Category Archives: Azure Backup

OMS and System Center: What's New in August 2018

In August have been announced, by Microsoft, a considerable number of news about Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. Our community releases this monthly summary that gives you a comprehensive overview of the main news of the month, in order to stay up to date on these news and have the necessary references to conduct further study.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Azure Log Analytics

As already announced in the article The management of Log Analytics from the Azure portal Microsoft has chosen to abandon the OMS portal, in favour of the Azure Portal. The date announced for the final withdrawal of the OMS portal is the 15 January 2019. As a result of this choice also creation of new workspace of Azure Log Analytics can be performed only from the Azure Portal. Trying to create a new workspace from the old OMS portal you will be redirected to the Azure portal to complete the task. Have not made any changes to REST API and PowerShell to create workspaces.

Even the Advanced Analytics Portal is incorporated into the Azure Portal. At the moment you can access this portal by logging on to Logs (preview) available in the workspace of Log Analytics.

Figure 1 - Advanced Analytics available in the Logs (preview) from the Azure Portal

 

Azure Automation

Managing updates through Azure Automation Update Management sees the addition of a new option for the deployment of the updates. When creating or editing an update deployment is now an option the Reboot, that allows you to control whether and when reboot systems. For more information please visit the official technical documentation.

Figure 2 – Reboot option available in the update deployment

In the functionality of Change Tracking the following changes have been made:

  • To track changes and make the inventory of the files in the Windows environment now you can use: recursion, wildcards, and environment variables. In Linux there is already the support for recursion and wildcards.
  • As for the changes that are processed in files, both Windows and Linux, introduced the ability to display the content of the changes.
  • Introduced the possibility to reduce the frequency with which Windows services are collected (frequency is expressed in seconds and runs from a minimum of 10 seconds to a maximum of 30 minutes).

Agent

This month the new version ofOMS agent for Linux systems fixes some bugs and introduces an updated version for several core components, that increase the stability, the safety and improve the installation process. Among the various news is introduced the support for Ubuntu 18.04. To obtain the updated version of the OMS agent you can access to the official GitHub page OMS Agent for Linux Patch v 1.6.0-163. In the case the OMS agent for Linux systems has been installed using the Azure Extension and if its automatic update is active, this update will be installed independently.

Figure 3 – Bug fixes and what's new for the OMS agent for Linux

 

Azure Site Recovery

For Azure Site Recovery was released theUpdate Rollup 27 introducing new versions of the following components:

  • Microsoft Azure Site Recovery Unified Setup/Mobility agent (version 9.18.4946.1): used for replication scenarios from VMware to Azure.
  • Microsoft Azure Site Recovery Provider (version 5.1.3550.0): used for replication scenarios from Hyper-V to Azure or to a secondary site.
  • Microsoft Azure Recovery Services agent (version 2.0.9125.0): used for replication scenarios from Hyper-V to Azure.

The installation of this update rollup is recommended in deployments where there are components and their respective versions below reported:

  • Unified Setup/Mobility agent version 9.14.0000.0 or later.
  • Site Recovery Provider (with System Center VMM): version 3.3. x. x or later.
  • Site Recovery Provider (for replication without VMM): version 5.1.3100.0 or later.
  • Site Recovery Hyper-V Provider: version 4.6. x. x or later.

For more information on the issues resolved, on improvements from this Update Rollup and to get the procedure for its installation is possible to consult the specific KB 4055712.

 

In Azure Site Recovery was introduced support for enabling disaster recovery scenarios Cross-subscription, for IaaS virtual machines, as long as belonging to the same Azure Active Directory tenant. This feature is very useful because often you have environments that use different Azure subscriptions, created primarily to have greater control of costs. Thanks to this new support you can more easily reach business continuity requirements creating disaster recovery plans without altering the topology of the Azure subscriptions in your environment.

Figure 4 - VM replica configuration to a different subscription target

 

Azure Site Recovery now can integrate with Veritas Backup Exec Instant Cloud Recovery (ICR) with the release of Backup Exec 20.2. Using ICR, Backup Exec users are able to configure replication of VMs on-premises to Azure and easily operate the DR plan if necessary, reducing the Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and the Recovery Time Objective (RTO). Instant Cloud Recovery requires a subscription Azure and supports Hyper-V and VMware virtual machines. For more details and references you can see thespecific announcement.

Azure Backup

In this interesting article there is the procedure to monitor all workloads protected by Azure Backup using Log Analytics.

System Center

System Center Configuration Manager

Released the version 1806 for the Current Branch (CB) of System Center Configuration Manager that introduces new features and major improvements in the product.

Among the main innovations of this update there is a new feature called CMPivot. It is a new utility available in the Configuration Manager console that can provide information in real time about connected devices in your environment. On this information you can apply filters and groupings, then perform certain actions.

Figure 5 – Features and benefits of CMPivot functionality

For a complete list of new features introduced in this version of Configuration Manager, you can consult theofficial announcement.

 

Released the version 1808 for the branch Technical Preview of System Center Configuration Manager. This update introduces the ability to perform a gradual release of software updates automatically. The button that allows you to configure this operation is shown in figure below and can be found in the console nodes All Software Updates, All Windows 10 Updates, and Office 365 Updates.

Figure 6 – Phased Deployment creation button

For more information about configuring Phased Deployments in Configuration Manager, you can refer to the Microsoft technical documentation .

I remind you that the releases in the Technical Preview Branch allows you to evaluate in preview new SCCM functionality and is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

 

System Center Operations Manager

Released the updated version of Microsoft System Center 2016 Management Pack for Microsoft Azure (version 1.5.20.18).

There are also the following news:

 

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To try out the various components of System Center you must access theEvaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

OMS and System Center: What's New in July 2018

Microsoft announces constantly news about Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. As usual our community releases this monthly summary that provides a general overview of the main new features of the month, in order to stay up to date on these topics and have the necessary references to conduct further exploration.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Azure Log Analytics

The possible integration of Azure Data Factory (ADF) with Azure Monitor lets you send usage metrics to Operations Management Suite (OMS). The new solution Azure Data Factory Analytics, available in the Azure marketplace, can provide an overview of the State of health of the Data Factory, allowing you to go into detail of the information collected. This can be very useful for troubleshooting. It is also possible to collect metrics from different data factories to the same workspace of OMS Log Analytics. For configuration details required to use this solution, you can see the official documentation.

