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TimeFinder Control Option

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The Business Challenge

Application Data Unavailability...

System available
2 am
Stop application Backups
Start competing
process
Batch Processing

DSS Extracts, DW Loading,

Application Testing
Process completes
Restart application
6 am Complex Reporting and Queries
System available
Shrinking Windows
Volume of Information Growing

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The Solution

Workload Cooperation... With

TimeFinder
System
available
2:00 am
2:15 am System Backups
available
Batch Processing
DSS Extracts, DW Loading,
Application Testing

Complex Reporting and Queries

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TimeFinder Features
Use a Business Continuance Volume (BCV) to create additional mirror
images of standard volumes. BCVs can be:
Dynamically established with standard volumes
Split off to create point-in-time copies of production data

Additional mirrors can address workload compression and maintain

continuous business operation that include:
Decision support
Backup
Fast recovery of standby data
Testing or application development

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Business Continuance Volumes (BCV)

BCV is a binary copy/mirror of a Symmetrix

Logical Volume (also known as a standard)
STD
Standard and BCV should have same size STD
Mirror
Data copied in the background with little or no
performance impact for production
Separately addressable after splitting
BCV
Can be locally or remotely mirrored

BCV
Mirror

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Basic TimeFinder Operations

Establish / Incremental Establish

Note: It is highly
STD BCV
Split recommended that
files be closed and
Restore / Incremental Restore the file system be
dismounted before
STD BCV
Split and Restore
operations!

STD BCV

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How Establish Works

Establish synchronizes a Standard and
Standard Device BCV Device
BCV pair
Incremental est. updates changed tracks STD
only
BCV device becomes BCV

Not Ready to the host STD

BCV added to Standard as next available Mirror

mirror
Before Establish
Symmetrix copies data from Standard
device to BCV device in background After Establish
Devices stay synchronized until Split Standard Device BCV Device
NR to host
command issued
STD

BCV

STD
Mirror

BCV

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How Split Works

Devices stay synchronized until broken Standard Device BCV Device
apart by Split command NR to host
As the Split executes, this is the Point STD
In Time Copy of the Standard device BCV
data
The BCV becomes Ready to the host STD
Mirror
and is removed from the Standard
devices mirror group
The BCV can be used by any host BCV

application for read or write operations

Before Split
After Split

Standard Device BCV Device

STD

BCV

STD
Mirror

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How Restore Works

Restore synchronizes a Standard Device BCV Device

Standard and BCV pair
STD
Incremental restore updates changed tracks
only BCV
BCV becomes Not Ready to the host
STD
BCV added to Standard as next available Mirror
mirror
Symmetrix copies data from BCV to the Before Restore
Standard After Restore
Data on BCV is immediately available on Standard Device BCV Device
start of restore NR to host
STD

BCV

STD
Mirror

BCV

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Multi-BCVs

Standard device keeps track of changes to multiple BCVs one after

the other

Incremental establish or restore now possible with 8 BCVs by default

BCV1 2am Incremental

Establish
Establish
Split
or 4am
4am STD BCV
ST BCV2
D Establish
Incremental
Split
Restore

BCV3 6am
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TimeFinder Definitions
Standard Device Configured for normal Symmetrix operation
BCV Device Configured for dynamic mirroring,
When not mirror of a standard device
Is available to host like a standard device

BCV Pair BCV device of the same emulation and capacity

dynamically paired as an additional mirror of
the standard device mirror(s)
Establish Making a BCV pair by copying data from the
standard device to the BCV device
Restore Making a BCV pair by copying data from the
BCV device to the standard device mirror(s)
Synchronized Paired BCV and standard device have same data

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SYMCLI
Symmetrix Command Line Interface
SYMCLI provides your host with command line options that can
obtain device configuration information
Control the configuration
Retrieve status and Performance data on attached Symmetrix units

The SYMCLI is an open systems application written using the

Symmetrix Application Programming Interface

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Device Naming Conventions

dev 0C7 pd \\.\Physicaldrive8

ORCL001

dev 086 DATA001 /dev/dsk/c2t3d0s2

dev 010 BACKUP001 pd \\.\Physicaldrive22

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BCV Devices
Each BCV volume:
Has its own host address (TID/LUN)
Has its own Symmetrix device number

BCVs can be an additional mirror of a Standard device that is:

Unprotected
RAID1
RAID-S
Any of above in an SRDF configuration

BCVs must be the same size and geometry of the Standard device it
mirrors.

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BCV Device Host Address

BCV
The BCV Device has its own host address

\\.\Physicaldrive5 C7

Standard

\\.\Physicaldrive1
The BCV Device has its own Symmetrix Device 85
Number

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Gatekeeper Devices
1Gatekeeper Devices

Low level I/O commands executed using SYMCLI are routed to Symmetrix via a
Symmetrix storage device that is specified as a gatekeeper.

