machine at the moment that you
configure protection on that virtual machine:
n

recovery.defaultPriority

recovery.powerOnTimeout

recovery.powerOnDelay

recovery.customizationShutdownTimeout

recovery.customizationTimeout

recovery.skipGuestShutdown

recovery.powerOffTimeout

Site Recovery Manager keeps a copy of virtual machine recovery settings on each Site Recovery Manager
site. If recovery advanced settings are different on the protection and recovery sites,Site Recovery Manager
initializes recovery settings for a virtual machine to different values at each site. Then when
Site Recovery Manager recovers the virtual machine from site A to site B, it applies the local recovery

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settings for site B. When recovering from site B to site A Site Recovery Manager applies the local recovery
settings for site A. This condition exists until you explicitly edit and save individual virtual machine
recovery settings from the recovery plan Virtual Machines tab. Recovery settings for the affected virtual
machine synchronize and become identical on both Site Recovery Manager sites.
Procedure

138

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Recovery.

Click Edit to modify the recovery site settings.
Option

Action

Change the virtual machine power
off timeout in IP customization. The
default value is 300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the recovery.customizationShutdownTimeout text
box. This value is the minimal virtual machine power off timeout in
seconds used in IP customization workflow only. If you specify power off
timeout in virtual machine recovery settings, the greater value of the two
takes precedence.

Change the IP customization
timeout. The default value is 600
seconds.

Enter a new value in the recovery.customizationTimeout text box. This
value is the timeout used in preparation of IP customization scripts on the
Site Recovery Manager Server. You rarely need to change this value.

Change the default priority for
recovering a virtual machine. The
default value is 3.

Enter a new value in the recovery.defaultPriority text box.

Enable or disable forced recovery.
The default value is false.

Select or deselect the recovery.forceRecovery check box. Activate forced
recovery in cases where a lack of connectivity to the protected site severely
affects RTO. This setting only removes the restriction to select forced
recovery when running a recovery plan. To actually enable forced
recovery, select it when you run a plan.

Change the timeout for hosts in a
cluster to power on. The default
value is 1200 seconds.

Enter a new value in the recovery.hostPowerOnTimeout text box.

Change the default timeout value to
wait for guest shutdown to
complete before powering off VMs.
The default value is 300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the recovery.powerOffTimeout text box. This value
defines the guest operating system timeout before power-off is attempted
as a last resort to shutting down the virtual machines.
NOTE The virtual machines power off when the timeout expires. If the OS
of the virtual machine has not completed its shutdown tasks when the
timeout expires, data loss might result. For a large virtual machine that
requires a longer time to shut down gracefully, set the guest OS power-off
timeout individually for that virtual machine as described in “Configure
Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown Options,” on page 90.

Change the delay after powering on
a virtual machine before starting
dependent tasks. The default value
is 0.

Enter a new value in the recovery.powerOnDelay text box. The new value
applies to power-on tasks for virtual machines at the recovery site.

Change the timeout to wait for
VMware Tools when powering on
virtual machines. The default value
is 300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the recovery.powerOnTimeout text box. The new
power-on value applies to power-on tasks for virtual machines at the
recovery site. If protected virtual machines do not have VMware Tools
installed, set this value to 0 to skip waiting for VMware Tools when
powering on those VMs and avoid a timeout error in SRM.

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Option

Action

Enable or disable skipping the
shutdown of the guest OS. The
default value is false.

Select or deselect the recovery.skipGuestShutdown check box.
If skipGuestShutdown=true, Site Recovery Manager does not attempt
guest OS shutdown on protection site VMs, but directly powers them off
instead. In this case, the value set for recovery.powerOffTimeout has no
effect together with this setting. If VMware Tools are not installed in the
virtual machine, enable this setting to avoid a guest OS shutdown error in
Site Recovery Manager.
You can also enable the option to directly power off virtual machines
without a shutdown timeout, bypassing the guest OS. See “Configure
Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown Options,” on page 90.

Enable or disable automatic VM IP
customization during recovery. The
default value is true.

Select or deselect the recovery.useIpMapperAutomatically check box. If
you select the option and IP mapping rules are configured for virtual
networks, then Site Recovery Manager evaluates these rules during
recovery to customize the VMs. If you deselect the option, the IP mapping
rules are not evaluated during recovery. You can override the option for
each VM in VM Recovery Settings IP Customization mode.

Click OK to save your changes.

What to do next
To apply the changes to virtual machines that you have previously protected, you must reconfigure those
virtual machines. For example, if you reconfigure the defaultPriority setting, you can manually
reconfigure the priority of a previously protected virtual machine to match the new defaultPriority setting.
You can apply changes from either Recovery Plans or from Protection Groups.
See “Apply Recovery Settings to Virtual Machines in a Recovery Plan,” on page 139 and “Apply Recovery
Settings to Virtual Machines in a Protection Group,” on page 140.

