This page describes the MySQL and and other environmental requirements you should verify before running the install program. The ZRM for MySQL components required on each are described in /p/span, line 1, column 23: ")" expected.
Throughout this document, The MySQL Server refers the database server being backed up by the ZRM for MySQL Server, which also called the ZRM Server.
ZRM for MySQL backup server requirements
- To run the Rapid Installer, the ZRM Server requires 256MB of free memory. You should have at least 500MB of disk space, and you should not install the ZMC itself (/opt/zmanda/zrm) on an NFS partition.
- In addition to the space required for the software itself, you should ensure that there is always 10% free in the Zmanda installation and temporary directories. If ZRM for MySQL runs out of space on either of these directories while a backup is in progress, the backup will fail with MySQL errors similar to the following:
System Error
DBD::mysql::db do failed: Incorrect key file for table
'/var/tmp/#sql_24b8_0.MYI'; try to repair it at
/opt/zmanda/zrm/bin/amreport_wrapper line 105.
8:51:26, Mon Mar 17, 2008:ZMC Database Query failed: mysql query
failed:Incorrect key file for table '/var/tmp/#sql_24b8_0.MYI'; try to repair it
- If you encounter messages like this in the ZMC, try increasing the amount of available disk space in the relevant directories.
- Verify that the ZRM server has operating system accounts for a mysql user belonging to the mysql group. The account should have a login shell, and be able to execute commands on the ZRM server. If implementing a copy plugin to back up clients, matching accounts must be set up on the clients. The uid and gid of the mysql user must match on the ZRM server and the MySQL server (backup client).
- See the "Creating a MySQL Backup User Account" section below for details on the MySQL account.
- The Amanda server and client require that certain communication ports are open:
- The Amanda server must open inbound TCP ports 11000:11040.
- Non-Windows Amanda clients must open inbound TCP port 10080 and outbound TCP ports 11000:11040.
- Windows clients must open inbound TCP ports 10080 and 10081, and outbound TCP ports 700:800.
ZRM Server Package Dependencies
The following packages are required on the ZRM Server (32-bit versions of packages required):
Linux
- ZRM for MySQL requires the MySQL client commands listed below to be installed on the ZRM server. ZRM uses the following MySQL commands on the ZRM server:
- The MySQL client commands installed on the ZRM server must be compatible with the version of MySQL servers being backed up. Zmanda recommends installing the same version of MySQL software on the ZRM server and MySQL server.
- The ZRM server assumes that the MySQL backup client's MySQL commands are installed in /usr/bin/. You can change this default either globally or by backup set. If necessary, you can change the client command location and binary log location in {{web.html($Config_method)}}. See the MySQL subsection of the {{web.html($BS_Config_method)}} for details.
- perl: The Perl-DBI, Perl-DBD-MySQL, and perl-XML-Parser modules are also required. See the Perl installation notes section of the manual.
- mailx: The mailx package can be found as part of the OS distribution. The mailx package must be configured to send mail from the ZRM machine to the MySQL database backup administrator.
- compat-libstdc++-33-3: The GNU C and GNU C++ Compiler runtime libraries
These packages are installed by default on most Linux distributions. If you need to add them, you can use yum or apt-get, either from the distribution media, or from a distribution repository (run either as root):
#yum install package_name
or
#apt-get install package_name
Solaris 10 (Both Sparc and Intel Architectures)
- ZRM for MySQL requires the MySQL client commands listed below to be installed on the ZRM server. ZRM uses the following MySQL commands on the ZRM server:
- The MySQL client commands installed on the ZRM server must be compatible with the version of MySQL servers being backed up. Zmanda recommends installing the same version of MySQL software on the ZRM server and MySQL server.
- The ZRM server assumes that the MySQL backup client's MySQL commands are installed in /usr/bin/. You can change this default either globally or by backup set. If necessary, you can change the client command location and binary log location in {{web.html($Config_method)}}. See the MySQL subsection of the {{web.html($BS_Config_method)}} for details.
- perl: The Perl-DBI, Perl-DBD-MySQL, and perl-XML-Parser modules are also required. See the Perl installation notes section of the manual.
