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Veritas NetBackup™ for VMware Administrator's Guide

Last Published: 2019-06-28

Product(s): NetBackup (8.2)

Options for selecting VMware virtual machines

This topic describes the options on the policy Clients tab, or in the Backup Policy Wizard.

You can use these options to manually select virtual machines, or to configure NetBackup to select virtual machines automatically. For automatic selection, you specify the selection criteria (rules) in the policy's Query Builder. When the backup job runs, NetBackup discovers the virtual machines that currently meet the criteria and backs up those virtual machines.

A procedure is available.

See Configuring automatic virtual machine selection.

Table: Virtual machine selection

Option	Description
Select manually	Click this option and click New to manually enter virtual machines names, or to browse and select them from a list. See Browse for VMware virtual machines. Note: The rest of the fields and options are for automatic selection of virtual machines.
Select automatically through VMware Intelligent Policy query	Click this option to allow NetBackup to automatically select virtual machines for backup based on the rules that you enter in the Query Builder.
Enable vCloud Director integration	Enables backup of the virtual machines that reside in a vCloud environment. Requires the automatic selection of virtual machines. With this option, the policy selects for backup only the virtual machines that vCloud manages: it skips the virtual machines that are not in vCloud.
NetBackup host to perform automatic virtual machine selection	This host discovers virtual machines and automatically selects them for backup based on your query rules. The resulting list determines which virtual machines are backed up. To designate your media servers as discovery hosts, select Backup Media Server from the pull-down.

Table: Query Builder

Option	Description
Query Builder (Join, Field, Operator, Values)	Use these pull-down fields to define rules for automatic selection of virtual machines. From left to right, each pull-down further defines the rule. Click the plus sign to add the rule to the Query pane. Click the reset icon (curved arrow) to blank out the pull-down fields. See Query Builder field reference. See Examples for the NetBackup Query Builder.
Advanced Mode	Places the Query Builder in Advanced Mode for manual entry of rules. See Using the Query Builder in Advanced Mode. See Query Builder field reference. See Examples for the NetBackup Query Builder.
Basic Mode	Returns the Query Builder from Advanced Mode to Basic Mode. See Query Builder field reference.
Edit	Use this option to change an existing query rule when in Basic Mode, as follows: Click the rule and then click Edit. Make new selections in the Query Builder pull-down fields. Click the save option (diskette icon).
Remove	Deletes a query rule when in Basic Mode. Click on the rule and then click Remove.
Test Query...	Click this option to test which virtual machines NetBackup selects based on the rules in the Query Builder. Note: This test option does not create the backup list for the policy. When the next backup runs from this policy, NetBackup re-discovers virtual machines and consults the query rules. At that time, NetBackup backs up the virtual machines that match the rules. See Test Query screen for VMware. As an alternative, you can use the nbdiscover command to test a query. Refer to the NetBackup Commands Reference Guide.
Reuse VM selection query results for:	Sets the refresh rate of an internal cache of the query results. NetBackup uses the cache to determine which virtual machines to select at the time of the backup. The cache speeds up the selection of virtual machines without burdening the vCenter server at each scheduled backup. A faster cache refresh rate synchronizes the cache with the changes recorded in vCenter, such as the addition or removal of virtual machines. However, each cache refresh consumes vCenter resources. With a slower refresh rate, new virtual machines may not be included immediately in the next backup. New or changed virtual machines are included when the cache is refreshed. Note that fewer vCenter resources are consumed with a slower refresh rate. The default is 8 hours. For 8 hours, NetBackup uses the cache and does not attempt to rediscover virtual machines. Changes to the virtual environment do not affect the cache during that period. After 8 hours, the next execution of the policy causes NetBackup to rediscover virtual machines. If any changes match a rule in the query, the list of selected virtual machines is modified accordingly. Note: The cache is refreshed before the next scheduled backup whenever the policy is changed and saved. More information is available on the Reuse VM selection query results for: option: See About the Reuse VM selection query results option.