BDRSuite - Backup for Linux Endpoints

Protecting customer data on their workstation and laptop is very essential. Most of the uncommitted valuable data reside in Laptops and Desktops. Most Organizations protect the endpoints using regular backups and recover the data in no time in case of hardware failures or accidental deletion. This article will walk you through how to install and configure the BBA agent on Linux endpoints and configure the backup job in BDRSuite. BDRSuite supports Linux, Windows, and Mac endpoints. It also supports backup data encryption to secure the data. A flexible scheduling option and uninterrupted backup jobs make BDRSuite stand out from the market.

In my current LAB environment, I have BDRSuite 5.3.0.1 which is generally available for use. I have CentOS Linux VM which has been quickly bootstrapped using Vagrant/Virtualbox.

[root@webapp1 ~]# df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
devtmpfs        912M     0  912M   0% /dev
tmpfs           919M     0  919M   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs           919M  8.5M  911M   1% /run
tmpfs           919M     0  919M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/sda1        40G  4.2G   36G  11% /
tmpfs           184M     0  184M   0% /run/user/0

[root@webapp1 ~]# cat /etc/redhat-release
CentOS Linux release 7.9.2009 (Core)
[root@webapp1 ~]#

[root@webapp1 ~]# ifconfig eth1
eth1: flags=4163<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,MULTICAST>  mtu 1500
        inet 172.16.16.31  netmask 255.255.255.0  broadcast 172.16.16.255
        inet6 fe80::a00:27ff:fe95:4bcb  prefixlen 64  scopeid 0x20<link>
        ether 08:00:27:95:4b:cb  txqueuelen 1000  (Ethernet)

Here is the prerequisite for the Linux endpoints to protect using BDRSuite backup.

BDRSuite – Backup Repository configuration:

1. Login to BDRSuite to validate the backup repository.

BDRSuite - Backup Server config — BDRSuite – Backup Server config

2. Click on the block storage configuration. You could also create the backup repository using object storage.

3. Here is my simple backup repository for testing the Linux VM backup and recovery.

Backup Repository Configuration - Block storage — Backup Repository Configuration – Block storage

BDRSuite – Configure Linux endpoint Backup:

Let’s add the Linux endpoint to the BDRSuite and perform the backup.

1. Login to the BDRSuite console and navigate to the endpoint tab.

BDRSuite - Vembu Backup for Endpoint — BDRSuite – Vembu Backup for Endpoint

2. Click on “Data Sources” and click on “Add Linux”.

Data Sources - Add Linux — Data Sources – Add Linux

3. Enter the IP address or FQDN of the backup client and add the credentials to install the agent automatically.

4. BDRsuite provides the option to choose the user account or Linux private key.

Save Credentials - for root user — Save Credentials – for the root user

5. Click OK to proceed. If you want to install the BBA agent manually, you can refer to the KB article which is provided in the wizard.

Install BBA agent automatically - BDRSuite — Install BBA agent automatically – BDRSuite

6. Here is the BBA agent installation progress. In the backend, BDRSuite copies the BBA agent to the endpoint and performs the installation. For the Linux endpoint, the Perl package must be installed prior to adding the client.

BBA Agent installation on Linux endpoint

7. Once the installation is completed and connected to the client, you will get the idle status like below. We have successfully installed BBA agent on CentOS 7 and added the endpoint to the BDRSuite.

BDRSuite - Linux Endpoint — BDRSuite – Linux Endpoint

BDRSuite – Configure Linux endpoint Backup:

1. Navigate to the “Backup” tab. Click on configure backup – > Linux.

2. Enter the job name and select the backup repository.

Enter the Job name and select the repository - BDRSuite — Enter the Job name and select the repository – BDRSuite

3. Select the Linux – CentOS endpoint to configure the backup.

4. Select the files and folders to add to the backup rotation. For testing purposes, I have added only /tmp and /var filesystems.

Select the folders and files to backup - BDRSuite — Select the folders and files to backup – BDRSuite

5. The next section helps you to configure the desired backup schedule for the endpoints. You can choose incremental backup and full backup schedules. You can also set the expiry date for the backup in the Advanced settings.