- mailx: The mailx package can be found as part of the OS distribution. The mailx package must be configured to send mail from the ZRM machine to the MySQL database backup administrator.
- gcc3g++rt: The GNU C++ Compiler runtime libraries
- CSWgcc3corert: The GNU C Compiler runtime libraries
The Zmanda Network downloads page collects all of these packages in a downloadable tar archive (which is made available after you select a platform to download). If necessary, download the tar archive to the local system, extract it, and run pkgadd as the superuser to install any necessary packages:
# pkgadd -d package_name
MySQL server (backup client) requirements
- Verify that the version(s) of MySQL server(s) that you deploy are supported by Zmanda Recovery Manager for MySQL. See Tested Platforms for details.
- If implementing a copy plugin to back up clients, you must set up an operating system account for the mysql user, with a UID and GID that match those on the ZRM server. This user must have read/write access to the MySQL data directory and binary logs.
Package dependencies for MySQL servers (backup clients)
ZRM for MySQL requires the 32-bit versions of all packages.
Linux
- perl: The Perl-DBI, Perl-DBD-MySQL, and perl-XML-Parser modules are also required. See the Perl installation notes section of the manual.
- xinetd
- sudo (required only for snapshot backup configurations)
- Gnu tar version 1.15 or later.
These programs are installed by default on most Linux distributions. If you need to add them, you can use yum or apt-get to install them, either from the distribution media, or from a distribution repository (you run either as root):
#yum install package_name
or
#apt-get install package_name
Solaris 10 (both Sparc and Intel Architectures)
- perl: The Perl-DBI, Perl-DBD-MySQL, and perl-XML-Parser modules are also required. See the Perl installation notes section of the manual.
- SUNWcsu
- SUNWsshcu
- SUNWgzip
- SMCtar (version 1.15.1 or greater)
- SMCgpgme
- SMCsudo (required only for snapshot backup configurations)
- SMCgrep
- SMCcoreu
The Zmanda Network downloads page collects all of these packages in a downloadable tar archive (which is made available after you select a platform to download). If necessary, download the tar archive to the local system, extract it, and run pkgadd as the superuser to install any necessary packages:
# pkgadd -d package_name
Windows (2003 Server, XP, and Vista)
Databases to be backed up must be stored on NTFS volumes with the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) enabled. Windows clients must open inbound TCP ports 10080 and 10081, and outbound TCP ports 700:800.
Creating a MySQL Backup User Account
We recommend creating a MySQL database user for ZRM backup and recovery instead of using the MySQL root user. If the MySQL database backup user and restore user are different, set the privileges of the backup user in {{web.html($BS_Config_method)}} for the backup set.
Restore user privileges can be specified on the mysql-zrm command line via the --user and --password options.
Although MySQL allows dollar signs ($) in passwords, the ZMC does not. If you must use passwords that include dollar signs at your site, consider using one of the alternative methods for storing MySQL user passwords described in the MySQL article "Keeping your Password Secure".
Required Privileges for the MySQL Account
MySQL backup and restore users need, at minimum, the following MySQL privileges:
- backup user
- LOCK TABLES, SELECT, FILE, RELOAD, SUPER, SHOW VIEW
- restore user
- CREATE, DROP, INDEX, SHUTDOWN, INSERT, ALTER, SUPER, REPLICATION CLIENT, CREATE VIEW
SHOW VIEW and CREATE VIEW privileges are required for MySQL server version 5.0 or greater.
MySQL backup user requires SUPER privileges even when MySQL replication is not being used. For incremental backups, ZRM for MySQL requires SUPER privileges to enable binary logging.
A MySQL replication slave backup user should have REPLICATION CLIENT privileges in addition to the above privileges.
