Method, system, and apparatus for translating logical information representative of physical data in a data protection system

• US 7,865,470 B2
• Filed: 09/09/2004
• Issued: 01/04/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 09/09/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Anand, Karandeep Singh, Wahlert, Brian M, van Ingen, Catharine, Raman, Venkatasubrahmanyam, Fries, Robert M, Badami, Vinay, Pai, Sunil, Lashkari, Yezdi Z, Berkowitz, Brian T, Gonzalez, David E, Harikrishnan, Seetharaman, Kulkarni, Purushottam M, Chandhok, Nikhil Vijay, Zizys, Giedrius
• Primary Examiner(s): Rones; Charles
• Assistant Examiner(s): CAO, PHUONG THAO
• Application Number:
  US10/937,061
• Publication Number:
  US 20060053304A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,308 Days
• Field of Search: 707/999.202, 707/999.204, 707/640, 707/821
• US Class Current: 707/640
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1451 by selection of backup contents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1464 for networked environments
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2097 maintaining the standby controller/processing unit updated initialisation or re-synchronisation thereof G06F11/1658 and subgroups

Abstract

A method for creating a group plan for protecting an object located at a production location is provided. A selection of an object for which a group plan is to be created is received along with protection intents for the selected object. The protection intents are translated into a group plan for protecting the selected object.

Claims

1. A method for creating a backup plan for protecting data physically located at a production location by specifying namespace elements existing at a logical level, the namespace elements at the logical level representing one or more protectable data objects residing in the production location, the method performed in a computer comprising one or more processors and system memory, and comprising:

for at least one or more namespace elements at a logical level, mapping the namespace elements to one or more protectable data objects located at a production location;

performing an initial discovery which discovers said mapping between the at least one or more namespace elements at the logical level and the one or more protectable data objects located at the production location;

receiving a selection of namespace elements for which a group backup plan is to be created;

for the selected namespace elements, automatically tracking any changes that occur with respect to the production location for any of the protectable data objects that correspond to the selected namespace elements contained in the group backup plan;

receiving a selection of protection intents for the selected namespace elements of the group backup plan, the protection intents identifying how the selected namespace elements are to be protected; and

carrying out the received protection intents for the group backup plan for the selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects using the discovered mapping of the selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects located in the production location, by performing the group backup plan, the group backup plan consisting of one or more jobs and scheduling parameters for protecting the corresponding protectable data objects of the selected namespace elements.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a list of objects located at a production location.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the protection intents are stated as goals.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

in response to receiving a selection of an object, providing a protection intent default for the selected object.

5. The method of claim 4, where the protection intent default is a user-selectable protection template.

6. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

in response to providing a protection intent default, receiving an acceptance of the provided protection intent default.

7. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

in response to providing a protection intent default, receiving a modification of the provided protection intent default.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected object is a protectable object.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected object is a plurality of protectable objects.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected object is a protected group.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected object is a datasource.

12. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

creating a replication job, wherein the replication job replicates changes made to the selected object.

13. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

creating an archive job, wherein the archive job creates a point in time copy of the selected object.

14. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

creating a temporal version job, wherein the temporal version job creates an image of a point-in-time of a replica of the selected object.

15. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

creating a schedule for a validation routine.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the validation routine comprises:

obtaining a validation parameter from a production location representative of the selected object;

obtaining a validation parameter from a storage location representative of a copy of the selected object; and

comparing the validation parameter from the production location and the validation parameter from the storage location.

17. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

allocating resources for storing a copy of the selected object.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein allocating resources, comprises:

determining an amount of resources for storing a copy of the selected object,

creating a job for allocating the determined amount of resources; and

executing the created job.

19. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

subsequent to allocating resources, creating a checkpoint, wherein the checkpoint identifies a location that is used to restart the method.

20. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

identifying existing jobs associated with the selected object;

terminating the identified existing jobs;

validating a replica representative of the selected object; and

creating a new job representative of the received protection intents.

21. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

in response to receiving a selection of protection intents, creating a job representative of the selection of the protection intents.

22. The method of claim 1, wherein the received protection intents are stored in an Extensible Markup Language.

23. The method of claim 1, wherein the received protection intents are stored in a binary form.

24. The method of claim 1, wherein the received protection intents are stored in a database table.

25. A computer program product comprising one or more computer readable storage media containing executable code for executing in a processor of a computing system a method for creating a backup plan for protecting data physically located at a production location by specifying namespace elements existing at a logical level, the namespace elements at the logical level representing one or more protectable data objects residing in the production location, the method comprising:

for at least one or more namespace elements at a logical level, mapping the namespace elements to one or more protectable data objects located at a production location;

performing an initial discovery which discovers said mapping between the at least one or more namespace elements at the logical level and the one or more protectable data objects located at the production location;

receiving a selection of namespace elements for which a group backup plan is to be created;

for the selected namespace elements, automatically tracking any changes that occur with respect to the production location for any of the protectable data objects that correspond to the selected namespace elements contained in the group backup plan;

receiving a selection of protection intents for the selected namespace elements of the group backup plan, the protection intents identifying how the selected namespace elements are to be protected; and

executing the received protection intents for the group backup plan for the selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects using the discovered mapping of the selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects located in the production location, the group backup plan consisting of one or more jobs and scheduling parameters for protecting the corresponding protectable data objects of the selected namespace elements.

26. The computer program product of claim 25, further comprising:

generating a preparation plan, wherein the preparation plan includes jobs for making a copy of the protectable data objects corresponding to the selected namespace elements and storing the copy at a storage location;

generating a protection plan, wherein the protection plan includes jobs for maintaining an accuracy of the copy of the protectable data objects.

27. The computer program product of claim 26, further comprising generating a resource plan, wherein generating the resource plan includes determining an amount of storage space required for storing the copy of the protectable data objects corresponding to the selected namespace elements at the storage location and creating jobs for allocating resources.

28. The computer program product of claim 26, wherein the preparation plan includes a job for validating the copy of the protectable data objects corresponding to the selected namespace elements.

29. The computer program product of claim 26, wherein generating the preparation plan includes determining whether any data has been indicated as removed from the plan.

30. The computer program product of claim 29, wherein, in response to determining that data has been removed from the plan, creating a job to stop ongoing protection activity at the production location.

31. The computer program product of claim 25, wherein the one or more jobs include a replication job, and a temporal version job.

32. The computer program product as defined in claim 25 wherein the method further comprises:

receiving a further selection of namespace elements for which a group backup plan is to be created;

for the further selected namespace elements, automatically tracking any changes that occur with respect to the production location for any of the protectable data objects that correspond to the further selected namespace elements contained in the group backup plan;

determining that the further selected namespace elements are to be added to the group backup plan; and

executing the received protection intents for the group backup plan for the further selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects using the discovered mapping of the further selected namespace elements and their corresponding protectable data objects located in the production location, the group backup plan consisting of one or more jobs and scheduling parameters for protecting the corresponding protectable data objects of the further selected namespace elements.