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Deploying

Secure Automated Backup with Compass

The IBM Cloud Catalog features two BaaS offerings powered by Cobalt Iron Compass:

  1. Secure Automated Backup with Compass – this offering protects customer enterprise, hybrid workloads whether on-premises, in PowerVS cloud, in IBM VPC cloud, or in IBM Cloud Classic infrastructure through a consolidated management control experience. Hybrid workloads protected include AIX, Linux (on Power and x86), IBM i, Windows, MacOS, HP-UX, Solaris, Oracle, Db2, SQL Server, SAP, SAP HANA, PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, NAS devices, and other systems and applications.
  2. Secure Automated Backup with Compass for Power VS – this offering is focused on protection of Power VS workloads including AIX, IBM i, Linux on Power, Oracle, DB2, and SAP HANA.

You can provision these Secure Automated Backup with Compass offerings from the IBM Cloud Catalog for immediate deployment. The solution provides the pre-configured environment for Cloud backup and recovery for all supported workloads. These offerings are powered by IBM Storage Protect and are the only automated BaaS and recovery solutions for IBM Cloud workloads. Compass also protects IBM i workloads, either on-premises or in the IBM Power VS cloud, through its new Compass Tape Gateway (CTG) Virtual Tape Library (VTL) feature.

For more information, see Introducing Secure Automated Backup with Compass: Enterprise-Grade Data Protection, Now Even More Accessible.

IBM Cloud® Partner Cobalt Iron® provides an automated backup offering for on-premises and IBM cloud workloads. The backup offering is called Secure Automated Backup with Compass®. It is powered by Cobalt Iron Compass and is accessible from the IBM Cloud catalog.

Deploying the Compass backup offering

To deploy the Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering in IBM data center, complete the following steps:

  1. Provision Secure Automated Backup with Compass in your IBM Cloud account from the IBM Cloud Catalog.
    1. Log in to the IBM Cloud catalog with your credentials.
    2. In the search box, type Compass Backup and click Secure Automated Backup with Compass tile (see Note below).
    3. Select a deployment location for your backup offering.
    4. Define the fields – Pricing plan, Service name, Resource group (optional), your IBM Cloud API key, and Compass organization name according to your business needs. Also, specify the VPC subnet IP range that you want to use to access the Compass Vaults.
    5. Check that you have read the 3rd party terms and then click Create. Note: For Compass to create or edit Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), Transit Gateway, and cloud networking resources, the following minimal cloud resource permissions for your IBM Cloud account are required for the user API key provided in the “IBM Cloud API key” field.
      1. Transit Gateway (Resource Group specific):
        • gateway.edit
      2. VPC Infrastructure (All Resources):
        • vpc.vpc.list
        • vpc.vpc.read
      3. VPC Infrastructure (Resource Group specific):
        • vpc.vpc.create

When you provision the Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering, Compass automation:

    1. Creates the Compass BaaS VPC for the dedicated use of Compass backup operations. It is recommended not to deploy any additional resources to the Compass BaaS VPC.
    2. Creates Virtual Private Endpoints (VPEs) and Cloud Service Endpoints (CSEs) for private, secure, high-speed IP connectivity to the Compass Vaults (ie, the managed backup server instances) in the IBM Cloud.
    3. Connects the Compass BaaS VPC to the Local Transit Gateway.
      1. If a Local Transit Gateway does not exist, Compass automation creates one and connects the Compass BaaS VPC to it.
      2. If a Local Transit Gateway already exists, Compass connects the BaaS VPC to that Local Transit Gateway.
      3. If more than one Local Transit Gateway already exist, Compass connects the BaaS VPC to the first Local Transit Gateway found. If this is not the correct one, reconnect the Compass BaaS VPC to the correct Local Transit Gateway.
    4. Creates an organization in Compass Commander for the customer in this IBM Cloud data center location.
    5. Creates a Compass Commander administrator with single sign-on authentication with IBM Cloud credentials for the user provisioning Compass.
    6. Creates default administrative roles, backup policies, and backup schedules so users can immediately begin backups to Compass.

After the Compass service is provisioned, it will appear under the cloud resource list as a storage resource. If you click on the Compass cloud resource icon it will give you additional information and a link to launch the Compass Commander interface using single sign-on through your IBM Cloud account credentials.