Apply Recovery Settings to Virtual Machines in a Recovery Plan
If you change advanced recovery settings on a protected virtual machine, you must reconfigure the virtual
machine for the settings to take effect.
You can more efficiently configure recovery settings in a recovery plan if you target a single setting or a
single virtual machine. In some cases, you can apply a setting only this way, for example, if you change
settings in a disaster recovery or incomplete recovery scenario.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select Site Recovery > Recovery Plans.

Select the recovery plan to which the virtual machine belongs.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Right-click a virtual machine and click Configure Recovery.

Make the changes you want to the recovery properties settings.

Click OK.

What to do next
To apply recovery settings to virtual machines in a Protection Group, see “Apply Recovery Settings to
Virtual Machines in a Protection Group,” on page 140.

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Apply Recovery Settings to Virtual Machines in a Protection Group
If you change advanced recovery settings for protected virtual machines, the new settings do not take effect
until the virtual machines are reconfigured.
You can more conveniently update recovery settings by using the Protection Groups feature when you
apply settings to multiple virtual machines, although it can be used for a single virtual machine. You can
select all of the virtual machines in a protection group and update the settings all at once.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Protection Groups.

Select the protection group to which the virtual machines belong.

On the Related Objects tab, click Virtual Machines.

Select the virtual machine and click Remove Protection.
The virtual machine status changes to Not Configured.

Click Configure All to reconfigure all virtual machines in the protection group, or select a virtual
machine and click Configure Protection to reconfigure only that virtual machine.

What to do next
To apply recovery settings to a virtual machine in a recovery plan, see “Apply Recovery Settings to Virtual
Machines in a Recovery Plan,” on page 139.

Change Remote Manager Settings
If you run tasks that take a long time to complete, the default timeout period on the remote site might elapse
before the task completes. You can configure additional timeouts to allow long-running tasks to finish.
A long-running task might be the test recovery or cleanup of a large virtual machine. If a virtual machine
has large disks, it can take a long time to perform a test recovery or to perform a full recovery. The default
timeout period monitors the connectivity between the sites, so if a task takes a longer time to complete than
the default timeout period and does not send notifications to the other site while it is running, timeouts can
result. In this case, you can change the remote manager settings so that Site Recovery Manager does not time
out before a long-running task finishes.
Procedure

140

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Remote Manager.

Click Edit to modify the remote manager settings.
Option

Action

Configure the maximum time to wait
for a remote operation to complete.
The default value is 900 seconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.defaultTimeout.

Mark a virtual machine as protected
by Site Recovery Manager. The
default value is true.

Select the checkbox to enable the value
remoteManager.enableCustomFields.

Set a time period to wait for
requests to aggregate at the remote
site. The default value is 2000
milliseconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.powerOnAggregationInterval.

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Option

Action

Configure the maximum time to wait
for cancelled tasks to stop. The
default value is 300 seconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.taskCancelDefaultTimeout.

Configure an additional timeout
period for tasks to complete on the
remote site. The default value is 900
seconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.taskDefaultTimeout.

Configure the number of seconds to
wait for a timed out task to report
progress. The default value is 180
seconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.taskProgressDefaultTimeout. The task
is allowed more time to complete if progress update is received within that
time.

Configure the number of seconds to
wait for a timeout of xVC-vMotion.
The default value is 3600 seconds.

Enter a value for remoteManager.xVcVMotionTimeout.

Change Remote Site Settings
You can modify the default values that the Site Recovery Manager Server at the protected site uses to
determine whether the Site Recovery Manager Server at the remote site is available.
Site Recovery Manager monitors the connection between the protected site and the recovery site and raises
alarms if the connection breaks. You can change the criteria that cause Site Recovery Manager to raise a
connection event and change the way that Site Recovery Manager raises alarms.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Remote Site Status.

Click Edit to modify the settings.

Option

Action

Change the number of failed pings
before raising a site down event.
The default value is 5.

Enter a new value in the remoteSiteStatus.drPanicDelay text box.

Change the number of remote site
status checks (pings) to try before
declaring the check a failure. The
default value is 2.

Enter a new value in the remoteSiteStatus.drPingFailedDelay text box.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change Replication Settings
You can adjust replication settings to modify how long Site Recovery Manager waits for the creation of
virtual machine placeholders to finish.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Replication.

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Click Edit to change the settings.
Option

Action

Skip the check for non-protected
replica virtual machines while
deactivating the protection site
during Planned Migration. The
default value is false.

Select the checkbox to enable the value
replication.disablePiggybackVmsCheckDuringDeactivate.

Change the timeout in seconds to
wait when creating a placeholder
virtual machine. The default value is
300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the replication.placeholderVmCreationTimeout text
box.