Figure 1 – Overview of the new Azure Data Factory Analytics solution

In Log Analytics, query execution introduces the ability to easily select the workspace on which to execute the queries.:

Figure 2 - Selection of the workspace on which to perform the Log Analytics query

The same possibility is also introduced in Azure Application Insights Analytics. This feature is useful because in each query tab you can select the specific workspace, avoiding having to open Log Analytics in different browser tabs.

In case they are collected custom logs in Azure Log Analytics, a separate category was created called "Custom Logs", where they are grouped.

Figure 3 – Grouping of custom logs in the specific category

For workspace of Log Analytics present in the region of West Europe, East US, and West Central was announced the availability in public preview of Metric Alerts for logs. The Metric alerts for logs allow you to use data from Log Analytics as metrics of Azure Monitor. The types of supported logs has been extended and the complete list is available at this link. For more information please visit the official documentation.

Azure Backup

In Azure Pricing Calculator, the official Microsoft tool for estimating the cost of Azure services, has been made possible to obtain a more accurate estimate of the costs of Azure Backup, allowing you to specify different retention range for the Recovery Points.

Figure 4 – New parameters to make a more accurate estimate of costs of Azure Backup

 

Azure Site Recovery

For Azure Site Recovery was released theUpdate Rollup 26 introducing new versions of the following components:

  • Microsoft Azure Site Recovery Unified Setup/Mobility agent (version 9.17.4897.1): used for replication scenarios from VMware to Azure.
  • Microsoft Azure Site Recovery Provider (version 5.1.3400.0): used for replication scenarios from Hyper-V to Azure or to a secondary site.
  • Microsoft Azure Recovery Services agent (version 2.0.9122.0): used for replication scenarios from Hyper-V to Azure.

The installation of this update rollup is recommended in deployments where there are components and their respective versions below reported:

  • Unified Setup/Mobility agent version 9.13.000.1 or later.
  • Site Recovery Provider version 5.1.3000 or later.
  • Hyper-V Recovery Manager 3.4.486 or later.
  • Site Recovery Hyper-V Provider 4.6.660 or later.

For more information on the issues resolved, on improvements from this Update Rollup and to get the procedure for its installation is possible to consult the specific KB 4344054.

Azure Automation

Regarding Azure Automation has been introduced the possibility to configure the Hybrid Runbook Workers so that they can execute only runbooks digitally signed (the execution of unsigned runbooks not fail). The procedure to be followed is reported in this section of the Microsoft's article.

System Center

Following the first announcement of the Semi-Annual Channel release of System Center, took place in February with the version 1801, this month has been released the new update release, System Center 1807.

The update release 1807 introduces new features for Virtual Machine Manager and Operations Manager, while for Data Protection Manager, Orchestrator and Service Manager contains fixes for known issues (including bug fixes present in the UR5 for System Center 2016, released in April).

What's new in Virtual Machine Manager 1807
  • Supports selection of CSV for placing a new VHD
  • Display of LLDP information for networking devices
  • Convert SET switch to logical switch
  • VMware host management: VMM 1807 supports VMware ESXi v6.5 servers in VMM fabric
  • Support for S2D cluster update
  • Support for SQL 2017
What's new in Operations Manager 1807
  • Configure APM component during agent install or repair
  • Linux log rotation
  • HTML5 Web console enhancements
  • Support for SQL Server 2017
  • Operations Manager and Service Manager console coexistence

For further details please visit the Microsoft official documentation:

System Center 1807 can be download from System Center Evaluation Center.

For all System Center products (DPM, SCORCH, SM, SCOM and VMM) you can now Update existing deployments going from SQL server 2016 to SQL server 2017.

Please remember that the release belonging to the Semi-Annual Channel have support for 18 months.

System Center Configuration Manager

Released the version 1807 for the branch Technical Preview of System Center Configuration Manager. The main novelty in this release is l & #8217; introduction of the new Community hub, through which you can share scripts, reports, configuration items and more, about Configuration Manager. Through the community hub, accessible from the SCCM console, you can introduce into your environment solutions provided by the community.

Among the new features in this release are also:

  • Improvements to third-party software updates
  • Co-managed device activity sync from Intune
  • Approve application requests via email
  • Repair applications
  • Admin defined offline operating system image servicing drive
  • Improvements to run scripts

Please note that the Technical Preview Branch releases help you to evaluate new features of SCCM and it is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

System Center Operations Manager

In order to configure the connection between Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center Operations Manager you must import the following new management packs, version-specific:

This change to the MPs was made necessary to allow proper communication with new APIs of OMS Log Analytics, introduced after moving towards the Azure Portal of Log Analytics.

Figure 5 - SCOM Wizard for the OMS onboarding

It is reported the new wave of System Center Operations Manager management packs released for SQL Server, now lined up to version 7.0.7.0:

In July were also released the following Management Packs for the Open Source software, version 7.7.1129.0, which include the following news:

Apache HTTP Server

  • Supports Apache HTTP Server version 2.2 and 2.4
  • Provides monitoring of busy and idle workers
  • Provides monitoring of resource usage – memory and CPU
  • Provides statistics for virtual hosts such as “Requests per Minute” and “Errors per Minute”
  • Provides alerting for SSL Certificate expiration

MySQL Server

  • Supports MySQL Server version 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, 5.6, and 5.7
  • Supports MariaDB Server version 5.5, and 10.0
  • Provides monitoring of databases
  • Provides monitoring of disk space usage for server and databases
  • Provides statistics for Key Cache, Query Cache, and Table Cache
  • Provides alerting for slow queries, failed connections, and full table scans

The following new MPs have also been released by Microsoft:

  • MP for Active Directory Federation Services version 0.2.0
  • MP for Active Directory Federation Services 2012 R2 version 1.10172.1
  • MP for Microsoft Azure version 5.20.18

Please also note the new community version (1807) of the Azure Management Pack, issued by Daniele Grandini.

