Backing up VM and datastore resource groups on demand

A backup operation on a resource group is performed on all the resources defined in the resource group. You can back up a resource group on demand from the VMware vSphere web client GUI in vCenter. If a resource group has a policy attached and a schedule configured, then backups occur automatically according to the schedule.

Before you begin

You must have created a resource group with a policy attached.
If you are backing up a resource that has a SnapMirror relationship to secondary storage, you must have SnapCenter admin privileges.

About this task

Note: In Virtual Storage Console (VSC), you could perform an on-demand backup without having a backup job configured for a VM or datastore. However, in SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere, VMs and datastores must be in a resource group before you can perform backups.

Steps

In the VMware vSphere web client in vCenter, click in the toolbar, and then select SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware from the drop-down list.
In the left Navigator pane, click Resource Groups.
In the Objects tab of the Resource Groups page, select the resource group you want to back up, and then click (Run Now) in the toolbar.
If the resource group has multiple policies configured, then in the Backup Now dialog box, select from the drop-down list the policy you want to use for this backup operation, and then click Yes.
Click OK to start the backup.
Optional: Monitor the operation progress by clicking Recent Tasks at the bottom of the window or on the dashboard Job Monitor for more detail.

Result

Note: If the quiesce operation fails for any of the VMs in the backup, then the backup is marked as not VM consistant even if the policy selected has VM consistency selected. In this case, it is possible that some of the VMs were successfully quiesced.