Backing up a VIOS to an IBM i

Bart Administration, IBM i, VIOS July 9, 2012January 2, 2014 1 Minute

If an administrator run a VIOS within IBM i environment only, he needs to do backups anyway.
The most efficient way how to do it, is perform backups to a NFS file system exported by an IBM i .

To do so, in the System i navigator

Network -> Servers -> TCP/IP

Start NFS Server, and add a specific directory to the NFS export list. (Righ click Exports).

Now, from the VIOS shell you can mount the export directory, and perform a backup command to the remote file system.

If an administrator run VIOS environment without a NIM server, and the restore operation would be perform from a HMC, I suggest a command:

backupios -file /mnt/backupfile -nomedialib

Having this, an administrator stores VIOS backups on the IFS of an IBM i. Now its enough backin up the IFS together with libraries from a system i.

Tagged
backup
NFS

Published by Bart

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Published July 9, 2012January 2, 2014

8 thoughts on “Backing up a VIOS to an IBM i”

Joe Wood says:

February 21, 2017 at 20:30

I want to do exactly this, but without Navigator. We have two IBM i NFS servers (one in each data center) serving up 16 lpars for PTF’s and OS images. I’m at the point where I’m getting all of those nasty “restore: 0511-702 Cannot open or create” messages from the backupios. From IBM i 7.2, I used 1) CHGNFSEXP OPTIONS(‘-i -o’) DIR(‘/QOpenSys/viosbackups’) and 2) CHGAUT OBJ(‘/QOpenSys/viosbackups’) USER(*PUBLIC) DTAAUT(*RWX) SUBTREE(*ALL). Any thoughts on how to get past the 0511-702’s ?

Reply
1. Bart says:
  
  February 21, 2017 at 23:31
  
  Hi Joe,
  It is hard to answer because I don’t know what exactly you are trying. Doing a backup is one thing, but how are you trying to restore a VIOS? Are you trying to restore via the HMC ( i think installp command) and do a restore from NFS share or you have a NIM server which use the share or you get the initial VIOS image from a DVD media and then you are trying some restore? Each of these scenario have different requirements and can have errors caused by a different reason.
  
  Reply
  1. Joe Wood says:
    
    February 23, 2017 at 18:32
    
    Bart,
    
    The end goal is to simply have a full VIOS backup image that “could” be restored from HMC (V8R8.5.0.1 currently, moving to V8R8.6.0 shortly), via the NFS share.
    
    Current VIOS is 2.2.3.4 and will be moving it forward after we have a full backup.
  2. Bart says:
    
    February 23, 2017 at 19:01
    
    I understand, but what kind of restore are you trying to do? Scratch restore after complete vios crash or just restore a configuration to already running vios?
    It is important to know, because you can’t just run restore from NFS share. You need to use the HMC or a NIM server.
Joe Wood says:

February 23, 2017 at 20:34

Scratch restore from HMC.

I can produce successful VIOS backups to the NFS with: backupios -file /viosbackup/viosfull170223.mksysb -mksysb This requires NIM server, and that’s not usable via HMC.

The current steps used are:
IBM i – chgnfxexp options(‘-i -o’) dir(‘/QOpenSys’)
VIOS – mount IBMIHOST:/QOpenSys/viosbackups /viosbackup
VIOS – backupios -file /viosbackup -nomedialib

It runs for 3-4 minutes, I can see the data being created on IBM i, 3.4gb, even /SPOT, then on VIOS we get a bunch of restore: 0511-705’s and mostly restore: 0511-702’s. Then of course the data created vanishes from the NFS share as the backup command fails.

I believe the issue is on IBM i using the corrrect combination of CHGNFSEXP options….

Thank you for any advice.

Reply
1. Bart says:
  
  February 23, 2017 at 21:32
  
  the first thing which comes to my mind is the HMC release. Do you have pretty recent HMC firmware installed?
  For instance, the restore will not work, if the VIOS release is more recent then the HMC firmware. In terms of NFS authorities, at the time when I was using the HMC to restore I didn’t deal with NFS authorities.I had ‘everyone’ access set.
  I’m still not sure what exactly you are trying to do. If you want to restore the VIOS completely, why do you do mount on the VIOS?
  
  Reply
2. RT says:
  
  April 15, 2017 at 05:36
  
  I’m getting the same thing in several environments trying to backupios 2.2.4.0 to do updates. latest HMC @8.8.6.0.SP1 doesn’t help, i7.1 nfs host. Have even given „root” to host IP’s and still getting 0511-702 error. I’ve taken to using a spare LUN to backupios to then move the file to the i-LPAR. Please post if you found a resolution.
  
  Reply
  1. Joe Wood says:
    
    April 15, 2017 at 23:33
    
    RT – we have solved our issue and can backupios to IBM i NFS hosted storage from VIOS using backupios -file /viosbackup -nomedialib. Takes about 30-35 minutes to a skinny lpar (power8, .20 processor, and 4gb memory) and we end up with an 8.6gb nim_resoures.tar on our IFS.
    
    Please share your IBM i & VIOS commands for review.
    
    We are VIOS 2.2.3.4 and IBM i 7.2 – HMC, although not a factor in this process is also V8R8.6.0.1