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NetBackup IT Analytics Help

Last Published: 2024-09-04

Product(s): NetBackup IT Analytics (11.3)

Add a Veritas NetBackup Data Collector policy

Prerequisites

To add a Veritas NetBackup Data Collector policy, you must have:

Data Collector added on the NetBackup IT Analytics Portal. See Add/Edit Data Collectors section in the NetBackup IT Analytics User Guide for more information. Preserve the user ID and passcode used while adding a Data Collector on the portal and use the same credentials to install and configure the Data Collector software on the Data Collector server.
Data Collector server installed with the collector software.
For specific prerequisites and supported configurations for a specific vendor, see the NetBackup IT Analytics Certified Configurations Guide.
See Install Data Collector Software on Windows.
See Install Data Collector software on Linux.
NetBackup Primary Server (RBAC or NBAC) user credentials with the required access permissions. The steps to enable the access permissions for NetBackup users are described below.
Note:
After modifications of the access rights, RBAC user should to run bpnbat -login -loginType WEB command as non-root user.

User permissions for RBAC-enabled NetBackup

This option of applying permissions to a custom role is applicable for NetBackup 9.0 and later. If you enter a non-root user, you must create a custom role in NetBackup web UI RBAC screen with the following permissions and attach the role to this user ID. See Add a custom RBAC role section in NetBackup Web UI Administrator's Guide for steps to create a custom role.

Select all the View permission for all the objects under NetBackup Management, Protection, and Storage sections of the NetBackup web UI.
From the NetBackup Management > CLI Sessions section, enable CLI Execute.
From the NetBackup Management > Malware section, enable View scan results.
From the RBAC > (Edit RBAC customs role) > Global Permission tab > Security > enable View permission for Global Security Settings.
From the RBAC > (Edit RBAC customs role) > Global Permission tab > Security > enable View permission for Security Events.

User permissions for NBAC-enabled NetBackup

If you are configuring the policy in an environment with NetBackup Access Control (NBAC), provide the credential of a NetBackup user created using the following steps:

Login as an Administrator to the NBAC-enabled NetBackup and go to Security Management > Access management > User group.
Create a new user group for the NetBackup IT Analytics collection.
Within the new user group, select Authenticated principles as assigned users.
From the Permissions tab, assign these permissions from the respective section for the NetBackup IT Analytics collection.
- Job: Browse, Read permissions.
- Policy: Browse, Read , Operate, Configure permissions.
- Drive: Browse, Read permissions.
- Media: Browse, Read permissions.
- Robot: Browse, Read , Operate, Configure permissions.
- Device Host: Browse, Read permissions.
- Storage Unit: Browse, Read permissions.
- NetBackup Catalog: Browse, Read permissions.
- Audit: Browse, Read, Run Report permissions.
- Volume Pool: Browse, Read permissions.
- Report: Browse, Read permissions.

To add Veritas NetBackup Data Collector policy:

Select Admin > Data Collection > Collector Administration. Currently configured Data Collectors are displayed.
Select the Data Collector from the list to which you want to add the policy. Use the filter to find the collector if required.
Click Add Policy, and then select Veritas NetBackup from the policy list.
Configure the Veritas NetBackup Data Collector policy based on the filed descriptions under policy parameters below and then click OK to save the policy. Mandatory parameters are denoted by an asterisk (*).
See Policy Parameters.

