Disaster recovery for a single-server deployment

Backup and recovery procedures help protect against disasters that might result in data loss. In a single-server deployment in which all components are installed on the same computer, failover or automatic disaster recovery is not supported.

The following methods are useful for handling recovery after a disaster:

• Back up the Configuration Database: The Configuration Database holds critical configuration data. This data must be backed up, because all components depend on it. You must store the backup copy of the Configuration Database on a separate machine. This step alone is sufficient to recover from a disaster. After the backup, search and notification alerts can work on the new data that is available on the new setup. For more information, see Backing up the Configuration Database.
• Back up the Indexer: If you need a backup of the historical data for search and notification alerts, the Indexer data must be backed up. For more information, see Backing up the Indexer.
• Back up the custom configuration files: When you reinstall product components after a disaster recovery, the reinstallation works with default properties, but the custom changes are not captured. To capture all custom changes, you must back up the following custom configuration files:
  
  • customIndexstrategies.yml
  • olaengineCustomConfig.properties
  • searchserviceCustomConfig.properties
  • customIndexstrategies.yml

  For more information about these files, see Modifying the configuration files.

  Additional information

  The Search, Console Server, and Collection Station components are stateless and depend on the Configuration Database and Indexer for proper initialization.

Backing up the Configuration Database

Use the following procedures for backing up and restoring the Configuration Database data.

To back up the Configuration Database data

1. Open the command prompt.
2. Navigate to the Configuration Database installation directory.
   By default, the product installs the Configuration Database at the following location:
   • Windows: %BMC_ITDA_HOME%\hsqldb
   • Linux: $BMC_ITDA_HOME/hsqldb

3. Execute the following command to perform an online backup:

   java -jar lib/sqltool.jar --sql="BACKUP DATABASE TO '<Backup-Directory>/' NOT BLOCKING;" --inlineRC=url=jdbc:hsqldb:hsql://<IP-Address>:<port>/bwdb,user=sa

    

   where:

   • <Backup-Directory> refers to the directory path of the backup file; for example, C:/backup/ITDADB-20140203T154316.tar.gz.
   • <IP-Address> refers to the IP address or host name of the computer on which the Configuration Database is running. 

   • <port> refers to the port number on which Configuration Database is running.

4. Execute the command results in a prompt for the sa user password.

   When the backup command is successfully executed, a back up file called ITDADB-<Timestamp>.tar.gz is created in the backup directory. Every time you execute the backup command, a new backup file is created.

To restore the Configuration Database data

1. Stop the Configuration Database service. For more information, see Starting or stopping product services.
2. Open the command prompt.
3. Navigate to the Configuration Database installation directory.
   By default the product installs the Configuration Database at the following location:
   
   • Windows: %BMC_ITDA_HOME%\hsqldb
   • Linux: $BMC_ITDA_HOME/hsqldb
4. Navigate to the data directory and remove the following files:
   • ITDADB.properties
   • ITDADB.log
   • ITDADB.script

5. Change directory to the Configuration Database installation directory and execute the following command to restore the Configuration Database:

   java -cp lib/hsqldb.jar org.hsqldb.lib.tar.DbBackup --extract <Backup-File-Absolute-Path> data

   where:
   <Backup-File-Absolute-Path> refers to the absolute path to the backed-up file; for example, C:/backup/ITDADB-20140203T154316.tar.gz.

6. When the restore command is successfully executed, the following files are created in the data directory:

   • ITDADB.properties

   • ITDADB.log

   • ITDADB.script

7. Start the Configuration Database service.
   For more information, see Starting or stopping product services.

Backing up the Indexer

All indexed log data is stored by the Indexer. Each index contains log data for the configured number of hours. Multiple files are created for each index.

To back up the Indexer data

1. Stop the Collection Station. For more information, see Starting or stopping product services.
   Stopping the Collection Station helps you:
   • Avoid losing data that is still being sent to the Indexer from the Collection Station.
   • Avoid backing up corrupt or incomplete data, which can occur due to writes happening concurrently.
2. Copy the indexer file located at %BMC_ITDA_HOME%\data\indexer on a separate location (on another disk).
   This file contains all data and metadata related to the indices.
3. Restart the Collection Station.
   For more information, see Starting or stopping product services.

To restore the Indexer data

1. Copy the backed-up data to %BMC_ITDA_HOME%\data\indexer.
2. Start the Indexer.
   For more information, see Starting or stopping product services.