Change the timeout in seconds to
wait for consistency group
information to be replicated to the
remote site before starting an
online sync on that site. The default
is 900 seconds.

Enter a new value in the replication.protectionInfoSyncTimeout textbox.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change SSO Setting
You can modify the Single Sign On setting for Site Recovery Manager to renew SSO tokens.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click SSO.

Click Edit to change the sso.sts.tokenLifetime setting to specify the number of seconds to use SSO
tokens before they are renewed.
The default value is 28800 seconds (8 hours).

Click OK to save your changes.

Change Storage Settings
You can adjust the storage settings to modify how Site Recovery Manager and vCenter Server communicate
with the storage replication adapter (SRA).
Procedure

142

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Storage.

Click Edit to modify the storage settings.
Option

Action

Change timeout in seconds for
executing an SRA command. The
default value is 300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storage.commandTimeout text box.

Change timeout in seconds
between datastore monitoring
related operations. The default
value is 30 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storage.datastoreMonitoringPollingInterval text
box.

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Option

Action

Allow Site Recovery Manager to
automatically create tag categories
and the Replicated tag that Storage
DRS compatibility requires. The
default value is true.

Select the storage.enableSdrsStandardTagCategoryCreation check box.

Allow Site Recovery Manager to
automatically create and attach tags
to replicated or protected
datastores for Storage DRS
compatibility. The default value is
true.

Select the storage.enableSdrsTagging check box. If you clear the check
box, Site Recovery Manager deletes all the tags and tag categories and
breaks compatibility with Storage DRS.

Allow Site Recovery Manager to
repair missing or incorrect tags on
replicated or protected datastores
for Storage DRS compatibility. The
default value is true.

Select the storage.enableSdrsTaggingRepair check box.

Change the maximum number of
concurrent SRA operations. The
default value is 5.

Enter a new value in the storage.maxConcurrentCommandCnt text box.

Change the minimum amount of
time in seconds between datastore
group computations. The default
value is 0.

Enter a new value in the storage.minDsGroupComputationInterval text
box.

Change the interval between status
updates for ongoing data
synchronization operations. The
default value is 30 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storage.querySyncStatusPollingInterval text box.

Change the interval between
Storage DRS tagging related
operations. The default value is 50
seconds.

Enter a new value in the storage.sdrsTaggingPollInterval text box.

Change the interval between
storage array discovery checks.
The default value is 86400 seconds
(24 hours).

Enter a new value in the storage.storagePingInterval text box.

Change the maximum amount of
time permitted for data
synchronization operations to
complete. The default value is
86400 seconds (24 hours).

Enter a new value in the storage.syncTimeout text box.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change ABR Storage Policy Setting
You can modify the ABR Storage Policy setting to specify the interval (in seconds) to perform autodiscovery of datastores that match a virtual machine storage policy.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Select ABR Storage Policy and click Edit.

Change the value for storagePolicyAbrReplication.policyDatastorePollInterval as needed. The default
value is 20 seconds.

Click OK to save your changes.

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Change Storage Provider Settings
For array-based replication, the SAN provider is the interface between Site Recovery Manager and your
storage replication adapter (SRA). Some SRAs require you to change default SAN provider values. You can
change the default timeout values and other behaviors of the Site Recovery Manager SAN provider.
You can change settings for resignaturing, fixing datastore names, host rescan counts, and timeouts in
seconds. For more information about these values, see the SRA documentation from your array vendor.
Procedure

144

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click Storage Provider.

Click Edit to modify the storage provider settings.
Option

Action

Make Site Recovery Manager
attempt to detach and reattach
LUNs with duplicate volumes. The
default value is true.

Select the storageProvider.autoDetachLUNsWithDuplicateVolume check
box.

Set the LVM.EnableResignature
flag on ESXi hosts during test and
recovery. The default value is 0.

In the storageProvider.autoResignatureMode text box, enter 0 to disable,
1 to enable, or 2 to ignore the flag. The default setting is 0. If you set this
flag to 1, Site Recovery Manager resignatures all known VMFS snapshot
volumes, including any volumes that Site Recovery Manager does not
manage. If you leave the flag set to 0, Site Recovery Manager only
resignatures the VMFS snapshot volumes that it manages.

Change the timeout in seconds to
wait for Batch Attach LUN operation
to complete on each ESXi host. The
default value is 3600 seconds.

Enter a value in the storageProvider.batchAttachTimeoutSec text box.

Change the timeout in seconds to
wait for Batch Detach LUN
operation to complete on each ESXi
host. The default value is 3600
seconds.

Enter a value in thestorageProvider.batchDetachTimeoutSec text box.

