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SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere 5.0

Manage backups

Contributors netapp-jani netapp-aoife netapp-madhulik
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You can rename and delete backups performed by SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere. You can also delete multiple backups simultaneously.

Rename backups

You can rename SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere backups if you want to provide a better name to improve searchability.

Steps

  1. Click Menu and select the Hosts and Clusters menu option, then select a VM, then select the Configure tab, and then click Backups in the SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere section.

    vSphere client screen

  2. On the Configure tab, select a backup, and click Rename.

  3. On the Rename Backup dialog box, enter the new name, and click OK.

    Do not use the following special characters in VM, datastore, policy, backup, or resource group names: & * $ # @ ! \ / : * ? " < > - | ; ' , . An underscore character (_) is allowed.

Delete backups

You can delete SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere backups if you no longer require the backup for other data protection operations. You can delete one backup or delete multiple backups simultaneously.

Before you begin

You cannot delete backups that are mounted. You must unmount a backup before you can delete it.

About this task

Snapshots on secondary storage are managed by your ONTAP retention settings, not by the SnapCenter VMware plug-in. Therefore, when you use the SnapCenter VMware plug-in to delete a backup, Snapshots on primary storage are deleted but Snapshots on secondary storage are not deleted. If a Snapshot still exists on secondary storage, the SnapCenter VMware plug-in retains the metadata associated with the backup to support restore requests. When the ONTAP retention process deletes the secondary Snapshot, then the SnapCenter VMware plug-in deletes the metadata using a purge job, which is executed at regular intervals.

  1. Click Menu and select the Hosts and Clusters menu option, then select a VM, then select the Configure tab, and then click Backups in the SnapCenter Plug-in for VMware vSphere section.

    vSphere client window

  2. Select one or more backups and click Delete.

    You can select a maximum of 40 backups to delete.

  3. Click OK to confirm the delete operation.

  4. Refresh the backup list by clicking the refresh icon on the left vSphere menu bar.