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To try out the various components of System Center, you can access theEvaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

OMS and System Center: What's New in June 2018

In June have been announced, by Microsoft, a considerable number of news about Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. Our community, through these articles released monthly, want to provide an overview of the main news of the month, in order to stay up to date on these arguments and have the necessary references for further information.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Log Analytics

Recently it was officially announced that the OMS portal will be deprecated, in favour of the Azure Portal. In this article are examined the aspects related to this change and what you should know to avoid being caught unprepared.

Figure 1 - Notifications in the OMS portal

Azure Backup

Azure Backup is enriched with an important new feature that allows you to natively protect SQL workload, running in IaaS virtual machines that reside in Azure. In this article are showed the benefits and the characteristics of this new feature.

Figure 2 – Protection of SQL Server on Azure VMs with Azure Backup

Released an updated version of the’Azure Backup agent (MARS), which can be obtained by accessing this link.

Using Azure Backup there is the possibility of generating the reports needed to be able to easily check the status of resource protection, details on the different backup jobs configured, the actual storage utilization and status of its alert. All this is made possible by using Power BI, allowing you to have a high degree of flexibility in the generation and customization of reports. In this video, recently published, there is show how to configure a Power BI workspace for sharing reports of Azure Backup within your organization. To analyze the steps required to configure the reporting of Azure Backup you can refer this article.

Figure 3 – Sharing PowerBI reports of Azure Backup

Azure Backup introduces the ability to protect workloads running on Azure Stack environment. The tenant who use the Azure Stack solution can then have a short term protection directly on the Azure Stack environment and can make use of Azure Recovery Service vault for long term retention and to perform offsite. For more details on this you can consult therelease announcement.

Figure 4 – Azure Stack Tenant backup with Microsoft Azure Backup Server

Azure Site Recovery

In Azure Site Recovery (ASR) was announced in "general availability (GA)" the ability to configure the Disaster Recovery (DR) of Azure Virtual Machines. Configuring the replication of virtual machines in different regions of Azure, you have the ability to make applications resilient to a fault affecting a specific Azure region. This feature is available in all the Azure regions where you can use ASR. Azure is the first public cloud to offer a native solution for Disaster Recovery for applications that run in IaaS.

During the preview, Microsoft has taken into account the different feedback from the customers and added to the solution, the following import capabilities:

We highlight these useful references regarding this solution:

Security and Audit

The solution Azure Network Security Group Analytics will be replaced by Traffic Analytics that was released in General availability (GA). This solution, fully cloud-based, allows you to have an overall visibility on network activities that are undertaken in the cloud environment. For more details about you can see "How to monitor network activities in Azure with Traffic Analytics"

System Center

System Center Data Protectrion Manager

In environments where System Center Data Protection Manager (SCDPM) is connected to Azure Backup service was introduced the ability to view all the items protected, details on the use of storage and information about the recovery points, direct from the Azure Portal, within the Recovery Service vault. This feature is supported for SCDPM 2012 R2, 2016 and for Azure Backup Server v1 and v2, as long as you have the latest version of Azure Backup Agent (MARS).

Figure 5 – Information from DPM outlined in Recovery Service vault

System Center Configuration Manager

It is usually released a technical preview per month in Configuration Manager, but this month, due to the considerable number of new features, they were released two.

The first is the version 1806 for the Technical Preview branch of System Center Configuration Manager. The main innovation introduced by this update is the addition of support for third-party software update catalogs. From the Configuration Manager console, you can easily subscribe to third-party software update catalogs, then publish updates via Software Update Point. These updates will be issued to the client by using the classic method of Configuration Manager to deploy software update.

Figure 6 – Access to third-party software update catalogs from the SCCM console

In addition to this new feature were released updates on:

  • Sync MDM policy from Microsoft Intune for a co-managed device
  • Office 365 workload transition in co-management
  • Configure Windows Defender SmartScreen settings for Microsoft Edge
  • Improvements to the Surface dashboard
  • Office Customization Tool integration with the Office 365 Installer
  • Content from cloud management gateway
  • Simplified client bootstrap command line
  • Software Center infrastructure improvements
  • Removed Network Access Account (NAA) requirement for OSD Boot Media
  • Removed Network Access Account (NAA) requirement for Task Sequences
  • Package Conversion Manager
  • Deploy updates without content
  • Currently logged on user information is shown in the console
  • Provision Windows app packages for all users on a device

The second is the version 1806.2 for the Technical Preview branch of System Center Configuration Manager, that mainly includes the following news related to the Phased deployment:

  • Ability to monitor the status natively, from the Deployments node.
  • Ability to create Phased deployment of applications and not just for task sequences.
  • Ability to carry out a gradual rollout during the deployment phase.

Also this preview contains updates regarding:

  • Management Insights for proactive maintenance
  • Mobile apps for co-managed devices
  • Support for new Windows app package formats
  • New boundary group options for optimized P2P behaviors
  • Third-party software updates support for custom catalogs
  • Compliance 9 – Overall health and compliance (Report)

Please note that the Technical Preview Branch releases help you to evaluate new features of SCCM and it is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

System Center Operations Manager

Released an updated version of the Management Pack for OS Windows Server 2016 and 1709 Plus which includes several updates and issues resolutions. For further information you can consult this article.

Released the version 8.2 of the MP Author that includes several improvements. For a list of what's new in this version you can see theofficial announcement of the release.

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To test the various components of System Center 2016 you can access theEvaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

Azure Backup: the protection of SQL Server in Azure Virtual Machines

Azure Backup is enriched with an important new feature that allows you to natively protect SQL workload, running in IaaS virtual machines that reside in Azure. In this article we will explore the benefits and the characteristics of this new feature.

