Discover and protect VMware VMs

Use the onboarding wizard to discover VMware virtual machines (VMs) managed by a vCenter or by an individual ESXi server. Once you discover one or more applications, you can protect them all at once by applying a backup template and profile or you can add them to the applications list as unmanaged or ignored VMs.

To discover and protect VMware VMs:

  1. In the management console, click the App Manager drop-down menu and select Applications.

  2. Click Add Application.

  3. Select VMware Engine.

  4. Click Add New Server to add vCenters or an ESXi server.

  5. Select a vCenter or an ESXi server where you want to perform VM discovery and click Next from the server list.

  6. On the Manage page, a list of VMs appears. Select a VM to discover and click Next.

  7. Apply the policy template and profile to the Compute Engine instance:

    1. Select one or more VMs that you want to protect.

    2. Select Apply Backup Plan.

    3. Select Apply Backup Plan from the Choose action drop-down list.

      The Choose template drop-down list opens.

    4. Select a template from the Choose template drop-down list.

      The Choose profile drop-down list opens.

    5. Click OK.

  8. Click Application Settings for each VM in the list to make changes to the default configuration.

    The Application Details and Settings page opens. See Configure application settings for VMs

  9. If there are multiple VMs and you want to make the same changes to all the VMs, click define settings for all applications and make the necessary changes.

  10. Click Next.

  11. Review the summary screen. If everything is correct, click Finish to complete the onboarding process. The selected VMs are backed up based on the policy template that you select.

  12. After onboarding is complete, a dialog appears. Click Finish again.

    Once the policy template is attached to the selected VMs, the status changes to a check mark.

    The check mark indicates that your VMs are ready to run a backup job within the schedule by the policy. If you want to run the job immediately, see Run on-demand job.

Add a server

In case the vCenter or ESXi server of interest isn't in the server list, add the VCenter or ESXi as new server using the following instructions.

  1. Click Add New Server.

  2. For Type, keep vCenter, the default, or select ESXi.

  3. Add the hostname and a friendly path for the host in Hostname. The name of the host must start with a letter, and contain letters, digits (0-9), and an underscore (_).

  4. Enter the IP address of the host in the IP Address field.

  5. Optionally, you can enter the port number—if you aren't using the default port number—in the Port field.

  6. Enter the login credentials for authentication in the Username and Password fields.

  7. Select one or more backup/recovery appliances where you want to add the server from the Appliance(s) checklist.

  8. Click Add to add the new server. If the information provided is incorrect, you see an error message and the new server isn't added.

What's next

The VMware administrator's guide

This page is one in a series of pages specific to protecting and recovering VMware VMs with Backup and DR. You can find additional information at: