On-the-fly PiT selection in cloud disaster recovery

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11809287-B2
Application number	US-202218064087-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 9, 2022
Priority date	May 21, 2020
Publication date	Nov 7, 2023
Grant date	Nov 7, 2023

Abstract

On-the-fly point-in-time recovery operations are disclosed. During a recovery operation, the PiT being restored can be changed on-the-fly or during the existing recovery operation without restarting the recovery process from the beginning. In one example, this improves recovery time operation (RTO) and prevents aspects of the recovery operation to be avoided when changing to a different PiT.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
converting an image of a selected point in time (PiT) to a converted virtual machine;
attaching a hydrated operating system (OS) disk to the converted virtual machine;
hydrating a data disk from the PiT as a volume;
attaching the volume to the converted virtual machine;
operating the converted virtual machine as a restored virtual machine;
running an application on the restored virtual machine; and
moving the volume to a second PiT when the volume attached to the restored virtual machine is not validated without requiring a second conversion of a second image of the second PiT to a second converted virtual machine.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
taking a snapshot of the volume prior to operating the converted virtual machine and running the application;
stopping the application without stopping operation of the hydrated OS; and
detaching the volume and restoring the volume to the snapshot.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
selecting the second PiT from a plurality of PiTs;
attaching the volume to a service virtual machine;
reviewing segments for PiTs of the volume between the selected PiT and the second PiT; and
updating the volume to the to the second PiT based on the review.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the second PiT is later in time than the selected PiT, further comprising writing the segments that are identified in reviewing the segments as changed to the volume.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the second PiT is earlier in time that the selected PiT, further comprising identifying dirty segments that need to be overwritten, and overwriting the dirty segments on the volume with most recent segments that were written to before or on the second PiT.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the data disk and the hydrated OS disk are the same disk.

7. A method comprising:
attaching volumes to a service virtual machine, wherein the volumes correspond to a first point in time (PiT) and are detached from a restored virtual machine;
reviewing segments for the volumes in a storage;
updating the volumes based on the review of the segments to a second PiT;
unmounting the volumes from the service virtual machine; and
mounting the volumes to the restored virtual machine.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the second PiT is earlier in time than the first PiT.

9. The method of claim 8 , further comprising identifying dirty segments that need to be overwritten, and overwriting the dirty segments on the volumes with most recent segments that were written to before or on the second PiT.

10. The method of claim 7 , wherein the second PiT is later in time than the first PiT.

11. The method of claim 10 , further comprising writing segments that are identified in reviewing the segments as changed to the volumes.

12. The method of claim 7 , further comprising hydrating a data disk from the first PiT as the volumes, and attaching the volumes to a virtual machine.

13. The method of claim 12 , further comprising running an application on the virtual machine.

14. The method of claim 13 , further comprising: taking a snapshot of the volumes prior to running the application, and restoring the volumes to the snapshot when the application fails to validate.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the volumes are updated to the second PiT without requiring a second image of a virtual machine to be converted to a virtual machine, further comprising converting an image of a virtual machine corresponding to the first PiT to a converted virtual machine.

16. A non-transitory storage medium having stored therein instructions that are executable by one or more hardware processors to perform operations comprising:
attaching volumes to a service virtual machine, wherein the volumes correspond to a first point in time (PiT) and are detached from a restored virtual machine;
reviewing segments for the volumes in a storage;
updating the volumes based on the review of the segments to a second PiT;
unmounting the volumes from the service virtual machine; and
mounting the volumes to the restored virtual machine.

17. The non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , further comprising:
identifying dirty segments that need to be overwritten;
overwriting the dirty segments on the volumes with most recent segments that were written to before or on the second PiT when the second PiT is earlier in time than the first PiT; and
writing the segments that are identified in reviewing the segments as changed to the volumes when the second PiT is later in time than the first PiT.

18. The non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , further comprising:
hydrating a data disk from the first PiT as the volumes;
attaching the volumes to a virtual machine; and
running an application on the virtual machine.

19. The non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , further comprising: taking a snapshot of the volumes prior to running an application, and restoring the volumes to the snapshot when the application fails to validate.

20. The non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , wherein the volumes are updated to the second PiT without requiring a second image of a virtual machine to be converted to a virtual machine, further comprising converting an image of a virtual machine corresponding to the first PiT to a converted virtual machine.

Assignees

• Emc Ip Holding Co Llc

Inventors

• Kushnir Tomer
• Shemer Jehuda
• Said Jawad
• Wolfson Kfir

Classifications

• G06F11/1469 Primary

  Backup restoration techniques · CPC title

• G06F11/1484

  involving virtual machines · CPC title

• G06F2201/815

  Virtual · CPC title

• G06F2201/84

  Using snapshots, i.e. a logical point-in-time copy of the data · CPC title

• G06F11/1464 Primary

  for networked environments · CPC title