Figure 1 - Protection with Azure backups of SQL Server in Azure VMs

Azure Backup has always been with an approach cloud-first allowing you to protect your systems quickly, safe and effective. The SQL Server protection in Azure IaaS virtual machines provides the only solution of its kind, characterised by the following elements:

  • Zero-backup infrastructure: you do not need to maintain a classic backup infrastructure, composed from the backup server, by various agents installed on systems and storage that host backups. Furthermore, nor is it required to use backup scripts, often needed in other backup solutions, to protect SQL Server.
  • Monitor backups by Recovery Services Vault: Using the dashboard, you can easily and intuitively monitor various backup jobs for all types of workloads protected: Azure IaaS VMs, Azure Files and SQL server databases. You can also set up email notifications against unsuccessful backup or restore.
  • Centralized management: you have the option to configure common protection policy, usable for databases residing on separate servers, where is defined the scheduling and the retention for short-term and long-term backup.
  • Restore DB to a precise date and time: an intuitive graphical interface allows the operator to restore the most appropriate recovery point for the selected date. Azure Backup will take care of managing the restoration of full backups, differential and log backup chain in order to get the database at the selected time.
  • Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of 15 minutes: You can back up the transaction log every 15 minutes.
  • Pay as you go service (PAYG): billing takes place monthly on the basis of consumption and there are no upfront costs for the service.
  • Native integration with SQL Server APIs: Azure Backup invokes the native APIs of the solution to ensure a high efficiency and reliability of the operations performed. Backup jobs can be viewed using SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS).
  • Support for Always On Availability Group: the solution is able to back up databases that reside within an Availability Group (AG), ensuring the protection in case of failover events, honoring the preference backup set at the AG level.

This new feature supports the following versions of the operating system and SQL Server, independently that are VMs are generated by a marketplace image or less (SQL Server installation done manually).

Supported operating systems

  • Windows Server 2012
  • Windows Server 2012 R2
  • Windows Server 2016

Linux, at the moment, is not supported.

Supported SQL Server VersionsEditions

  • SQL 2012 Enterprise, Standard, Web, Developer, Express
  • SQL 2014 Enterprise, Standard, Web, Developer, Express
  • SQL 2016 Enterprise, Standard, Web, Developer, Express
  • SQL 2017 Enterprise, Standard, Web, Developer, Express

To take advantage of this feature, the following requirements must be met:

  • Have a Recovery Services vault in the same region where resides the Azure virtual machine hosting SQL databases to be protected.
  • The virtual machine with SQL Server need connectivity to Azure public IPs.
  • On the virtual machine that holds the databases to be protected must be present specific settings. Azure Backup requires the presence of the VM extension AzureBackupWindowsWorkload. This extension is installed in the virtual machine during the process of discovery and enables communication with Azure Backup. The extension installation involves the creation in the VM, by Azure Backup, of the Windows virtual service account named NT Service AzureWLBackupPluginSvc. This virtual service account needs permissions of log in and sysadmin on SQL side, to protect your databases.

To enable the backup of SQL workloads in virtual machine in Azure it is necessary to carry out a process of discovery and later you can configure the protection.

Discovery process

This paragraph shows the procedure to be followed, by accessing the Azure Portal, to enable discovery of databases:

Figure 2 – Initiation of the discovery process

Figure 3 – Discovery in progress

Figure 4 – Discovery of DBs on selected systems

 

Configuring SQL backup

After the discovery phase of the the databases you can proceed with the configuration of SQL Server backup.

Figure 5 - Start the backup configuration, post DBs discovery inside the VMs

Figure 6 – Selection of DBs to be protected

Figure 7 – Creation of the policy that defines the type of SQL backup and data retention

Figure 8 – Enabling backup

 

Backup monitor and restore process

Figure 9 – Dashboard of the Recovery Service vault

Figure 10 - Number of backup items of SQL in Azure VMs

Figure 11 – SQL backup status

By selecting the single DB you can start the restore process.

Figure 12 - Starting the restore process of the DB

Figure 13 – Selecting the destination where to restore the DB

Figure 14 – Selecting the restore point to use

Figure 15 – Restore settings and directories where to place the files

Figure 16 – Starting the restore job

 

The Cost of the Solution

The cost for the protection of SQL Server in Azure Backup is calculated on the number of instances protected (individual Azure VMs or Availability Groups). The cost of a single protected instance depends on the size, which is determined by the overall size of the various protected DBs (without considering the amount of compression and encryption). At this cost it has to be added the cost of Azure storage actually consumed. This is Block Blob Storage including locally redundant storage (LRS) or geo-redundant storage (GRS). For more details on costs please visit the Microsoft's official page.

 

Conclusions

Azure Backup is enhanced with an important feature and confirms to be a great enterprise solution for systems protection, wherever they are. With this feature, Azure differs from any other public cloud, providing a solution for the protection of SQL Server in IaaS virtual machines, totally integrated into the platform. For more information on Azure Backup solution you can consult the official documentation.

OMS and System Center: What's New in May 2018

Compared to what we were used to seeing in recent months, in the month of may, have been announced by Microsoft a few news about Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. This article will summarize bringing the references needed to conduct further studies.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Log Analytics

Microsoft announced the retirement, starting from 8 June 2018, of the following solutions:

This means that, as of this date, you can no longer add this solutions in the Log Analytics workspaces. For those who are currently using it, is appropriate to consider that the solution will still work, but will be missing its support and will not be released new updates.

In this article are reported some important recommendations that should be followed when using the operators "Summarize" and "Join" in Log Analytics and Application Insights query. It is recommended to adjust the syntax of any existing query, using these operators, to comply with the specifications given in the article.

Security and Audit

It should be noted this interesting article where it is shown how you can detect and investigate unusual and potentially malicious activities using Azure Log Analytics and Security Center.

Azure Site Recovery

Microsoft has announced that the following versions of the REST API of Azure Site Recovery will be deprecated since 31 July 2018:

  • 2014-10-27
  • 2015-02-10
  • 2015-04-10
  • 2015-06-10
  • 2015-08-10

You will need to use at least version API 2016-08-10 to interface with Azure Site Recovery. This type of change has no impact on the portal of Azure Site Recovery and to the solution access via PowerShell.