Change the interval that
Site Recovery Manager waits for
VMFS volumes to be mounted. The
default value is 3600 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.batchMountTimeoutSec text
box. Change this value if you experience timeouts caused by
Site Recovery Manager checking for VMFS volumes that take a long time
to mount. This setting is available in Site Recovery Manager 5.5.1 and later.

Change the interval that
Site Recovery Manager waits for
VMFS volumes to be unmounted.
The default value is 3600 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.batchUnmountTimeoutSec text
box. Change this value if you experience timeouts caused by
Site Recovery Manager checking for VMFS volumes that take a long time
to unmount. This setting is available in Site Recovery Manager 5.5.1 and
later.

Set number of retries for batch
unmount of VMFS/NFS volumes.
The default is 3 tries.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.datastoreUnmountRetryCount
text box.

Change the interval that
Site Recovery Manager waits before
attempting to unmount the
datastore. The default is 1 second.

Enter a new value in the
storageProvider.datastoreUnmountRetryDelaySec text box.

Force removal, upon successful
completion of a recovery, of the
snap-xx prefix applied to recovered
datastore names. The default value
is false.

Select the storageProvider.fixRecoveredDatastoreNames check box.

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Option

Action

Change the time that
Site Recovery Manager waits before
removing the snap-xx prefix applied
to recovered datastore names. The
default value is 0 seconds.

Enter a new value in the
storageProvider.fixRecoveredDatastoreNamesDelaySec text box.

Delay host scans during testing and
recovery. The default value is 0
seconds.

SRAs can send responses to Site Recovery Manager before a promoted
storage device on the recovery site is available to the ESXi hosts. When
Site Recovery Manager receives a response from an SRA, it rescans the
storage devices. If the storage devices are not fully available yet, ESXi
Server does not detect them and Site Recovery Manager does not find the
replicated devices when it rescans. Datastores are not created and
recovered virtual machines cannot be found.
To delay the start of storage rescans until they are available on the ESXi
hosts, enter a new value in the storageProvider.hostRescanDelaySec text
box.
Only change this value if you experience problems with unavailable
datastores.

Repeat host scans during testing
and recovery. The default value is 1.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.hostRescanRepeatCnt text box.
Some storage arrays require more than one rescan, for example to discover
the snapshots of failed-over LUNs. In previous releases, you might have
used the storageProvider.hostRescanRepeatCnt parameter to introduce a
delay in recoveries. Use the storageProvider.hostRescanDelaySec
parameter instead.

Change the interval that
Site Recovery Manager waits for
each HBA rescan to complete. The
default value is 300 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.hostRescanTimeoutSec text box.

Set the number of times that
Site Recovery Manager attempts to
resignature a VMFS volume. The
default value is 1.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.resignatureFailureRetryCount
text box.

Set a timeout for resignaturing a
VMFS volume. The default value is
900 seconds.

Enter a new value in the storageProvider.resignatureTimeoutSec text box.
If you change the storageProvider.hostRescanTimeoutSec setting,
increase the storageProvider.resignatureTimeoutSec setting to the same
timeout that you use for storageProvider.hostRescanTimeoutSec.

Identify VMX file paths that
Site Recovery Manager should not
consider as potential VMX file
candidates after Storage vMotion.
The default value is .snapshot,

Some arrays create VMX file paths that the
storageProvider.storageVmotionVmxSearch search algorithm should
ignore. Enter a comma-separated list of strings in the
storageProvider.storageVmotionVmxFilePathsToSkip text box to identify
VMX file paths to ignore after Storage vMotion. Site Recovery Manager
does not consider VMX file paths that contain one or more of these strings
as potential candidate VMX files after Storage vMotion.

Search for VMX files in recovered
datastores to identify virtual
machines that Storage vMotion has
moved before or during a test or a
recovery. The default value is true.

The option is selected by default. Deselect the
storageProvider.storageVmotionVmxSearch check box to disable this
option.

Set the timeout in seconds for local
stretched devices to be matched to
the corresponding remote stretched
devices. The default is 300 seconds.

Enter the new value in the
storageProvider.stretchedDevicesMatchTimeout text box.

Set the number of parallel xVCvMotion requests per host. This
limit applies to both source and
target hosts. The default value is 2.

Enter the new value in the storageProvider.vmMigrationLimitPerHost
text box.

Set the timeout in seconds to wait
for newly discovered datastores to
become accessible. The default
value is 60 seconds.

Enter the new value in the
storageProvider.waitForAccessibleDatastoreTimeoutSec text box.

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Option

Action

Enable Site Recovery Manager to
wait to discover datastores after
recovery.

Select the storageProvider.waitForDeviceRediscovery check box.

Set the timeout in seconds to wait
for the Virtual Center to report
newly discovered datastores. The
default value is 30 seconds.

Enter the new value in the
storageProvider.waitForRecoveredDatastoreTimeoutSec text box.

