Getting started with Backup & Recovery in mCloud

Overview

mCloud includes an integrated Backup & Recovery service, powered by Storware, that lets you protect your virtual machines with scheduled full and incremental backups. The service is built into your mCloud dashboard, so there is no separate console to log into.

This article covers three things:

1. Finding your way around the Backup & Recovery dashboard

2. Creating a backup policy (which VMs to protect and how long to keep their backups)

3. Creating a backup schedule (when those backups run)

Restoring from a backup is covered in a separate article.

How backups work in mCloud: A policy defines what is protected and how long backups are kept. A schedule defines when backups run and links back to a policy. You will normally create one policy, then attach a full schedule and an incremental schedule to it.

Prerequisites

• Before backups can run, the Backup & Recovery service must be activated for your project by our Support Team. The dashboard is visible by default, but backup jobs will fail until access has been granted. To request activation, send an email to sales@micron21.com

• Access to the mCloud dashboard at https://mcloud.micron21.com

• One or more virtual machines running in your project that you want to back up

1. The Backup & Recovery dashboard

The Backup & Recovery tools appear as a plugin inside your mCloud (OpenStack Horizon) dashboard.

1. Log into mCloud at https://mcloud.micron21.com and select your project.

2. On the left menu, expand Backup & Recovery. You will see the following sections:

   • Overview – dashboards and reporting

   • Virtual Environments – your instances, backup policies (Backup SLAs), and mounted backups

   • Task Console – live and historical backup/restore tasks

   • Settings

3. Go to Overview > Dashboard to see the status of your protected environment.

The Dashboard is made up of four panels:

• Protection stats – the number of virtual machines currently covered by a backup policy.

• Success Rate – the proportion of backup tasks that completed successfully, along with the total amount of data protected.

• Current Backup Size – how much backup data you currently hold.

• Activity – a chart of backup and restore data over recent days.

A newly configured project will show low or zero values here until your first backup has run.

Other useful areas

• Virtual Environments > Instances – lists the VMs in your project and their protection status.

• Virtual Environments > Backup SLAs – where you create and manage Policies and Schedules (covered below).

Policies

Schedules

• Task Console – shows every backup and restore task, with its state, progress, node, destination and duration. Use this to confirm that a job you started is running or has completed.

  

2. Create a backup policy

A backup policy defines which VMs to protect and how long to keep their backups.

1. Go to Backup & Recovery > Virtual Environments > Backup SLAs.

2. Make sure the Policies tab is selected, then click Create.

3. The policy form is divided into collapsible sections. Expand each one and complete it as below.

General

Virtual Environments

Under Choose Virtual Environments, select the VM or VMs you want this policy to protect.

Rule (Default)

This section controls the backup destination and how long backups are retained.

1. Active – leave set to Yes.

2. Name – leave as Default.

3. Select Backup Destination – choose the backup destination provided for your project (for example, mCloud-Backup-002).

4. Set the retention values. The following are recommended starting points and can be adjusted to suit your requirements:

   Field	Recommended value
   Retention (Full) – number of days to keep	14
   Retention (Full) – number of versions to keep	2
   Retention (Inc.) – number of days to keep	14
   Retention (Inc.) – number of versions to keep	14

5. Keep last backup when source still exists – set to Yes. This ensures you always retain at least one recovery point while the VM exists.

6. Leave Immutable backup and Enable Secondary Backup Destination at their defaults unless these have been arranged for your project.

   
   

7. When all sections are complete, click Save.

Example below for the Rule

The retention values above are recommendations. Longer retention keeps more recovery points but uses more backup storage.

3. Create a backup schedule

A schedule defines when your backups run and links to the policy you created above. We recommend creating two schedules per policy: one Full backup that runs once a week, and one Incremental backup that runs on the remaining days.

Pick a time that suits your workload, ideally early morning or late at night when the VM is least busy. The examples below use a full backup one day a week and incrementals on the other days.

Recommended naming

Using a consistent name makes schedules easy to identify. We recommend:

• Full: Full - <Day> - <time> – for example, Full - Sunday - 4am

• Incremental: Incremental - Daily - <time> – for example, Incremental - Daily - 4am

Steps

1. Go to Backup & Recovery > Virtual Environments > Backup SLAs and select the Schedules tab.

2. Click Create.

   
   

   
   

3. Complete the form for your Full backup:

   Field	Setting
   Name	Full - <Day> - <time> (e.g. Full - Sunday - 4am)
   Status	Active
   Backup type	Full backup
   Schedule execution type	Time
   Start Window Length [min]	720
   Choose time of day for backup	Your chosen time (e.g. 04:00)
   Choose days (required)	The single day of the week for the full backup (e.g. Sunday)
   Choose Virtual Environment policies	Select the policy you created in step 2

4. Click Save.

5. Click Create again and complete the form for your Incremental backup:

   Field	Setting
   Name	Incremental - Daily - <time> (e.g. Incremental - Daily - 4am)
   Status	Active
   Backup type	Incremental backup
   Schedule execution type	Time
   Start Window Length [min]	360
   Choose time of day for backup	Your chosen time (e.g. 04:00)
   Choose days (required)	Every day except the full backup day (e.g. Monday–Saturday if the full runs on Sunday)
   Choose Virtual Environment policies	Select the same policy

6. Click Save.

Example below for a full backup schedule

Selected day of week occurrence and Selected months are optional and can be left blank for a standard weekly/daily schedule.

Once both schedules are saved, your VMs will be backed up automatically. You can confirm jobs are running under Backup & Recovery > Task Console.

Next steps

• Check Task Console after your first scheduled run to confirm the backup completed successfully.

• To recover data from a backup, see the separate Restoring from a backup article.