Policy Parameters

The following are the fields and its description:

Collector Domain: The domain of the collector to which the collector backup policy is being added. This is a read-only field. By default, the domain for a new policy will be the same as the domain for the collector. This field is set when you add a collector.
Policy Domain: The Collector Domain is the domain that was supplied during the Data Collector installation process. The Policy Domain is the domain of the policy that is being configured for the Data Collector. The Policy Domain must be set to the same value as the Collector Domain.
The domain identifies the top level of your host group hierarchy. All newly discovered hosts are added to the root host group associated with the Policy Domain.
Typically, only one Policy Domain will be available in the drop-down list. If you are a Managed Services Provider, each of your customers will have a unique domain with its own host group hierarchy.
NetBackup Primary Servers: Select the NetBackup Primary Server(s) from which data will be collected. Multi-select is supported. Only available NetBackup Primary Servers are displayed. For example, if a server has been decommissioned or it has been selected for use by another policy, it will not be displayed. Optionally, add/edit a NetBackup Primary server. These operations can also be completed in the Inventory tab.
- Add: Click Add to add a NetBackup server. Added servers are also displayed in the Inventory. If the hosts already exists, NetBackup IT Analytics displays a confirmation dialog box to update the Host Details (including the Host Type). Click Ok to update Host details / Host Type.
  See Add/Edit NetBackup Primary Servers within the Data Collector policy.
Edit: Select a server and click Edit to update the server values.
Note:
You can add multiple servers while creating the NetBackup policy, provided the NetBackup servers have the same credentials and Backup Software Location is also same for the servers.
Backup Software Location on the Server (Data Collector or NetBackup Primary Server): Backup Software Location should point to a location on either the Data Collector server or the NetBackup Primary Server. The location should either be the root folder or directory to the netbackup/volmgr folder(s) where the NetBackup software is installed.
Note:
If you are using the SSH/WMI remote collection method, this location is where the NetBackup software is installed on all the remote NetBackup Primary Servers that are configured.
Default Backup Software Home location for NetBackup:
For Windows: C:\Program Files\Veritas.
For Linux: /usr/openv.
Collection Method: Select from NetBackup Software on a Data Collector Server (default) or SSH or WMI protocol to NetBackup Primary Server.
- For NetBackup Software on a Data Collector Server, Job Details information can be collected as Scheduled collection. When this method is selected, then the probe NetBackup Event Monitor is unselected, and following probes are selected: Storage Unit Details, Storage Lifecycle Policies, and Backup Policies.
- For SSH or WMI protocol to NetBackup Primary Server, the NetBackup Event Monitor probe is unselected and disabled.
Remote Probe Login Details: These details are required for either of the following conditions.
- The collector is centralized and the SLP Job Details, License Details, or Backup Policies probe is selected.
- The collector is distributed and the Backup Policies probe is selected.
- The Collection Method is SSH or WMI protocol to the NetBackup Primary Server.