Set the time interval in seconds that
Site Recovery Manager waits for
VMFS volumes to become mounted.
The default value is 30 seconds.

Enter the new value in the
storageProvider.waitForVmfsVolumesMountedStateTimeoutSec text
box.

Click OK to save your changes.

Change vSphere Replication Settings
You can adjust global settings to change how Site Recovery Manager interacts with vSphere Replication.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

On the Manage tab, click Advanced Settings.

Click vSphere Replication.

Click Edit to modify the vSphere Replication settings.

146

Option

Description

Allow vSphere Replication to
recover virtual machines that are
included in Site Recovery Manager
recovery plans independently of
Site Recovery Manager. The default
value is false.

If you configure vSphere Replication on a virtual machine and include the
virtual machine in a Site Recovery Manager recovery plan, you cannot
recover the virtual machine by using vSphere Replication independently of
Site Recovery Manager. To allow vSphere Replication to recover virtual
machines independently of Site Recovery Manager, select the
allowOtherSolutionTagInRecovery check box.

Keep older multiple point in time
(PIT) snapshots during recovery.
The default value is true.

If you configure vSphere Replication to take PIT snapshots of protected
virtual machines, Site Recovery Manager only recovers the most recent
snapshot when you perform a recovery. To recover older PIT snapshots
during recovery, select the preserveMpitImagesAsSnapshots check box.

Change the timeout period for
vSphere Replication
synchronization operations. The
default value is 7200.

Enter a new value in the synchronizationTimeout text box. Change this
value if you experience timeout errors when vSphere Replication
synchronizes virtual machines on the recovery site.

Change the default RPO setting for
replications. The default value is
240.

Enter a new value in the vrReplication.timeDefault text box. The default
value is 240 minutes (4 hours). This value is selected when you configure
replications, but you can specify a different RPO in the Configure
Replication wizard when you configure replication for an individual
virtual machine or for a group of virtual machines.

Click OK to save your changes.

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Modify Settings to Run Large Site Recovery Manager Environments
If you use Site Recovery Manager to test or recover a large number of virtual machines, you might need to
modify the default Site Recovery Manager settings to achieve the best possible recovery times in your
environment or to avoid timeouts.
In large environments, Site Recovery Manager might simultaneously power on or power off large numbers
of virtual machines. Simultaneously powering on or powering off large numbers of virtual machines can
create a heavy load on the virtual infrastructure, which might lead to timeouts. You can modify certain
Site Recovery Manager settings to avoid timeouts, either by limiting the number of power on or power off
operations that Site Recovery Manager performs concurrently, or by increasing the timeout periods.
The limits that you set on power on or power off operations depend on how many concurrent power on or
power off operations your infrastructure can handle.
You modify certain options in the Advanced Settings menus in the vSphere Web Client or in the
Site Recovery Manager client plug-in. To modify other settings, you edit the vmware-dr.xml configuration
file on the Site Recovery Manager Server. Always modify settings by using the client menus when an option
exists. If you modify settings, you must make the same modifications on the Site Recovery Manager Server
and vCenter Server instances on both the protected and recovery sites.
For descriptions of the settings that you can change, see “Settings for Large Site Recovery Manager
Environments,” on page 148.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, select a cluster.

On the Manage tab, select Settings > vSphere DRS.

Click Edit.

In Advanced Options, set the srmMaxBootShutdownOps setting.
Option

Description

Option text box

Enter srmMaxBootShutdownOps.

Value text box

Enter the maximum number of boot and shutdown operations, for
example 32. If you set the value to 32, the next guest starts booting or
shutting down as soon as one of the first batch of 32 has finished, namely
VMs 1 to 32 all start together, then VM 33 starts once one of the first batch
has finished, VM 34 starts when the second one of the first batch has
finished, and so on.

Click OK to save your changes.

Open the vmware-dr.xml file in a text editor.
You find the vmware-dr.xml file in the C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery
Manager\config folder.

Change the defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster and defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerHost
settings in the vmware-dr.xml file:

...
24
4
...

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If these elements do not already exist in the vmware-dr.xml file, you can add them anywhere in the

section. If you set the value to 24, the next guest

starts booting or shutting down as soon as one of the first batch of 24 has finished, namely VMs 1 to 24
all start together, then VM 25 starts once one of the first batch has finished, VM 26 starts when the
second one of the first batch has finished, and so on.
9

Restart the Site Recovery Manager Server to apply the new settings.

In the vSphere Web Client, click Site Recovery > Sites, and select a site.

Select Advanced Settings > vSphere Replication and increase the
vrReplication.synchronizationTimeout setting.
The default value is 7200 seconds.

Select Advanced Settings > Storage and increase the storage.commandTimeout setting.
The default value is 300 seconds.

Click OK to save your changes.

