RAMESH SURAPARAJU: SAP landscapes
have advanced needs for backup storage,
especially when you design high availability and disaster
recovery.
In Google Cloud, there are many options for backup
to choose from.
What are these options?
Which one is relevant for your SAP deployment scenario or use
case?
What is unique to Google Cloud?
Hi, I am Ramesh Suraparaju.
And in this video, I will answer these questions
on backup strategies and solutions for SAP systems
on Google Cloud.
Customers run mission-critical business processes
on their SAP systems.
Downtimes must be kept to a minimum
to ensure business continuity.
Regular backup of data ensures speedy recovery
from potential data loss.
Google Cloud offers cost-effective native
capabilities as well as partner solutions for backup of data.
Before we look at various backup options,
let us look at a typical SAP deployment.
Here is the architecture of SAP deployment on Google Cloud.
The application layer is a set of one or more SAP NetWeaver
application servers deployed on Compute Engine with associated
persistent disk storage in a specific zone within a Google
Cloud region.
The database layer has a single database server for SAP
and is also deployed on Compute Engine with associated
persistent disk storage.
Zooming in on the storage part of this architecture,
we can see that there are a few specific volumes at file system
level that are relevant for backup.
In the application layer, these are the virtual machine boot
disk, the folders for SAP MNT, and swap space.
At the database layer, the relevant volumes are, again,
the boot disk, folders that contain the data
and logs of the database, and folders that hold the database
backups.
Google Cloud recommends to separate
these backup relevant folders from the boot disks
into separate persistent disks.
Google also recommends that assisted disks
are used, especially for SAP HANA installations,
due to their performance and throughput requirements.
HDD can be used for cost optimization and backup
purposes.
Now let us look at an example of a centralized S/4HANA
deployment on Google Cloud.
When I select this deployment in the Google Cloud console
and click on name of the instance,
we can see the disk layout for this deployment.
Here you can see the boot disk of the S4 instance
and all the other backup-relevant volumes created
and attached to the S4 instance.
Now let me introduce you to the backup options
for each component of a SAP installation on Google Cloud.
Persistent disk snapshots are global resources
that offer a simple and straightforward way for backup.
Cloud storage buckets offer regional, dual-region, and
multi-region storage options that can support
high availability and disaster recovery architectures of SAP
installations.
Cloud storage also offers different storage clusters,
like nearline, coldline, and archive storage,
with rule-based configuration for time
to live and transitioning between these storage classes.
Partner solutions for shared file systems like NetApp,
Cloud volumes also offer a resilient backup option
using Cloud storage buckets.
Cloud Filestore is a cost-effective option
for single-zone SAP installations,
like SAP HANA scale-out, in a single zone
where high availability is achieved by standby nodes
within the same zone.
How can these options be used to back up SAP systems?
At the application layer, you can schedule PD snapshots
as backup for disks of the SAP NetWeaver application server.
For multi-instance installations where a shared file
storage like NetApp is used, you can
use the features of the shared file solution
to back up disks to Cloud storage buckets.
At the database layer 2, you can schedule snapshots of PDs.
In case of SAP HANA database, you
can bypass the persistent disks for HANA backup volumes
and use Backint agent for Google Cloud
to directly back up to Cloud storage buckets.
Let me drill down into the application layer.
This architecture shows a multi-instance SAP NetWeaver
installation with separate VMs for primary and additional
application servers, as well as the central services.
You can see that these snapshots are created
for each of the backup-relevant disks,
like the boot disk, SAP MNT, and the swap space folders.
You can schedule these snapshots for automating
the backup mechanism across your SAP landscape.
Now let me show you how to schedule a snapshot
of a persistent disk.
Here you can see the existing snapshot schedules
for a centralized two-tier deployment of a S/4HANA system,
where the database and application server are all
installed on a single server.
While you can see schedules exist for boot, swap,
and other disks of this deployment,
a schedule for backup of HANA data is still missing.
Let us go ahead and see how to create one.
Here, I navigate to the relevant persistent disk, which
is called s4hana-data, and see that there is no snapshot
scheduled for this disk.
I will proceed to edit the disk configuration to create one.
Notice that you need not stop the VM to do this.
Once I am in the Edit mode of the disk,
I can choose to create a snapshot schedule
and specify required configuration like name,
description, location of the snapshot,
regional or multiregional, the scheduled frequency,
and start time for taking the snapshot.
I can also specify the deletion rules.
In my example, I want it to be 90 days.
After entering all parameters, I click Create.
Finally, I save the disk configuration.
The schedule to take snapshots for the HANA data disk
is now active.
You can check, in the snapshot schedules page,
that there is now a new schedule to back up the HANA data
volume.
Productive SAP installations often
use shared file storage in the application layer
to enable faster failover of application servers.
Shared file solutions, like NetApp cloud volumes,
also offer configuration of snapshots
of the shared disks to Google Cloud Storage buckets.
Let me move on to the database layer.
If the database server is SAP HANA,
you have two alternatives.
The first option is to create schedules
to snapshot the relevant disks and automate a regular backup
of your database.
Alternative option is to use the SAP HANA Backint
agent for Google Cloud.
The HANA Backint agent is a free-of-cost software agent
that can be downloaded from Google Cloud
to be installed on the VM that runs your SAP HANA.
Once the Backint agent is installed,
you can specify the Cloud storage bucket
into which the backup files are to be stored.
You can then turn on the options for catalog and log backup
to use the Backint agent.
Another feature is to enable parallel backup streams
to decrease backup times drastically.
When this configuration is done, your SAP HANA system
and databases will now use the Backint agent
to back up directly to Google Cloud Storage bucket.
All the subsequent backups that are triggered by your SAP HANA
database are directly stored in the specified Google Cloud
Storage bucket instead of a file system
folder of a persistent disk.
In this way, you can bypass the need
to provision a persistent disk for HANA backup volumes.
Here, you can see the storage bucket in which the HANA backup
files are stored.
You can see that the systems and the tenant databases
have separate backup folders.
And of course, you can restore a database directly
from its bucket location.
To complete the database layer, this architecture
shows the snapshots scheduled for all backup-relevant folders
in case of any other database server,
like Sybase ASE or MS SQL server.
You can refer to the relevant database server documentation
for the exact location and names of the data, log,
and backup folders.
To summarize, Google Cloud recommends separate disks
for backup-relevant volumes of your SAP deployment.
You can schedule snapshots of persistent disks
as primary mechanism for backup of SAP systems.
Shared file solutions also support snapshots
to Google Cloud Storage.
You can use SAP HANA Backint agent for Google Cloud
to bypass persistent disks for HANA backup volumes.
You can find a lot more information
about backup options and solutions for SAP deployments
on Google Cloud at the links below this video.
Also, please navigate to cloud.google.com/sap
for information about other topics related to SAP on Google
Cloud.
Thanks for listening.
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