Example: Command that grants minimal user privileges for database user dbabackup to backup and restore database expenses (which uses MySQL 4.x) remotely from machine server.company.com :
mysql> GRANT LOCK TABLES, SELECT, FILE, RELOAD, SUPER, CREATE, DROP, INDEX, SHUTDOWN, INSERT, ALTER, SUPER, REPLICATION CLIENT
-> ON expenses.*
-> TO 'dbabackup'@'server.company.com'
-> IDENTIFIED BY 'obscure';
ZRM for MySQL should be running on server.company.com. If you are restoring from logical backups, additional privileges will be required for the restore user. For example, if there are stored procedures in the logical backup image being restored, the restore user must have CREATE ROUTINE and ALTER ROUTINE privileges. If you are not sure of the list of privileges that are required for restoration, temporarily grant the restore user all privileges for the databases and/or tables being restored.
Note: If you are backing up remote MySQL server, backup user privileges should be granted for the backup user accessing from the MySQL server as well as the server running ZRM (ZRM server).
Binary Logs
Incremental backups of MySQL require that binary logging is enabled on the MySQL server. To enable binary logging, start the MySQL server daemon (mysqld) with the --log-bin option:
mysqld --log-bin=BinLogFilename
Note: Enabling binary logs on a MySQL server reduces performance by about 1%.
It is the best practice to store binary logs in a different file system than the file system containing the database directories.
Consult MySQL reference manual for more information on MySQL binary logs.
Requirements for Snapshot and Storage Checkpoint Backups
ZRM for MySQL can create temporary snapshots of the filesystems or storage volumes and use these snapshot volumes to do backups. If the database resides on a Veritas File System (VxFS), storage checkpoints can be leveraged.
Because snapshot and storage checkpoint mechanisms are faster than backups to other media, this reduces the time that database tables must be locked. These technologies create a consistent copy of the MySQL database with little impact on MySQL applications, and thus scale well as databases grow.
If the MySQL databases or tables use only transactional storage engines such as InnoDB, the time the application is locked is further reduced.
While taking snapshots of databases or tables that use non-transactional storage engines such as MyISAM, ZRM for MySQL flushes the database pages to the disk and obtains a read lock on the database(s) / table(s). The read lock is held only for a moment.
File system I/O is stopped before taking a snapshot when the database resides on the file systems that support freeze/thaw operations such as XFS, VxFS (Veritas file systems).
Snapshots of LVM (logical volume manager) in Linux platforms, VxFS (Veritas filesystems) Storage Checkpoints, VSS (Volume Shadow Services) on Windows, SnapManager (on Network Appliance filers), ZFS on Solaris platforms are supported.
All MySQL database files (data, log, indexes) must be stored on snapshot-capable storage volumes. If any of the files are not on snapshot cable storage volumes, snapshot backup method will not be used. Instead, raw backup via mysqlhotcopy is performed.
Snapshots and the pre-conditions for using them are discussed in more detail in the Snapshot Plugins Overview.
SSL Between MySQL Servers and ZRM server
SSL provides an additional layer of security while moving backups over a network. We recommended that you enable SSL on the MySQL server if the backups are performed on unsecured networks. Installing SSL between the local ZRM for MySQL server and remote MySQL server(s) is necessary only for logical backups of remote MySQL servers.
To verify the availability of SSL support in the MySQL server, you can either:
- Run the following command on the local server:
# mysqld --ssl --help
- When the SSL support does not exist, the system responds with a message like this:
060828 15:25:08 [ERROR] mysqld: unknown option '--ssl'
- Examine the value of the have_openssl system variable:
mysql> SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'have_openssl';
+---------------+-------+ | Variable_name | Value | +---------------+-------+ | have_openssl | YES | +---------------+-------+
Consult the MySQL reference manual for configuring SSL on MySQL.
Zmanda recommends using either of the two options given below to configure SSL when remote backups of MySQL servers done using unsecured networks.
- Set SSL parameters in the my.cnf file of MySQL on the ZRM server.
ssl-ca=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/cacert.pem ssl-cert=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/client-cert.pem ssl-key=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/client-key.pem
- Set SSL parameters for all backup set in mysql-zrm.conf file of ZRM for MySQL.
ssl-options="--ssl --ssl-ca=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/cacert.pem
--ssl-cert=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/client-cert.pem
--ssl-key=mySQL_conf_dir/openssl/client-key.pem"