  1. You must ensure connectivity from your workload instances to the Compass Vaults in the IBM Cloud.
    1. For workloads on Power VS cloud, you need to connect those Power VS workspaces to the Local Transit Gateway that the Compass BaaS VPC is connected to.
    2. For workloads on VPC Cloud, you need to connect those VPC instances to the Local Transit Gateway that the Compass BaaS VPC is connected to.
    3. For workloads in Classic Infrastructure Cloud, you need to connect those instances directly to the Compass CSEs for connectivity to the Compass Vaults.
    4. For on-premises workloads, you need to connect those workloads through Direct Link or VPN connection to the Local Transit Gateway that the Compass BaaS VPC is connected to.
  1. For non-IBM i workloads, register the systems to Compass and download agents from the Cobalt Iron Commander interface:
    1. Log on to the Cobalt Iron Commander interface by launching Commander from the Compass cloud resource details page or using this link.
    2. Register new systems that need protection to Compass
    3. Navigate to the protected system and download the agent installer to your system to be protected. Then run the agent installer.
    4. Setup IP name resolution for connection to the Compass Vaults. This can be done by either
      1. Adding entries for VPE IP address to fully-qualified domain name mappings into the local systems host file (eg, /etc/hosts file on AIX).
      2. Adding entries for VPE IP mappings into your enterprise DNS servers.
  1. Further information on setting up Compass name resolution, including your specific, private VPE IP addresses assigned to Compass Vaults is available through the Compass cloud resource. Click on the Compass service from the IBM cloud storage resource list, select “Step 2: Get Started” then select “Step 2: Setup Compass Name Resolution”.
    1. Your backups should now be ready to run.
    2. For more information Commander and installing Compass agents, see Cobalt Iron documentation.
  2. For protecting IBM i workloads with the Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering, see the following section.

Protecting IBM i Workloads with Compass

The Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering includes the Compass Tape Gateway (CTG) Virtual Tape Library (VTL) that can be used as a target for IBM i backup.

Compass and CTG deliver the capabilities that IBM i users need: airtight security (including the unique Compass Zero Access® architecture), intelligent automation, seamless integration with IBM i, flexible deployment, and a modern SaaS-native approach to IBM i data protection. Designed to simplify operations, strengthen security, and support hybrid deployments, Compass helps organizations future-proof their IBM i backup strategies while reducing complexity and risk.

The Compass VTL feature can be used with IBM® Backup, Recovery, and Media Services (BRMS) or IBM i SAV commands to protect IBM i data.

Deploying the Compass Backup Offering for IBM i

To deploy Compass for IBM i from IBM Cloud, complete the following steps:

  1. Provision Secure Automated Backup with Compass for your account for a region from the IBM Cloud catalog as described above.
  2. Ensure connectivity from your IBM i instances to the Compass Vaults in the IBM Cloud as described above (Deploying the Compass Backup offering – Step 2).
  3. Access the Cobalt Iron Commander graphical interface to complete the following steps:
    1. Create a new Compass VTL as an iSCSI target using the Compass VTL Wizard
    2. The Compass VTL Wizard will step you through creation of the library, drives, and virtual tape volumes for use by IBM i backup utilities.
      For more information on setting up the Compass VTL, see the Compass Tape Gateway User’s Guide.
  4. Configure the Compass VTL as an iSCSI target on your IBMi system using IBM Navigator for i. https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/ibm-navigator-i
  5. Leverage BRMS or SAV commands to write backups to virtual tape volumes in the Compass VTL

For more information on protecting IBM i workloads with Compass, see the Compass Quick Start Guide for IBM i Data Protection

Single Copy or Dual Copy Backup

The Compass offering has options for single copy or dual copy. Using the single copy option provides a backup of your data in a single Compass Vault in a single cloud data center. Compass Vaults are backup server instances that are preconfigured in IBM Cloud data centers worldwide.

Using the dual copy option maintains two copies of your workload data in two cloud data centers. Compass automatically replicates the data across data centers.

Pricing in IBM Cloud data centers

When you use the Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering, you are billed monthly through IBM Cloud for the amount of data that is backed up for the region. The backup data is the amount of stored data after duplication and compression. For more information about pricing plans, see Secure Automated Backup with Compass in the IBM Cloud catalog. You can generate an estimate of the cost based on your expected usage from the Summary pane.

Compass Vault Maintenance

As part of the SaaS delivery of Compass, regular Vault maintenance can occur.

During this maintenance window, backup and archival operations may be unavailable for up to 60 minutes per Vault as updates are applied in a rolling sequence.  Primary and secondary instances are not updated simultaneously, so restore operations remain available through replication Vaults where enabled.

You may receive alerts or observe failed database archive log offloads during this period.  This behavior is expected.  Normal backup and archive log services resume automatically when maintenance is complete.

If you experience backup or database archive log offload issues after the maintenance window has ended, contact Cobalt Iron Support for assistance.

Support for the Secure Automated Backup with Compass Offering

To get the support for the Secure Automated Backup with Compass offering, contact Cobalt Iron. You must have the login credentials to Compass to access the following pages:

  • For more information, see the Cobalt Iron documentation.
  • For issues related to backup and restore, contact Cobalt Iron by opening a service ticket through cobaltiron.com.

For more information about the issues that are related to Power Virtual Server or IBM Cloud, see Getting help and support.

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