System Center

System Center Orchestrator

The Integration Packs of Orchestrator, version 7.3 for System Center 2016, have been released.
The download can be done at this link and includes the following components:

  • System Center 2016 Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Configuration Manager.
  • System Center 2016 Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Data Protection Manager.
  • System Center 2016 Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Operations Manager.
  • System Center 2016 Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Service Manager.
  • System Center 2016 Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Virtual Machine Manager.

These Integration Packs allow you to develop automation, interfacing directly with the other components of System Center. The Integration Pack for System Center 2016 Operations Manager has been revised to require no more the presence of the Operations Manager console to function correctly.

System Center Operations Manager

Following, are updates released for Operations Manager Management Packs:

  • Active Directory Federation Services version 10.0.1.0
  • Active Directory Federation Services 2012 R2 version 7.1.10100.1

System Center Service Management Automation

Service Management Automation sees the release ofUpdate Rollup 5. Among the issues addressed are:

  • Runbooks that, using cmdlets of System Center 2016 Service Manager, fail with the error "MissingMethodException".
  • Runbooks that fail with the exception "unauthorized access".

Improvements have also been made in the debug logging.

To see the complete list of issues and the details on how to upgrade, you can access to the specific knowledge base.

 

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To test the various components of System Center 2016 you can access theEvaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

Azure Backup: as the solution evolves

Microsoft recently announced important news regarding the protection of virtual machines using Azure Backup. Thanks to an update of the backup stack you can get consistent improvements that make the solution more powerful and extend the potential. In this article will be investigated the benefits obtained by the update and will be examined the steps to switch to the new backup stack.

Features introduced by the new backup stack

Instant Recovery points and performance improvements

The Azure Backup job for the protection of virtual machines can be divided into two distinct phases:

  1. Creating a snapshot of the VM.
  2. Snapshot transfer to a Recovery Service vault.

Figure 1 - Steps of the backup job

Updating the backup stack, the recovery point is made available immediately after you create the virtual machine snapshot (Phase 1), and it is usable for restore operations according to the known methods. Unlike before that it was possible to use it only at the end of phase 2. From the Azure portal it is possible to distinguish the type of recovery point, as at the end of phase 1, the recovery point type is defined as "snapshots", while at the end of the snapshot transfer to the backup vault, the recovery point type is marked as "snapshot and vault".

The snapshots created during the backup process are maintained for 7 days. With this change are reduced considerably the execution time of the restore, carried out using the snapshots, which can be used in the same way to the checkpoint created by Hyper-V or VMware.

Support for large disks

The new backup stack also allows you to protect disks of size up to 4TB, both typologies: managed and unmanaged. Previously the limit in the maximum size of protected disks was 1 TB.

Distribution of disks during the recovery of virtual machines

After the upgrade of the backup stack you have the option to choose where to place the disks unmanaged of the virtual machines during the restore process. This reduces the configurations that would be necessary, post restore activities, putting all disks within the same storage account.

The Upgrade process

In order to enjoy the benefits introduced by the new backup stack you must manually upgrade your subscription which owns the Recovery Service Vault in the manner later described.

Consideration Pre-Upgrade

Before dealing with the upgrade of the stack you should consider the following aspects:

  • Since the upgrade is enabled at the Azure subscription level, the method of performing backups is changed for all protected virtual machines, present in the specific subscription. In the future it will be possible to have more granular control of this upgrade process.
  • The snapshots are saved locally to speed up the process of creation of the recovery point and to increase the speed of the restore processes. This means that there will be costs for the storage used by the snapshots preserved for 7 days.
  • The incremental snapshots are saved as page blob. For those who use managed disks there are no additional costs, while those using unmanaged disks must also consider the cost of the saved snapshots (during the 7 days) in the local storage account.
  • In the event of restore of a premium VM, starting from a snapshot recovery point, will be present, when creating the VM performed by the restore process, a temporary storage location.
  • For premium storage account you need to consider an allocation of 10 TB, for snapshots created for the purpose of instant recovery.

How to upgrade

The upgrade can be performed directly from the Azure portal or through PowerShell commands.

By accessing the Recovery Service vault from Azure portal, a notification will appear which indicates the ability to perform the backup stack upgrade.

Figure 2 – Backup stack upgrade notification

Selecting the notification the following message will appear that allows you to start the upgrade process.

Figure 3 - Launch of the backup stack upgrade process

The same operation can be performed using the following Powershell commands:

Figure 4 – Powershell commands to register the subscription to the upgrade process

Upgrade backup stack generally takes several minutes (maximum two hours), but it has no impact on scheduled backups.

Considerations

This major update of the Azure Backup stack shows that the solution is evolving to expand its capabilities and to ensure higher performance levels. To make a contribution with new ideas or vote the features that are considered most important for Azure Backup you can access this page. For more details on Azure Backup you can see the Microsoft's official documentation.

OMS and System Center: What's New in April 2018

Microsoft announces constantly news about Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. Our community releases this summary monthly, allowing you to have a general overview of the main new features of the month, in order to stay up to date on these news and have the necessary references to conduct further study.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Log Analytics

Microsoft has decided to extend the Alerts in Log Analytics from OMS to the Azure Portal, centralizing on Azure Monitor. This process will be done automatically starting from 14 May 2018 (the date has been postponed, Initially it was planned for 23 April), will not result in any change to the configuration of Alerts and related queries, and it does not foresee any downtime for its implementation. For further details please consult the specific article “The extension of Log Analytics Alerts in Azure Monitor“.

Figure 1 – Notification of alerts extension in the OMS portal

To avoid situations where, the resources managed in Log Analytics may send in an unexpected way a high volume of data to the OMS Workspace, is introduced the ability to set a Daily Volume cap. This allows you to limit the data ingestion for your workspace. You can configure the Data volume cap in all regions, accessing to the section Usage and estimated costs:

Figure 2 – Setting the Daily volume cap

The portal also shows the trend of the volume of data in the last 31 days and the total volume of data, grouped by solution:

Figure 3 – Data ingestion for solution (latest 31 days and total)

Log Search API usage, used by the old Log Analytics query language, has been deprecated since 30 April 2018. The Log Search API has been replaced with theAzure Log Analytics REST API, which supports the new query language and introduces greater scalability than the results you can return. For more details on this you can consult theofficial announcement.