Primary Server Domain: Specify the domain associated with the NetBackup Primary Server User ID. For Windows Primary Servers, this domain is used, in conjunction with the User ID, for the execution of the remote lifecycle policies utility (nbstlutil) by the SLP Job Details probe, when the Data Collector is not installed on the NetBackup Primary Server; unused for remote Linux Primary Servers. In addition, for NetBackup 7.7.3 only, this domain is used by the License Details probe to collect plugin information (bpstsinfo).
For NetBackup 8.3 and above, this domain is used by Backup Policies probe (FETB and Protection Plan collection) for REST API based authentication.
This field is required when the Collection Method is SSH or WMI protocol to the NetBackup Primary Server and that Primary Server is a Windows Server.
Primary Server User ID: This field is required when the Collection Method is SSH or WMI protocol to the NetBackup Primary Server. Depending on NBAC or RBAC-enabled NetBackup, enter the appropriate credentials of the user created using the steps described in the prerequisites above.
Specify the user name with login rights on the selected NetBackup Primary Server. The user name and password are used for the execution of the remote lifecycle policies utility (nbstlutil) by the SLP Job Details probe, when the Data Collector is not installed on the NetBackup Primary Server. In addition, for NetBackup 7.7.3 only, the credentials are used by the License Details probe to collect plugin information (bpstsinfo). A Windows user name requires administrative privileges.
In case of NetBackup 8.3 and above, these credentials are also used by the Backup Policies probe for REST API based authentication. These credentials will be used for all Primary Servers.
If SSH/WMI collection is specified, the username must have superuser privileges to run most NetBackup commands.
Primary Server Password: This field is required when the Collection Method is SSH or WMI protocol to the NetBackup Primary Server.
The password associated with the NetBackup Primary Server User ID. The user name and password are used for the execution of the remote lifecycle policies utility (nbstlutil) by the SLP Job Details probe, when the Data Collector is not installed on the NetBackup Primary Server. In addition, for NetBackup 7.7.3 only, the credentials are used by the License Details probe to collect plugin information (bpstsinfo).
In case of NetBackup 8.3 and above these credentials are also used by the Backup Policies probe for REST API based authentication. These credentials will be used for all Primary Servers.
If password-based login to NetBackup primary server is not allowed, for example in cloud deployment of NetBackup, then SSH private key can be specified here in the following format:
privateKey=<path-of-private-key>|password=<passphrase> where
- <path-of-private-key>| is the file path of the SSH private key.
- <passphrase> is the password used while creating the SSH private key.
See Prerequisites for collection from Veritas NetBackup deployed on Kubernetes clusters.
WMI Proxy Address: Specify the IP address or hostname of the WMI Proxy. If this field is blank, 127.0.0.1 will be used. This is used for remote nbstlutil execution of the SLP Job Details probe, when the Data Collector is not installed on the NetBackup Primary Server. In addition, for NetBackup 7.7.3 only, this is used by the License Details probe to collect plugin information (bpstsinfo).
For NetBackup 8.3 and above, this domain is used by Backup Policies probe (FETB and Protection Plan collection) for REST API based authentication.
This field is required when the Collection Method is SSH or WMI protocol to the NetBackup Primary Server and that Primary Server is a Windows Server.