Settings for Large Site Recovery Manager Environments
To protect a large number of virtual machines, you can modify the default Site Recovery Manager settings to
achieve the best possible recovery times in your environment or to avoid timeouts.
You modify certain options in the Advanced Settings menus in the vSphere Web Client or in the
Site Recovery Manager client plug-in. To modify other settings, you edit the vmware-dr.xml configuration
file on the Site Recovery Manager Server. Always modify settings by using the client menus when an option
exists. If you modify settings, you must make the same modifications on the Site Recovery Manager Server
and vCenter Server instances on both the protected and recovery sites.
To modify the settings, see “Modify Settings to Run Large Site Recovery Manager Environments,” on
page 147.

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Table 12‑1. Settings that Modify the Number of Simultaneous Power On or Power Off Operations
Option

Description

srmMaxBootShutdownOps

Specifies the maximum number of concurrent power-on
operations for any given cluster. Guest shutdowns, but not
forced power offs, are throttled according to this value.
Guest shutdowns occur during primary site shutdowns
(planned failover) and IP customization workflows.
Modify this option per cluster in the vSphere Web Client
by right-clicking a cluster and selecting Settings. Click
vSphere DRS, then Edit > Advanced Options. Type the
option to override the
defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster value that
you can set in the vmware-dr.xml file. You can set a global
value defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster in
the vmware-dr.xml file, and then set different
srmMaxBootShutdownOps values for individual clusters
in the vSphere Web Client. By default, throttling is turned
off.

defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster

Specifies the maximum number of concurrent power-on
operations for all clusters that Site Recovery Manager
protects. Guest shutdowns, but not forced power offs, are
throttled according to this value. Guest shutdowns occur
during primary site shutdowns (planned failover) and IP
customization workflows. You modify this setting in the
vmware-dr.xml file. The srmMaxBootShutdownOps
value that you can set in the vSphere Web Client overrides
the defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster value.
You can set a global value
defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerCluster in the
vmware-dr.xml file, and then set different
srmMaxBootShutdownOps values for individual clusters
in the vSphere Web Client. By default, throttling is turned
off.

defaultMaxBootAndShutdownOpsPerHost

Specifies the maximum number of concurrent power-on
operations on any standalone host. You can only set the
option in the vmware-dr.xml file. By default, throttling is
turned off.

Table 12‑2. Settings that Modify Timeout Periods
Option

Description

vrReplication.synchronizationTimeout

Site Recovery Manager enforces a timeout to complete an
online or offline synchronization for virtual machines
replicated by vSphere Replication during a test or failover.
If a synchronization does not finish within the given
timeout, for example, because of a slow network or a large
virtual machine, Site Recovery Manager reports a failure
during a test or failover. Modify this option in the
vSphere Web Client. In Site Recovery, select a site. On the
Manage tab, select Advanced Settings > vSphere
Replication. The default value is 7200 seconds.

storage.commandTimeout

The timeout for running SRA commands in ABR-related
workflows. In some cases, such as surfacing LUNs and
snapshots, some arrays take longer than the default time to
respond. Modify this option in the vSphere Web Client. In
Site Recovery, select a site. On the Manage tab,
selectAdvanced Settings > Storage. The default value is
300 seconds.

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Site Recovery Manager Events and
Alarms

Site Recovery Manager supports event logging. Each event includes a corresponding alarm that
Site Recovery Manager can trigger if the event occurs. This provides a way to track the health of your
system and to resolve potential issues before they affect the protection that Site Recovery Manager provides.
This chapter includes the following topics:
n

“How Site Recovery Manager Monitors Connections Between Sites,” on page 151

“Configure Site Recovery Manager Alarms,” on page 152

How Site Recovery Manager Monitors Connections Between Sites
Site Recovery Manager monitors the connection between the protected and recovery sites and logs events if
the remote site stops responding.
When Site Recovery Manager establishes the connection between two paired Site Recovery Manager Server
instances, the Site Recovery Manager Server that initiated the connection sends a RemoteSiteUpEvent.
If Site Recovery Manager detects that a monitored connection has broken, it starts periodic connection
checks by sending a ping request to the remote site. Site Recovery Manager monitors the connection checks
and logs events.
n

Site Recovery Manager sends pings at regular intervals. You can configure this interval by setting the

remoteSiteStatus.pingInterval value. The default is 300 seconds.
n

The connection monitor skips a number of failed pings. You can configure this number by setting the

remoteSiteStatus.pingFailedDelay value. The default is 2.
n

When the number of skipped failed pings exceeds the value of the remoteSiteStatus.pingFailedDelay
setting, Site Recovery Manager sends a RemoteSitePingFailedEvent event.
When the number of skipped failed pings exceeds a higher limit Site Recovery Manager sends a

RemoteSiteDownEvent event for every failed ping and stops sending RemoteSitePingFailedEvent events.
You can configure this higher limit of failed pings by setting the remoteSiteStatus.panicDelay setting.