Agent

This month the new version ofOMS agent for Linux systems resolves a significant number of bugs and introduces new versions of the various components. It also introduced support for Debian 9, AWS 2017 and Open SSL 1.1. To obtain the updated version of the OMS agent you can access to the official GitHub page OMS Agent for Linux Patch v 1.6.0-42.

Figure 4 – Bug fixes and what's new for the OMS agent for Linux

Azure Backup

As for Azure Backup, have been announced the following improvements in service scalability:

  • Ability to create up to 500 recovery services vaults in every subscription for region (previously the limit was 25).
  • The number of virtual machines that can be registered in each vault is increased to 1000 (it was previously 200).

Azure Backup, for the protection of Azure Iaas VM, now supports the storage account secured using storage firewalls and Virtual Networks. More details about this can be found on Microsoft's official blog.

Figure 5 - Protection of Azure Iaas VM in storage protected scenarios

There are different rules to enable the long-term backup for Azure SQL Database . The procedure, to keep the backup of Azure SQL DB up to 10 years, expected saving in an Azure Recovery Vault Service. By introducing this new feature, you have the option to keep the long-term backup directly within an Azure Blob Storage and will terminate the need for a Recovery Vault Service. All this gives you more flexibility and greater control of costs. For more details about it you can see the article SQL Database: Long-term backup retention preview includes major updates.

System Center

System Center Configuration Manager

For System Center Configuration Manager has been released the version 1804 for the Technical Preview branch. In addition to general improvements in the solution this update introduce new features concerning the OSD, the Software Center and the Configuration Manager infrastructure. All the new features included in this update can be found in the article Update 1804 for Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch. Please note that the Technical Preview Branch releases help you to evaluate new features of SCCM and it is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

System Center Operations Manager

Microsoft has released theUpdate Rollup 5 (UR5) for System Center 2016 Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC). This update does not introduce new features, but fixes several bugs.

Following, are the references, about this update, for each System Center product:

There are no updates regarding Service Provider Foundation.

System Center Operations Manager 1801 introduces support for Kerberos authentication when the protocol WS-Management is used from the management server for the communication with UNIX and Linux systems. This allows you to have a higher level of security, eliminating the need to enable basic authentication for Windows Remote Management (WinRM).

Also in System Center Operations Manager 1801 introduces the following improvements on the management of the Linux log file monitor:

  • Support for Wild Card characters in the name and path of the log file.
  • Support for new match patterns that allow customized searches of log.
  • Support for pluging Fluentd published by fluentd community.

Below there are the news concerning the Management Pack of SCOM:

  • MP for Windows Server Operating System 2016 and 1709 Plus 10.0.19.0
  • MP for SQL Server 2008-2012 7.0.4.0
  • MP for SQL Server 2014 7.0.4.0
  • MP for SQL Server 2016 7.0.4.0
  • MP for Microsoft SQL Azure Database 7.0.4.0
  • MP for SQL Server Dashboards 7.0.4.0
  • MP for UNIX and Linux 7.6.1085.0

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To test the various components of System Center 2016 you can access theEvaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

OMS and System Center: What's New in March 2018

In March there have been several news announced by Microsoft on Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. In this series of articles, which we make with monthly basis, are listed all the main innovations of the current month, accompanied by the necessary references to be able to conduct further studies.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Azure Automation

In Azure Automation new features have been officially released that allow you to:

  • Manage the distribution of updates (Update management).
  • Collect inventory information about the applications installed on systems (Inventory).
  • Track changes made on the machines (Change tracking).

The our article, posted in recent months, shows how to configure the Azure Automation Account to take advantage of these new features and reports the key features.

Figure 1 – Related solutions in Log Analytics


Azure Backup

Azure Backup introduces several new features that address the following aspects:

  • Large disk support: ability to protect disks of size up to 4 TB, both typologies: managed and unmanaged. The limit was previously of 1 TB.
  • Backup and Restore performance improvements: to reduce the execution time of the backup and restore will be retained snapshots, performed during the backup process, for 7 days.
  • Instant recovery point: the recovery point is made available instantly at the moment of creation of the snapshot made by the backup job, in a similar way to the checkpoint created by Hyper-V or VMware.
  • Distribute the disks of restored VM: during the restore process you are given the opportunity to choose where to place the disks unmanaged of virtual machines. This reduces the configurations, post restore activities, that would be required putting all disks within the same storage account .

To take advantage of these improvements you need to upgrade your subscription which owns the Recovery Service Vaults. The upgrade can be performed directly from the Azure Portal (there will be an appropriate notification in the dashboard of the Recovery Service vault ) or via PowerShell commands. For further information you can consult theMicrosoft's official announcement.

Figure 2 – Subscription upgrade process at the new stack

Microsoft has also announced that the Azure Backup service is now also available in the regions of Azure France (France Central and France South).

 

System Center

Microsoft has officialized the release of Windows Server 2019 which will be available to the public in the second half of 2018. In the same time will be made available System Center 2019 and it will have full support for Windows Server 2019 from the very first day of release.

System Center Configuration Manager

During the month has been released the version 1802 for the Current Branch (CB) of System Center Configuration Manager that introduces new features and major improvements in the product.

