Rubrik Cloud Data Management (CDM) will integrate with NetApp’s SnapDiff APIs to enable faster ONTAP backups, the companies announced yesterday.
Backups are normally done incrementally after an initial full system backup, backing up only the files that have changed. This saves time compared to the original full backup. However, this changed file information collection process takes take longer and longer as the filesystem population of directories, sub-directories and files grows into the tens of millions.
Usually external backup software accesses a NAS filesystem and does a so-called tree walk; inspecting every directory, sub-directory and file to collect a record of the filesystems’ state. This is compared to a previous record and a list of changed files which need backing up is created.
With this NetApp deal, Rubrik’s CDM no longer has to do a tree walk and can get its list of changed files to backup quicker and with far less CPU resources. As ONTAP runs on-premises in NetApp arrays and also in the public cloud, Rubrik CDM runs faster ONTAP backups in both environments.
Spot the difference
NetApp’s Data ONTAP OS takes snapshots of its filesystem. SnapDiff, a proprietary crawler or indexer in the array, compares two snapshots, listing the files which have been added, deleted, modified and renamed. Internal NetApp APIs give access to the SnapDiff engine.
Third-party software vendors with SnapDiff API licenses include Catalogic, Commvault, IBM (TSM) and Veritas (NetBackup).
But Rubrik is the first backup vendor to gain NetApp access to SnapDiff APIs to find and send backed up data to the public cloud.
SnapDiff enhanced functions for Rubrik include data compliance, governance and hybrid cloud application failover/failback of ONTAP systems.
SnapDiff API integration will be released with v5.2 of Rubrik’s CDM in early 2020.