Active Probes

Note:

Explicit schedules set for a Collector policy are relative to the time on the Collector server. Schedules with frequencies are relative to the time that the Data Collector was restarted.

Tape Library & Drive Inventory: Select the check box to activate Tape Library data collection from your NetBackup environment.
The default polling frequency is every 12 hours. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available. Optimize performance by scheduling less frequent collection.
Tape Inventory: Select the check box to activate Tape data collection from your NetBackup environment.
The default polling frequency is every 18 hours. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available. Optimize performance by scheduling less frequent collection.
Drive Status: Select the check box to activate Tape Drive status collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every 20 minutes. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Job Details: Select the check box to activate Job data collection from your NetBackup environment. The polling frequency would depend on the value of ENABLE_MINUS_T_OPTION advanced parameter.
Refer to Backup Manager advanced parameters section for more details on ENABLE_MINUS_T_OPTION parameter.
This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Duplication Jobs: Select the check box to activate Duplication Job data collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every 60 minutes. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Backup Message Logs:
This probe is active by default and cannot be deactivated. It performs the Message Log (bperror) data collection from your NetBackup environment. Its default polling frequency is every 5 minutes.
Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
SLP Job Details: Select the check box to activate SLP Job Details collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every 6 hours.
Note:
When selecting this SLP Job Details option, if you are using centralized NetBackup data collection, you must also configure the settings in the Login Details for Remote Probes section of this Data Collector policy.
Host Details: Select the check box to activate Host Details data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probe calls NetBackup REST APIs to collect and persist environmental details. The default polling frequency is once a week.
This probe is selected by default.
Also, ensure this probe is selected to enable access to NetBackup web interface from the IT Analytics Portal. The steps to enable access to the web interface are documented under Access NetBackup web interface from the IT Analytics Portal section of the User Guide.
See Access NetBackup web interface from the IT Analytics Portal.
Click clock icon to modify the scheduled frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week, and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Event Notifications: Select the check box to activate Event Notifications data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probe calls NetBackup REST APIs to collect and persist critical event notifications.
This probe supports NetBackup version 9.1 and above. For version lower than 9.1, the data collection fails and an error status is displayed on the collection status page.
The default polling frequency is every minute. This probe is selected by default.
Click the clock icon to modify the schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Audit Events: The Audit Events probe collects the audit events such as user login success or failure, policy modification etc. from Netbackup Primary server.
Select the check box to activate Audit Events data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probes connects directly to NetBackup Primary server to collect and persist the audit details.
The default schedule is every 1 hour.
You can configure the Advanced parameter NBU_AUDIT_LOOKBACK_DAYS for the first time collection of the NetBackup Audit events. By default, it collects events from last 3 days for the first time.
Change the value of this advanced parameter to collect events that are anything other than 3 days.
See NBU_AUDIT_LOOKBACK_DAYS.
Note:
When selecting this Audit Events option, if you are using centralized NetBackup data collection, you must also configure the settings in the Login Details for Remote Probes section of this Data Collector policy.
License Details: Select the check box to activate License Details data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probes collects and persists license key information for NetBackup. The default polling frequency is monthly. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month.
Client Exclude/Include List Details: Select the check box to activate Client Exclude/Include List Details data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probe collects from Linux/Unix and Windows NetBackup clients. This probe connects directly to each NetBackup client to collect and persist the NetBackup client exclude/include list of files and directories. The default polling frequency is monthly. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month.
This probe skips exclude/include data collection from VMware, HyperV, RHEV, Nutanix, AWS, Azure, GCP and Kubernetes workloads. Configure the NBU_CLNT_EXC_INC_SKIP_POLICY_TYPE_IDS advanced parameter to add comma separated policy id(s) of any additional workload(s) to skip exclude/include data collection.
USE_ALT_NBU_INCL_EXCL - This advanced parameter can be configured for collection of NetBackup include/exclude lists from Unix clients. By default, the collector uses the NetBackup-recommended command syntax to retrieve the lists. If the lists are not collected successfully, set the advanced parameter to Y, which instructs the collector to use an alternative command syntax for list data retrieval from Unix clients. Valid values for this parameter are Y or N (Default= N). This parameter can be set at the Data Collector level.
Note:
For information on NetBackup policy types, refer to NetBackup Self Service Configuration Guide > Appendix A NetBackup policy types > List of NetBackup policy types section.
NetBackup Event Monitor: Collects events generated by the nb_monitor_util executable present in the NBU installation. Events include create/update/delete for Backup Policies, Storage Unit Details, Storage Unit Groups and Storage Lifecycle Policies, and Media Servers and Services updates. This probe is selected by default for new installations.
NetBackup Event Monitor is disabled if WMI/SSH collection is enabled.