The default is 5.

Site Recovery Manager continues to send RemoteSiteDownEvent events until the connection is
reestablished.

When a connection to the remote site Site Recovery Manager Server is reestablished,
Site Recovery Manager sends RemoteSiteUpEvent events.

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Site Recovery Manager Administration

Configure Site Recovery Manager Alarms
Site Recovery Manager adds alarms to the alarms that vCenter Server supports. You can configure
Site Recovery Manager alarms to send an email notification, send an SNMP trap, or to run a script on the
vCenter Server host.
The Alarm Definitions tab lists all of the Site Recovery Manager alarms. You can edit the settings for each
alarm to specify the action for Site Recovery Manager to take when an event triggers the alarm. By default,
none of the Site Recovery Manager alarms act until you configure the alarm.
NOTE In an environment with more than one vCenter Server, Site Recovery Manager displays all events
from the Site Recovery Manager Servers that are registered as extensions, even if you select events for a
specific vCenter Server.
Prerequisites
For alarms to send email notifications, configure the Mail settings in the vCenter Server Settings menu. See
ESXi and vCenter Server Documentation.
Procedure
1

In the vSphere Web Client, click a vCenter Server

In the Manage tab, click Alarm Definitions tab to display the list of vCenter Server alarms.

Click Add to add a new alarm.

On the General page, enter an alarm name, description, and select the object you want to monitor from
the drop-down list.

Choose a specific event that occurs on the object.

Select the Enable this alarm check box to enable the action for this alarm, and click Next.

On the Triggers page, click Add to add an event trigger.

Select an event from the drop-down list and the corresponding status.
If you see repeated events in the list, each event represents a single Site Recovery Manager instance and
triggers an alarm for the extension with which it is registered. For example, in a scenario with multiple
Site Recovery Manager instances, you can use RecoveryPlanCreated (SRM 1) and RecoveryPlanCreated
(SRM 2) for the same event on both extensions.

To add a condition that triggers the alarm, click Add, select an argument from the drop-down list, the
operator, and the transition from warning to critical condition.

Click Next.

On the Actions page, select an action from the drop-down list, enter the relevant information in the
configuration column, when to run the action, the number of minutes to repeat the action, and click
Finish.

What to do next
To edit an alarm definition, right-click an alarm and select Edit.

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Chapter 13 Site Recovery Manager Events and Alarms

Site Recovery Manager Events Reference
Site Recovery Manager monitors different types of events.

Site Status Events
Site status events provide information about the status of the protected and recovery sites and the
connection between them.
Table 13‑1. Site Status Events
Categor
y

Event Name

Event Type

Event Description

Unknown status

UnknownStatusEvent

Site Recovery Manager Server status is not
available

Info

Remote site down

RemoteSiteDownEvent

Site Recovery Manager Server has lost its
connection with the remote
Site Recovery Manager Server.

Error

Remote site ping failed

RemoteSitePingFailedEve
nt

Failures at the remote site or network connectivity
problems.

Warning

Remote site created

RemoteSiteCreatedEvent

Local site has been successfully paired with the
remote site.

Info

Remote site up

RemoteSiteUpEvent

Site Recovery Manager Server re-establishes its
connection with the remote
Site Recovery Manager Server.

Info

Remote site deleted

RemoteSiteDeletedEvent

Remote Site Recovery Manager site has been
deleted.

Info

vSphere Replication
replicated virtual
machine is added to a
protection group

HbrGroupVmAssociatedEve
nt

A virtual machine replicated by
vSphere Replication is added to a protection
group.

Info

vSphere Replication
replicated virtual
machine is removed
from a protection
group

HbrGroupVmDisassociated
Event

A virtual machine replicated by
vSphere Replication is removed from a protection
group.

Info

Local
vSphere Replication
Server is down

LocalHmsConnectionDownE
vent

Repeated connection attempts to
vSphere Replication fail.

Error

The connection to the
local
vSphere Replication
Server has been
restored

LocalHmsConnectionUpEve
nt

Connection to vSphere Replication is successful.

Info

The local
vSphere Replication
Server is not
responding

LocalHmsPingFailedEvent

Failure to establish connection to the local
vSphere Replication Server

Warning

The local inventory
service is down

LocalQsConnectionDownEv
ent

Unable to connect to the local inventory service
server. You can specify the number of internal
pings to skip before Site Recovery Manager
throws LocalQsConnectionDownEvent by
modifying the qsPanicDelay value in Site
Recovery > Sites > Site > Manage > Advanced
Settings > Connections.