The gatekeeper device allows SYMCLI commands to retrieve configuration and

status information from the Symmetrix without interfering with normal Symmetrix
operations. The gatekeeper must be accessible from the host where the commands are
being executed.

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Identifying Gatekeeper Devices

Example of the syminq command output:

syminq

\\.\Physicaldrive0 EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23091010 2208960

\\.\Physicaldrive1 EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23085010 2208960
\\.\Physicaldrive2 EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 230AB010 2208960
\\.\Physicaldrive3 BCV EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23086010 2208960
\\.\Physicaldrive4 BCV EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 230C7010 2208960
\\.\Physicaldrive5 BCV EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23010010 2208960
\\.\Physicaldrive6 BCV EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23001010 N/A
\\.\Physicaldrive7 GK EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 23011160 2880
\\.\Physicaldrive8 GK EMC SYMMETRIX 5064 2302C160 2880

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TimeFinder Command Overview

The SYMCLI TimeFinder commands are:

Each command includes a set of arguments, parameters

and options.

The commands are sent to the Symmetrix via a gatekeeper

device.

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Recommended Notes for Splits &

Restores
Splits BCV pairs
Note: For a fully synchronized copy of data, suspend I/O to all
applications that use the Standard device and make sure that all
host buffering and intermediate caching is flushed to the
appropriate logical device on the Symmetrix prior to
performing the split.
Restores BCV pairs
Note: You should suspend all I/O from the host to the Standard
device prior to executing the restore command. You can
resume I/O after the tracks are merged.

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Establish, Split, & Restore Operations

85 BCV
Establish BCV

Split BCV
85 BCV

Restore BCV
85 BCV

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SYMMIR Examples

symmir -g classdg establish dev 085 bcv pd physicaldrive8

symmir -g classdg -force split
symmir -g classdg -restore dev 085
symmir -g classdg -establish
symmir -g classdg -full restore
symmir -g classdg query
symmir -g classdg verify

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TimeFinder Cautions
Before Splitting, to get a valid point-in-time copy you must:
Stop/quiesce database or applications using the volumes
Ensure all writes are flushed from the host cache
Before Restoring, stop all applications using devices
Will change data on Standard volume
Not like a backup restore, this is done without host knowledge
Never restore from a Force-Split BCV!

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Timefinder Scripting
Timefinder commands are run to establish and split BCV devices

BCV devices are usually presented to a separate backup server

Timefinder scripting operation sequence

symmir -g <group name> establish (can be run on any server)

symmir -g <group name> split (can be run on any server)
Import/mount scripts (to be run on the backup server)
Run operation for the BCV eg. backup, development etc.
Deport/umount scripts (to be run on the backup server)

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symmir establish, verify, query

# symmir -g bcvg1 establish

Execute 'Incremental Establish' operation for device group 'bcvg' (y/[n]) ? y

'Incremental Establish' operation execution is in progress for

device group 'bcvg'. Please wait...

'Incremental Establish' operation successfully initiated for device group 'bcvg'.

# symmir -g bcvg1 verify

All devices in group 'bcvg' are in the 'Synchronized or Restored' state.

# symmir -g bcvg1 verify -restored

None of the devices in group 'bcvg' are in the 'Restored' state.

# symmir -g bcvg1 query
. . .
Standard Device BCV Device State
------------------------- ------------------------------------ ------------
Inv. Inv.
Logical Sym Tracks Logical Sym Tracks STD <=> BCV
------------------------- ------------------------------------ ------------

std029 029 0 bcv011 011 * 0 Synchronized

. . .
(*): The paired BCV device is associated with this group.

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symmir split, restore, verify, query

# symmir -g bcvg1 split -noprompt
'Split' operation execution is in progress for
device group 'bcvg'. Please wait...
'Split' operation successfully executed for device group
'bcvg'.
# symmir -g bcvg1 verify
None of the devices in group 'bcvg' are in the 'Synchronized or Restored'
state.
# symmir -g bcvg1 -noprompt restore std029
'Incremental Restore' operation execution is in progress for device 'std029' in
device group 'bcvg'. Please wait...
'Incremental Restore' operation successfully initiated for device 'std029'
in group 'bcvg'.
# symmir -g bcvg1 query std029
. . .
Standard Device BCV Device State
------------------------- ------------------------------------ ------------
Inv. Inv.
Logical Sym Tracks Logical Sym Tracks STD <=> BCV
------------------------- ------------------------------------ ------------
std029 029 0 bcv011 011 * 0 Restored
. . .

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Instant Split Feature

Splits still serial but host perceives them as 50-100 times faster
Application processing can continue rapidly - no more long quiesce
times
Split continues in background while BCV and standard are ready
for access
Suitable for applications where split times impacted
I/O response (e.g. big metavolumes on NT )
Database availability (e.g. on striped volumes)

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