Storage Unit Details: Select the checkbox to activate Storage Unit data collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every 4 hours. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Storage Lifecycle Policies: When selecting this option, you must also configure settings in the Login Details for Remote Probes section of this Data Collector policy. Select the check box to activate Storage Lifecycle Policy (SLP) collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every 8 hours. This probe is selected by default. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
Backup Policies: Performs Backup Policy data collection from your NetBackup environment. This probe also collects the FETB and protection plan data using REST APIs, provided the NetBackup version is 8.3 or later. You need to provide the REST API credentials under Remote Probe Login Details to allow the APIs to collect data. This probe is enabled by default and is not editable. The FETB data collected is also validated against the license entitlement of the subscription.
The default polling frequency is every 8 hours. Click the clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week and month. Advanced use of native CRON strings is also available.
NetBackup IT Analytics supports VMware, Hyper-V, Oracle, MSSQL intelligent policies in NetBackup. As a part of Oracle and MSSQL intelligent policies, the instance details backed up by policy is displayed in NetBackup Policies Details report.
Security Details: Select the checkbox to activate Security Details data collection from your NetBackup environment. The default polling frequency is every hour at minute 15. This probe is not selected by default. It collects data using NetBackup commands and REST APIs, provided the NetBackup version is 10.0 or later. You need to provide the REST API credentials under Remote Probe Login Details to allow the APIs to collect data. If API key is provided during configuration of NetBackup Primary servers, it is used to execute the REST API.
See Add/Edit Netbackup Primary Servers within the Data Collector policy for details about the API key.
Click clock icon to create a schedule frequency for collecting data. You can schedule the collection frequency by minute, hour, day, week, and month. Advanced use of native CRON string is also available.
NetBackup Resources Monitor: Select the checkbox to activate NetBackup Resources data collection from your NetBackup environment. The probe does not have a default schedule. Once enabled, it collects data received from the NetBackup IT Analytics Exporter installed on the NetBackup Primary Server. When you enable this probe, the NetBackup Primary Server (Internal Name) is added to Compute Resources Data Collection Policy. If there is no existing policy, a new policy for Compute Resources is added.
Note that the Internal Name of the NetBackup Primary server must match the instance (Hostname) of the NetBackup Primary Server.
See the NetBackup IT Analytics Exporter Installation and Configuration Guide for details on exporter installation.
NetBackup Actions:
Note:
The following Three actions for NetBackup probe are ALTA-specific
- Veritas.NetBackup.VTNB.AltaConnectorTaskProbeAPIKeyRenewal
  In Alta Connector deployment there is a API Key shared between Alta View and NBU. This key needs to be renewed periodically. This action is implemented to trigger key renewal logic.
- Veritas.NetBackup.VTNB.AltaConnectorTaskProbeNotificationMessageKey
  In Alta Connector deployment notification keys need to be add to NBU so that NBU can correctly interpret I18N text send to it by Alta Connector. This action is implemented to add notification keys on NBU Primary Server.
- Veritas.NetBackup.VTNB.AltaConnectorTaskProbeUpgrade
  In Alta Connector deployment , NBU specific scripts need to be invoked when NBU upgrades to 10.1.1 or above. This Action triggers execution of the script once it detects NBU is upgraded to 10.1.1 or above.
Notes: Enter or edit notes for your data collector policy. The maximum number of characters is 1024. Policy notes are retained along with the policy information for the specific vendor and displayed on the Collector Administration page as a column making them searchable as well.
Download SSL Certificate: Downloads the SSL certificate required to set up NetBackup IT Analytics Exporter on the NetBackup Primary Server.
See the NetBackup IT Analytics Data Exporter Installation and Configuration Guide for details on exporter installation.
Test Connection: Test Connection initiates a Data Collector process that attempts to connect to the subsystem using the IP addresses and credentials supplied in the policy. This validation process returns either a success message or a list of specific connection errors. Test Connection requires that Agent Services are running.
Test Connection checks if the utility nb_monitor_util is installed. This is required to use the probe NetBackup Event Monitor.
It also checks if the REST APIs were successfully executed against the NetBackup Primary Server. For REST APIs to succeed, you must provide the user credentials of the NetBackup Primary that has REST API access. The FETB and Protection Plan collection fails in absence of the user credentials.
Several factors affect the response time of the validation request, causing some requests to take longer than others. For example, there could be a delay when connecting to the subsystem. Likewise, there could be a delay when getting the response, due to other processing threads running on the Data Collector.
You can also test the collection of data using the Run functionality available in Admin>Data Collection>Collector Administration. This On-Demand data collection run initiates a high-level check of the installation at the individual policy level, including a check for the domain, host group, URL, Data Collector policy and database connectivity. You can also select individual probes and servers to test the collection run.

After adding the policy, collections can be run on-demand using the Run button on the Collector Administration page action bar. The Run button is only displayed if the policy vendor is supported for some policies. On-demand collection allows you to select which probes and devices to run collection against. This action collects data the same as a scheduled run, plus logging information for troubleshooting purposes. For probe descriptions, refer to the policy.

See Veritas NetBackup SSH: Changing the Linux Temporary Directory for Collection.