VM Backup & Restore

Available as of v0.2.0

VM backups are created from the Virtual Machines page. The VM backup volumes will be stored in the Backup Target (an NFS or S3 server) and they can be used to either restore a new VM or replace an existing VM.

Prerequisite: A backup target must be set up. For more information, see Backup Target Setup. If the BackupTarget has not been set, you’ll be presented with a prompt message.

Backup Target Setup

A backup target is an endpoint used to access a backup store in Harvester. A backup store is an NFS server or S3 compatible server that stores the backups of VM volumes. The backup target can be set at Settings > backup-target.

Parameter	Type	Description
Type	string	Choose S3 or NFS
Endpoint	string	EndPoint is a hostname or an IP address. Can be left empty for AWS S3.
BucketName	string	Name of the bucket
BucketRegion	string	Region of the bucket
AccessKeyID	string	AccessKeyID is like a user-id that uniquely identifies your account.
SecretAccessKey	string	SecretAccessKey is the password to your account.
Certificate	string	Paste the certificate if you want to use a self-signed SSL certificate of your s3 server
VirtualHostedStyle	bool	Use virtual-hosted-style access only, e.g., Alibaba Cloud(Aliyun) OSS

Create a VM backup

1. Once the backup target is set, go to the Virtual Machines page.
2. Click Take Backup of the VM actions to create a new VM backup.
3. Set a custom backup name and click Create to create a new VM backup.

Result: The backup is created. A notification message will be promoted, and users can go to the Advanced > Backups page to view all VM backups.

The ReadyToUse status will be set to true once the Backup is complete.

Users can either choose to restore a new VM or replace an existing VM using this backup.

Restore a new VM using a backup

To restore a new VM from a backup, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Backups page.
2. Specify the new VM name and click Create.
3. A new VM will be restored using the backup volumes and metadata, and users can access it from the Virtual Machines page.

Replace an Existing VM using a backup

You can replace an existing VM using the backup with the same VM backup target .

You can choose to either delete the previous volumes or retain them. By default, all previous volumes are deleted.

Requirements: The VM must exist and is required to be in the powered-off status.

1. Go to the Backups page.
2. Click Create.

The restore process can be viewed from the Virtual Machines page.