Build a Commvault Lab on AWS - Tutorial Part 1 of 2
For those who know me, I started working with Commvault way back when in my services days when the software was called still called Galaxy. As an offering, Commvault have always been seen as overly complex and difficult to setup or at least thats the perception. Fast forward many years into the future and in more recent time, I had the opportunity to be part of the Commvault team and I must say, how things have evolved so so much.
Technical guys learn technology differently and for me, nothing beats hands-on tinkering. So the first order of the day for me was to get an environment up and running ASAP. Fortunately for me, Commvault is already listed on the major hyperscaler’s (AWS, Azure & GCP) Cloud Marketplace. For the unaware, it simply mean you are only a few clicks away from installing a Commvault environment with close to “ZERO” knowledge!
So for those who have yet to see the #NewCommvault, today, I’m gonna step through a noob tutorial to get you started with Commvault on AWS be it for testing, lab or POC. What are some of the pre-requisites? To start, you will obviously need to sign up for an AWS account. As to the cost, it depends how long you want to turn on the lab for, but just to setup, it shouldn’t cost more than $10 dollars. Also, don’t worry about licenses. It is on trial mode for 60 days!
So let’s get started.
Step 1. After logging into the AWS Console. Do a search right at the top for “Commvault”. You should see a whole bunch of results returned. If you scroll down under the Marketplace section, you should find “Backup & Recovery BYOL”. Select that option.
Step 2. The next screen will provide you more details on the solution that you will be deploying. It also gives you an estimated cost per hour. When ready, click “Continue to Subscribe”
Step 3. On the next screen, click “Continue to Configuration”. We can keep most of the defaults, but do select the region that is most favourable for you. Naturally for me, its Asia Pacific (Singapore). When ready, hit “Click to Launch”.
Step 4. The next screen will ask for you to select how you’d prefer to launch the instance. I’m familiar with the EC2 console, so I’ve decided to select that option.
Step 5. In the EC2 launch console, you can have a whole lot more custom configuration around networks, security, EC2 instance type and etc. If you are a 1st timer, much of it can be left as default. You may be prompted to create a key pair towards the tail end of the process, otherwise just got a head and leave everything as default.
The instance type, I have left it as t3a.2xlarge. You can certainly pick some larger instance but you will also notice a whole bunch of the options have been greyed out because only a few are certified to run the Commvault instance. If you have nothing much to configure, just go right a head and hit “Review and Launch”.
Step 6. Jumps you straight to Step 7 for Review. Assuming you are running this for labs, probably heres your chance to add some additional storage to land your test backups on, but if you didn’t, I’ll show you in the next few steps anyway. Click “Launch”
Step 7. Like mentioned earlier, if this is your first AWS encounter, chances are you will need to create a new key pair. Otherwise, feel free to use an existing key pair (just make sure you have the key with you)
Step 8. The instance will now be launching and you can track the progress by going back to the AWS Dashboard > EC2. I’d usually give the instance a name to ease referencing it. Its up to you, but I’ve named mine “Commserve”. The entire launch process takes between 5-7 minutes.
Step 9. Now, while the instance is launching. Let’s create a landing storage for the backups. On the left navigation pane, click on Volumes. Click on “Create Volume” and we will carve out some storage and have it attached to the Commserve EC2.
Step 10. For lab purposes, I have gone with the cheapest disk type, Throughput Optimized HDD (st1). Depending on your needs, you can always go a higher tier. I have gone with the minimum of 125 GiB and picked Singapore as my Availability Zone. When ready, click “Create Volume”.
Step 11. Now once its done, we will attach it to the Commserve EC2 instance. Select the Volume Instance that you have created, then click on Actions. From the pulldown, select Attach Volume. A pop-up prompt will then ask you which instance, and this is where the earlier labelling helps. Select the Commserve, and click “Attach” again.
If the attach is successful, you will now see the state change from “available” to “in-use”.
Step 12 (optional). I generally like RDP easily to these instances once created. Static external accessible IP’s are important for me. By default, AWS provides a Dynamic internal & external IP address to the instances and it does not persist thru reboots. Given that it’s a lab, and the likelihood that I’m gonna shut it down every time I’m done using it, I will need to figure out the external IP addresses every time.
To save myself from this, AWS provides a service called Elastic IPs. Once created, you can assign a static IP / DNS name to your EC2 instance that persists over reboots.
To configure, click on the “Elastic IPs” on the left Navigation pane. Next click on the orange “Allocate Elastic IP Address” on the top right of the console, and it will bring you to the screen below. Accept the defaults, and click “Allocate”.
Step 13. Once allocated, we now need to assign it to the Commserve EC2. Select the Elastic IP, and select Action > Associate Elastic IP address. The next screen will prompt you if you would like to assign the IP to an instance or NIC. I have just left the default on as instance, and selected the Commserve EC2 from the pull down. Hit “Associate” when ready.
Step 14. Now we are all set to connect / RDP to the Commserve Instance! Click on the Instances on the left Navigation panel, and select your Commserve EC2. Click “Connect” on the top right hand corner of your console. You will then be presented with the options to configure RDP Client. You can now either Download the RDP configuration or just RDP directly to the Public DNS address.
The username is also detailed here as Administrator. As for the password, you will need to click on “Get Password”.
Step 15. This is where you will be asked for the earlier key pair. Pick the key pair, and you will then be given the decrypted password for your RDP session.
This will conclude Part 1 of 2 of setting up your Commvault lab on AWS.
Up to this point, you should have Commserve all installed, booted up and ready to go. Not too complex right?
