Download Snapshot From Vsphere EXCLUSIVE
Antonette Hespe
So I am running vmware vsphere client version 5.5.0 and I have a number of VM's running on it with all of their data saved to a datastore that is on another server. I can access the datastore and view the files of each vm and each vm contains each of the following type of file;
I have to set up a VM to a certain state, take a snapshot and send it to a client. Would I be right in assuming that all I would have to do is download the .vmsn file and send it, or is there more to it?It just seems too easy to me to download and send the file, anyone have any information would be greatly appreciated.
No, you would not. A snapshot is a delta file - it contains only the changes made to the disk, relative to the previous snapshot or the base disk. So to send a snapshotted VM, at a minimum, you need to transfer all the vmsn files, as well as the vdmk. If you expect to be able to fire up the machine at the location you send it to, they'll probably need the rest of the machine's files as well (like the .vmx) file.
Furthermore, copying a machine with snapshots isn't generally a supported operation. Check out the VMware KB on moving/copying VMs within a virtual environment - note that they tell you to commit any snapshots before moving or copying the VM. This is not to say it's impossible to move a VM that has snapshots, but it's not supported, and generally a much bigger pain that it's worth.
is it possible to export a VM snapshot into another medium or can I only export the VM to a template. as it stands I am saving snapshots within vSphere however they seem to be of little use unless I want to use them to restore from backup.
This is driving me crazy and maybe someone here can help me. I have a copy of a VM from a ESXi Server and I need to pull some files off of it. The VM has snapshots and I am unable to mount any of the disks to grab the data. Now I am having an issue getting the VM imported back into vmware where I can boot it as it won't boot from any of the snapshot disks but will boot the original install back when it was created many years ago. Is there anything that I am missing or is there something that I can do to fix this?
i have done so much searching, but all solutions proposed so far suggest doing it from "outside" - either some external machine or the host itself.
other workarounds suggest to enable automatic reverting to snapshot on power off event.
edit:
this is the reason why i think there must be some way to achieve this: inside the guest there are "vmare tools" running as system service. so i would expect this component to also expose a functionality to trigger the host / hypervisor reverting the current VM to snapshot.
if this is not possible currently it should be implemented as new feature :)
The snapshot functionality provides for example a massive advantage when performing any type of upgrade in the VM Operating System (OS). When the upgrade ends up rendering the VM useless, there is an easy way to restore the VM back to the state of before the upgrade. Many backup solutions like Veeam or Commvault use the same functionality of creating a snapshot and then download and store that snapshot as a backup.
However, there is also a downside to having snapshots, when snapshots are kept on the VM there is a possible loss of performance for every snapshot. This is because each snapshot has its own delta file and the ESXi node needs to calculate the differences between those files, which gets trickier with every snapshot. The best practice is to not keep snapshots for longer than absolutely needed and remove them via the snapshot manager.
As there were about 100 VMs needed to be migrated, this procedure would need to be done around 100 times. After a couple of VMs, I decided to be lazier and I created a script to do the job for me. I found out that there is a PowerCLI option to connect to multiple vCenters at the same time and changed my script accordingly. I programmed the script and everything went as expected, except that there was still a snapshot left on the VM. When trying to remove it manually through vCenter it throws a very useful error; A general system error occurred: Fault cause: vim.fault.GenericVmConfigFault
In the end, it was a lot of work to remove all the snapshots that were stuck. It showed me that automation can often help to make dull tasks quicker but when it goes wrong then it can cause some more work. This situation clearly is an example of that. All in all, I was happy to be able to migrate the VMs from one platform to the new one, and that I managed to remove the snapshots in the end.
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Can you try to create VM snapshot manually on vCenter and delete it half an hour later? If snapshot operation on vCenter without NetBackup takes long, nothing wrong in NetBackup but in VMware or site and capacity planning of VM.
Message: Failed to create vCenter snapshot associated with volume collection Daily-Snapshots schedule Daily for virtual machine AgilityDbSvr due to failure to quiesce the virtual machine. See vSphere Client to get details on the failure of the snapshot task for this VM.
There has always been some discussion about using vCenter to quiesce VM's and my answer is "generally" to only to use Nimble vCenter integration for Microsoft SQL and/or Exchange VM's, both of which need VSS integration for a consistent recovery point and which VMWare Tools can perform via a software VSS quiesce prior to Nimble taking the snapshot.
Everything else is generally (I'll avoid saying always here!) recoverable via a crash consistent snapshot, including Oracle. See Oracle Support Note: Supported Backup, Restore and Recovery Operations using Third Party Snapshot Technologies [ID 604683.1] - assumes you can access this within Oracle's support system. (I have a copy if needed) - but ultimately Oracle supprts recovering form a crash consistent snapshot.
A VMware snapshot is a copy of a virtual machine (VM) in a VMware environment taken at a specific point in time. Snapshots are useful for restoring a VM to a certain point in the event of a system failure or error. They are not useful for taking VM backups.
A VM snapshot is a point-in-time image of the state and data of a VM. The state refers to whether the VM is powered on, powered off or suspended. A snapshot of the VM can be taken in any of these states. The VM's data includes all its files, components and devices, such as its memory, disks and virtual network interface cards (NICs). When the VM's memory state is captured in a snapshot, the snapshot takes longer to complete and network response might also slow.
To create a backup, a VM can be quiesced -- meaning the VM file system's on-disk data is brought into a state suitable for backups. The operation pauses or alters the state of running processes on the VM. Snapshots alone should not be considered as backup for any virtual disks associated with one or more VMs. Also, running a VM on a snapshot for an extended period might result in system instability and/or data losses.
The VMware snapshot feature is available on standalone ESXi hosts, vCenter Server and in VMware Workstation. In the vSphere environment, the entire state of the VM is captured when the snapshot is taken. As noted earlier, snapshots can be taken when the VM is on, off or suspended. If the VM is in suspended state, however, VMware advises that the snapshot should be taken only after the suspend operation is complete.
When the VMware snapshot is taken, all writable data on the VM becomes read-only. VMware administrators can take multiple VM snapshots to create multiple possible point-in-time restore points. When a VM reverts to a snapshot, its current disk and memory states are deleted, and the snapshot becomes the new parent snapshot for that VM. The snapshot file cannot exceed the size of the original disk file, and it also requires some overhead disk space. Snapshots will grow rapidly with high disk-write activity volume.
As with VM snapshots in general, vSphere snapshots can be used for development and testing. They also provide a useful failsafe mechanism that enables easy system rollbacks during development, testing, patching or configuration changes.
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