Error

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Table 13‑1. Site Status Events (Continued)
Categor
y

Event Name

Event Type

Event Description

The connection to the
local inventory service
is restored

LocalQsConnectionUpEven
t

Connection to the local inventory server is
successful. You can specify the interval between
pings from Site Recovery Manager to the
inventory service by adding
number of
seconds in
the vmware-dr.xml configuration file.

Info

The local inventory
service is not
responding

LocalQsPingFailedEvent

Connection attempt to the local inventory service
fails. You can specify the number of internal pings
to skip before Site Recovery Manager throws
LocalQsPingFailedEvent by modifying the
qsPingFailedDelay value in Site Recovery > Sites
> Site > Manage > Advanced Settings >
Connections.

Warning

Low disk space

LowDiskSpaceEvent

Free disk space on the local site is low.

Warning

Low memory

LowMemoryEvent

Available memory on the local site is low.

Warning

SRM Server certificate
not yet valid

SrmCertificateNotValidE
vent

The SSL/TLS certificate for the specified SRM
Server is in the future.

Error

SRM Server certificate
expiring

SrmCertificateExpiringE
vent

The SSL/TLS certificate for the specified SRM
Server expires in the specified number of days.

Info

SRM Server certificate
has expired

SrmCertificateExpiredEv
ent

The SSL/TLS certificate for the specified SRM
Server has expired.

Error

Protection Group Events
Protection Group events provide information about actions and status related to protection groups.
Table 13‑2. Protection Group Replication Events

154

Catego
ry

Event

Description

Cause

CreatedEvent

Created protection group.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of creating a
protection group.

Info

RemovedEvent

Removed protection group.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of removing
a protection group.

Info

ReconfiguredEvent

Reconfigured protection
group.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of
reconfiguring a protection group.

Info

ProtectedVmCreatedEvent

Virtual machine in group is
configured for protection.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of the
protection of a virtual machine.

Info

ProtectedVmRemovedEvent

Virtual machine in group is
no longer configured for
protection.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of
unprotecting a virtual machine.

Info

ProtectedVmReconfiguredP
rotectionSettingsEvent

Reconfigured protection
settings for virtual
machine.

Posted on both vCenter Servers in the
completion of the Commit phase of
reconfiguring virtual machine protection
settings.

Info

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Chapter 13 Site Recovery Manager Events and Alarms

Table 13‑2. Protection Group Replication Events (Continued)
Catego
ry

Event

Description

Cause

ProtectedVmReconfiguredR
ecoveryLocationSettingsE
vent

Reconfigured recovery
location settings for virtual
machine.

Posted on the protected site vCenter Server
only on the successful completion of
reconfiguring the recovery location settings
for a protected virtual machine.

Info

PlaceholderVmCreatedEven
t

The placeholder virtual
machine was created in the
vCenter Server inventory.

Posted on the recovery site vCenter Server
placeholder virtual machine is created as a
result of protection, repair operation.

Info

PlaceholderVmCreatedFrom
OldProductionVmEvent

The placeholder virtual
machine was created in the
vCenter Server inventory
using the identity of the old
protected virtual machine.

Posted on the recovery site vCenter Server
placeholder virtual machine is created as a
result of swapping the old protected virtual
machine with a placeholder virtual machine
during or after reprotect operation .

Info

VmFullyProtectedEvent

Virtual machine in group:
Unresolved devices have
all been resolved.

A protected virtual machine's previously
unresolved devices have all been resolved.

Warnin
g

VmNotFullyProtectedEvent

Virtual machine in group:
One or more devices need
to be configured for
protection.

Posted on the protected site vCenter Server
only upon device handling updating the
recovery location settings with a non-empty
unresolvedDevices set. This can be triggered
by changes to the protected virtual machine or
during reprotect of a virtual machine.

Warnin
g

PlaceholderVmUnexpectedl
yDeletedEvent

Virtual machine in group:
The placeholder virtual
machine was removed
from the vCenter Server
inventory.

Posted on the recovery site vCenter Server
when Site Recovery Manager detects that the
placeholder virtual machine was
unexpectedly deleted or removed from the
vCenter Server inventory.

Warnin
g

ProductionVmDeletedEvent

Virtual machine in group:
The protected virtual
machine has been removed
from the virtual machine
vCenter Server inventory.

Posted when a protected virtual machine is
deleted or removed from the vCenter Server
inventory.

Error

ProductionVmInvalidEvent

Virtual machine in group:
Cannot resolve the file
locations of the protected
virtual machine for
replication.

Posted when the replication provider cannot
find the protected virtual machine files in
order to replicate them.

Error

Recovery Events
Recovery events provide information about actions and status related to the Site Recovery Manager
recovery processes.
Table 13‑3. Recovery Events
Event Name

Event Type

Event Description

Vmware Site Recovery Manager Administration 6.1 V Center Guide Srm AG 6 1 EN

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