Back in 2017 with the release of Veeam Backup & Replication 9.5 Update 3 we have introduced a new major feature: centralized management for the Veeam Agents. Since then our Agents have been receiving more and more enterprise-oriented features and this new release is no exception.
With v4 of Veeam Agent for Linux we have added application support for PostgreSQL and MySQL, deduplication storage support and some CLI enhancements.
Application processing for PostgreSQL and MySQL
Veeam Agent for Linux has always had the ability to add custom pre-freeze and post-thaw scripts for your database backups, but you could only do that from within the Agent itself and that wasn’t quite “it just works” style and by far the most requested databases to support were PostgreSQL and MySQL. With Veeam Agent for Linux v4 you can finally create application-consistent backup of these databases in a very streamlined manner.
Unlike the Plug-ins (SAP HANA, RMAN, etc.), this capability is a backup processing technique similar to the Oracle processing included in Veeam Agent for Linux. Whether you have your databases running on physical or virtual machines, or maybe even in the cloud, Veeam Agent for Linux will help you maintain integrity and availability of your data.
We support three methods of authentication for PostgreSQL:
- Internal database user + password
- Database user and password are required. A dedicated Linux system account is not required.
- The user should have super-user rights to trigger checkpoint operation.
- Internal database user + password file
- Only database user is required. The corresponding password is supplied via /root/.pgpass file that must have 0600 permissions set (read and write).
- A dedicated Linux system account is not required.
- System user without password (peer authentication)
- User supplies only a user name of a system user that has a matching database user and a permission to connect without a password (for local connections only).
In case of MySQL, we support two options:
- Database user + password
- Database user and password are required. A dedicated Linux system account is not required.
- Database user + password file
- Only database user is required. The corresponding password is supplied via .my.cnf file.
- Default location: root home directory but can be specified via
--defaults-pathkey. - A dedicated Linux system account is not required.
It’s also important to note here that PostgreSQL and MySQL is only supported via Veeam Agent for Linux as of now, so if you have those databases virtualized and need application-aware processing, it might be a good idea to try Veeam Agent for Linux.
Deduplication storage support
I’ve talked to many customers who have been wondering when we’ll support storage X or storage Y as Veeam Agent for Linux backup repositories. Well, here’s some good news: the code that talks to the target storage is now universal for both Veeam Backup & Replication and Agents. This means that Veeam Agent for Linux doesn’t have to be aware of the target storage type.
This leads us to the subtitle above: Veeam Agent for Linux v4 is now capable of sending backups to the dedupe appliances, including Data Domain and StoreOnce.
Command line enhancements
If you decide to choose the CLI path of interacting with Veeam Agent for Linux, we have some new commands. The main command of them included in this release is the ability to add a network share as a repository. These are the parameters:
- type — accepts “nfs”, “cifs”, and local (assumed by default)
- username — available for “cifs” only
- domain — available only for “cifs” and if a username is specified
- password — optional, available only for “cifs” and if a username is specified.
- options (optional parameter) — allows to override the default values that Veeam Agent for Linux supplies (e.g. SMB protocol version, caching options, etc).
Example:
veeamconfig repository create --type cifs --location //172.xx.xxx.xx/Share --username Administrator --name myShared –password
Wrap up
These new Veeam Agent for Linux features, especially databases support, have been heavily requested but that’s not all the Linux love from Veeam: there is new also a new Linux Proxy, VIX, XFS support and more. Learn about them here.
Veeam keeps true to its promise to make your data available wherever that data resides. Whether you decide to manage your Linux Agents centralized, or use them as stand-alone solutions, we got you covered. Learn more about Veeam Agent for Linux v4 on the product page.