This summarizes the areas impacted by this update:

Modern Management

  • Endpoint Protection workload transition in co-management
  • Management insights
  • Co-management reporting

Figure 3 – Co-management reporting

Microsoft 365 Adoption

  • Phased deployments
  • Windows AutoPilot Device Information report
  • Support for Windows 10 ARM64 devices
  • Surface Device Dashboard
  • Microsoft Edge browser policies
  • Report to show default browser for client machines
  • Windows 10 Servicing for a specific collection report
  • Improvements to Office 365 client management dashboard
  • Improvements for Windows Defender Exploit Guard
  • New settings for Windows Defender Application Guard

Streamlined Infrastructure

  • Configure Windows 10 Delivery Optimization to use Configuration Manager boundary groups
  • Add management points to your boundary group fallback relationships
  • Moving Distribution Points between sites

Improvements in Cloud Management Gateway

  • Cloud management gateway support for Azure Resource Manager
  • Install user-available applications on Azure AD-joined devices
  • Windows 10 in-place upgrade task sequence over the Internet

Improvements in Software Center

  • Approve application requests for users per device
  • Improvements to client settings for Software Center

Improvements in OSD

  • Improvements to Windows 10 in-place upgrade task sequence
  • Deployment Template for Task Sequences

Miscellaneous Improvements

  • Support for hardware inventory strings greater than 255 characters in length
  • Run scripts

Figure 4 – Run Script status

To see the complete list of new features and to get more details about it you can access the Microsoft's official documentation.

The update will be made available globally in recent weeks and will be displayed in the node "Updates and Servicing" in the SCCM console. To force the availability of this update you can use this PowerShell script.

For System Center Configuration Manager has been released the version 1803 for the Technical Preview branch. In addition to general improvements in the solution are introduced useful changes that can improve the Configuration Manager infrastructure. Furthermore, interesting improvements have been made to the Software Center. All the new features included in this update can be found in the article Update 1803 for Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch.

Please note that the Technical Preview Branch releases help you to evaluate new features of SCCM and it is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

System Center Updates Publisher

System Center Updates Publisher (SCUP) is the Microsoft solution that allows you to manage custom third-party update. This month a new version of SCUP has been officially released and can be downloaded at this link. The new release introduces support for Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016. All details about this release can be found in the’official announcement.

System Center Operations Manager

Following, are reported the news about Management Packs of SCOM:

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To try System Center products you can access to the’Evaluation Center and after the registration you can start the trial period.

OMS and System Center: What's New in February 2018

The month of February was full of news and there are different updates that affected Operations Management Suite (OMS) and System Center. This article summarizes in concise terms to have a global vision and it contains the necessary references to learn more about it.

Operations Management Suite (OMS)

Log Analytics

Everyone who uses Azure ExpressRoute will be glad to know that you can now monitor it by using the Network Performance Monitor (NPM). This feature has been in previews for a few months and has now passed in the state of general availability. Among the features of this monitor solution we find:

  • Ability to view interactively, using the topology view of NPM, the various components (network on-premises, circuit provider edge, circuit ExpressRoute, edge Microsoft, and the Azure VMs) and latency measured in each hop. This allows you to easily identify any performance issues in connectivity and quickly locate the problematic segment of communication.
  • Ability to view the bandwidth usage of primary and secondary ExpressRoute circuit . Thanks to drill-down is also possible to intercept the bandwidth usage for each vNet connected to the ExpressRoute circuit.
  • Ability to create queries and custom views thanks to the fact that all details of the solution are available in the repository of Log Analytics and therefore you can use the native search functionality and correlation to suit your needs.
  • Ability to diagnose various problems of connectivity present in ExpressRoute circuit .

Figure 1 – Azure ExpressRoute Monitoring

For more information about how to configure the ExpressRoute monitor with NPM please visit the Microsoft's official documentation.

Also in Network Performance Monitor (NPM) was introduced the Service Endpoint Monitor with the integration into the monitor and into the performance of your application also of the performance end-to-end of the network. This feature allows you to create different types of tests (HTTP, HTTPS, TCP and ICMP), that must be carried out in key points of the network infrastructure, so you can quickly identify whether the problem encountered is related to the network or is related to the application. Through the use of the network topology map the problem and its nature is easily locatable. This is a feature in public preview whose characteristics are described in detail in this article.

Agent

This month the new version ofOMS agent for Linux systems fixes some bugs and also introduces an updated version of the components SCX and OMI. To obtain the updated version of the OMS agent you can access to the official GitHub page OMS Agent for Linux Patch v 1.4.4-210.

Figure 2 – Bug fixes and what's new for the OMS agent for Linux

Azure Backup

In this article is described how to build the solution of monitor in Log Analytics for Azure Backup. With this monitor solution, you can control the main aspects of Azure Backup as the backup and restore jobs, backup alert and use of cloud storage. You can do all cross Recovery Service vault and cross subscription, being able to take advantage of the features built into Log Analytics, such as the automated opening of ticket via webhooks or through integration with ITSM. It is a community solution, and each contributed is obviously welcome.

For Azure Backup was announced (in general availability) the possibility of creating consistent backups at the application layer for Linux virtual machines running on Azure. On Windows systems this is done using the VSS component, while for Linux VM it is made available one scripting framework through which you can run the pre-scripts and post-scripts to control the backup execution.

Figure 3 – Mechanism for realization of backup application consistent in VMs Linux on Azure

For more details on this you can consult theofficial announcement, while for more information about Linux virtual machine protection in Microsoft Azure, using Azure Backup, you can view the article: Azure Backup: the protection of Linux on Azure.

Azure Backup introduces the ability to protect natively Azure File Shares. This feature is currently in Public Preview and the main features are:

  • Chance, accessing Recovery Service vault, to make the discovery of storage acccount and detect files shares unprotected.
  • Large-scale protection: there is the possibility to back up multiple file shares contained in a storage account and apply a common security policy.
  • Instant and granular restore. The protection is based on file share snapshots and this allows you to quickly restore files selectively.
  • From the Azure portal you can explore the different restore point available to easily identify which files to restore.

Figure 4 – Backup of Azure File Shares

For further information you can consult theofficial announcement.

This month has been released a Mandatory Update for the Microsoft Azure Recovery Services agent (MARS). For all those who use Azure Backup you must install this update as soon as possible to avoid failures in backup and recovery tasks.

