Help Center/ Cloud Backup and Recovery/ Service Overview/ What Is CBR?
Updated on 2024-05-17 GMT+08:00
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What Is CBR?

Overview

Cloud Backup and Recovery (CBR) enables you to easily back up Elastic Cloud Servers (ECSs), Bare Metal Servers (BMSs), Elastic Volume Service (EVS) disks, SFS Turbo file systems, and on-premises VMware virtual environments. In case of a virus attack, accidental deletion, or software or hardware fault, you can use the backup to restore data to any point when the data was backed up.

CBR Architecture

CBR involves backups, vaults, and policies.

Backup

A backup is a copy of a particular chunk of data and is usually stored elsewhere so that it may be used to restore the original data in the event of data loss. There are the following types of backups:

  • Cloud disk backup: provides snapshot-based backups for EVS disks.
  • Cloud server backup: uses the consistency snapshot technology to protect data for ECSs and BMSs. Backups of non-database servers are non-database server backups, and those of database servers are application-consistent backups.
  • SFS Turbo backup: backs up data of SFS Turbo file systems.
  • Hybrid cloud backup: protects data of VMware VMs by storing their backups to the cloud. You can manage the backups on the CBR console.

Vault

CBR stores backups in vaults. Before creating a backup, you need to create at least one vault and associate the resources you want to back up with the vaults. Then the resources can be backed up to the associated vaults.

Different types of resources must be backed up to different types of vaults. For example, cloud servers must be backed up to server backup vaults, not disk backup vaults or any other types of vaults.

Policy

  • A backup policy defines when you want to take a backup and for how long you would retain each backup.
Figure 1 CBR architecture

Differences Among the Backup Types

Table 1 Differences among the backup types

Item

Cloud Server Backup

Cloud Disk Backup

SFS Turbo Backup

Hybrid Cloud Backup

What to back up

All disks (system and data disks) on a server

One or more specific disks (system or data disks)

SFS Turbo file systems

Backups of on-premises hosts and VMs

When to use

You want to back up entire cloud servers.

You want to back up only data disks.

You want to back up entire SFS Turbo file systems.

You want to manage backups of on-premises servers and restore data on the cloud.

Advantages

All disks on a server are backed up at a time.

Only data of specific disks is backed up, which costs less than backing up an entire server.

File system data and their backups are stored separately, and the backups can be used to create new file systems.

On-premises data can be backed up to the cloud and used to re-build services in the cloud.

Backup Mechanism

CBR in-cloud backup offers block-level backup. The first backup is a full backup and backs up all used data blocks. For example, if a disk size is 100 GB and 40 GB has been used, only the 40 GB of data is backed up. An incremental backup backs up only the data changed since the last backup to save the storage space and backup time.

When a backup is deleted, data blocks will not be deleted if they are depended on by other backups, ensuring that other backups can still be used for restoration. Both a full backup and an incremental backup can be used to restore data to a given backup point in time.

When creating a backup of a disk, CBR also creates a snapshot for it. CBR keeps only the latest snapshot. Every time it creates a new snapshot during backup, it deletes the old snapshot.

CBR stores backups in OBS to ensure data security.

Backup Options

CBR supports one-off backup and periodic backup. A one-off backup task is manually created and is executed only once. Periodic backup tasks are automatically executed based on a user-defined backup policy.

Table 2 compares the two backup options.

Table 2 One-off backup and periodic backup

Item

One-Off Backup

Periodic Backup

Backup policy

Not required

Required

Number of backup tasks

One manual backup task

Periodic tasks triggered by a preset backup policy

Backup name

User-defined backup name, which is manualbk_xxxx by default

System-assigned backup name, which is autobk_xxxx by default

Backup mode

The first backup is a full backup and the consecutive backups are incremental.

The first backup is a full backup and the consecutive backups are incremental.

Application scenario

Executed before patching or upgrading the OS or upgrading an application. A one-off backup can be used for restoration if the patching or upgrading fails.

Executed for routine maintenance. The latest backup can be used for restoration if an unexpected failure or data loss occurs.

You can also use the two backup options together if needed. For example, you can associate resources with a vault and apply a backup policy to the vault to execute periodic backup for all the resources in the vault. Additionally, you can perform a one-off backup for the most important resources to enhance data security. Figure 2 shows the use of the two backup options.

Figure 2 Use of the two backup options

Access to CBR

You can access the CBR service through the console or by calling HTTPS-based APIs.

  • Console

    Use the console if you prefer a web-based UI. Log in to the console and choose Cloud Backup and Recovery.

  • APIs

    Use APIs if you need to integrate CBR into a third-party system for secondary development. For details, see Cloud Backup and Recovery API Reference.