Azure Site Recovery

In Azure Site Recovery was made available a wait functionality, that allows to protect virtual machines having managed disk, in the replication scenario between different Azure regions, allowing greater flexibility for Disaster Recovery scenarios with systems in Azure.

Figure 5 – Enabling replication of a VM with Managed Disks

System Center

As announced in the last few months and as is already the case for the operating system and Configuration Manager, also the others System Center products, in particular, Operations Manager, Virtual Machine Manager, and Data Protection Manager will follow a release of updated versions every 6 months (semi-annual channel). This month there was the first release with the version 1801 of System Center.

Figure 6 – Summary of what's new in version 1801 of System Center

To know the details of what is new in this release, please consult the official announcement. Please remember that for belonging to the semi-annual channel support is guaranteed 18 months.

System Center Configuration Manager

Released the version 1802 for the branch Technical Preview of System Center Configuration Manager: Update 1802 for Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch.

This release introduces a considerable number of innovations on different areas, including: OSD, Cloud Management Gateway, features of Windows 10 and Office 365, Software Center and Site Server High Availability.

Please note that the Technical Preview Branch releases help you to evaluate new features of SCCM and it is recommended to apply these updates only in test environments.

System Center Operations Manager

The feature called "Updates and Recommendations", introduced in SCOM 2016 for Management Packs from Microsoft, is useful to facilitate the process of discovery of appropriate MPs to monitor different workloads present in your infrastructure and keep them updated. This feature is enabled by well over 110 Microsoft workloads. Microsoft announced that it is extending this feature also for MPs produced and offered by third parties. In release 1801 of Operations Manager are currently covered MPs of the following external partners:

Figure 7 – Feature Updates and Recommendations with MPs of partners

As a result of the release of version 1801 of System Center were also made available the following new SCOM Management Packs:

System Center Service Manager

Released an new version of the Service Manager Authoring Tool.

Evaluation of OMS and System Center

Please remember that in order to test and evaluate for free Operations Management Suite (OMS) you can access this page and select the mode that is most appropriate for your needs.

To test the various components of System Center 2016 you can access theEvaluation Center and, after registering, you can start the trial period.

Azure Backup: the protection of Linux on Azure

Azure Backup is a Microsoft cloud-based data protection solution that, making available several components, allows you to back up your data, regardless of their geographical location (on-premises or in the cloud) toward a Recovery Service vault in Azure. This article will examine the main aspects concerning the protection of Linux virtual machines present in Microsoft Azure, using Azure Backup.

In the security scenario of Azure Iaas virtual machines (Infrastructure as a Service) do not need any backup server, but the solution is completely integrated into the Azure fabric and are supported all Linux distributions approved to run in Azure environment, with the exception of Core OS. The protection of other Linux distributions is also allowed provided that there is the possibility to install the virtual machine VM agent and there is support for Python.

How Azure back up Linux VM

On Linux systems are installed, during the execution of the first backup job, a specific extension called VMSnapshotLinux, through which Azure Backup, during job execution, pilot taking snapshots that are transferred to the Recovery Service vault.

Figure 1 – Principles of backing up Azure IaaS VM with Azure Backup

To have an effective data protection you should be able to make consistent backups at the application layer. Azure Backup by default for Linux virtual machines creates consistent backups at file system level but can also be configured to create application-consistent backup. On Windows systems this is done using the VSS component, while for Linux VM it is made available one scripting framework through which you can run the pre-scripts and post-scripts to control the backup execution.

Figure 2 – Application-consistent backups in Linux VM on Azure

Azure Backup before starting the virtual machine snapshot creation process invokes the pre-script, if this is completed successfully the snaspshot is created, at the end of which runs the post-script. The scripts are fully customizable by the user and they need to be created according to specific characteristics of the application present on the virtual machine. For more details please visit the Microsoft's official documentation.

How to enable the backup of Linux virtual machines running on Azure

Recently it has been introduced the possibility to enable from the Azure portal the protection of virtual machines already from the moment of creation:

Figure 3 - Enabling backup when creating the VM

Alternatively you can enable the protection after creating the virtual machine by selecting it from the Recovery Service vault or by accessing the blade of the VM in the section Operations – Backup. From the same panel, you can view the status of backups.

File Recovery of Linux virtual machine on Azure

Azure Backup, besides the possibility to restore the entire virtual machine, also allows for Linux systems to restore individual files using the File Recovery feature. To do this you can follow these steps below.

From the Azure portal, you select the virtual machine for which you need to restore the files and in the Backup section you start the task of File Recovery:

Figure 4 - Starting the process of File Recovery

At this point will appear the panel where you must select the recovery point that you want to use for the restore operation. Then press the button Download Script which generates a script with extension .sh, and password, that is used to mount the recovery point as system's local disk.

Figure 5 – Recovery Point selection and script download

The script must be copied on the Linux machine and to do that you can use WinSCP:

Figure 6 – Copy of the script on the Linux machine

By accessing the Linux system in terminal mode, you must assign execution permission to the copied script , using the command chmod +x and then you can run the script:

Figure 7 – Script for File Recovery

At the time of the execution the script requires the password which is shown in the Azure portal and then proceed with steps for making your recovery point connection via iSCSI channel and mount it as file system.

Now you can access the mount point path which exposes the selected recovery point and restore or consult the necessary files:

Figure 8 – Access to the path of the mount point

After completing the restore operation is appropriate to make an unmount of the discs through the appropriate button from the Azure portal (in any case the connection to the mountpoint is closed forcefully after 12 hours) and you need to run the script with the parameter -clean to remove the path of the recovery point from the machine.

Figure 9 – Unmount disks and removing mount points from the machine

If in the VM for which you want to restore the files are present LVM partitions, or RAID arrays you must perform the same procedure, but on a different Linux machine to avoid conflicts in the discs.

Conclusions

Azure Backup is a fully integrated solution in the Azure fabric that allows you to protect easily and with extreme effectiveness even Linux virtual machines present on Azure. All this happens without the need to implement complex infrastructure for the data protection. Azure Backup also helps to protect many large-scale systems and to maintain a centralized control of the data protection architecture.