One of the biggest challenges I faced running VMware’s internal Horizon environment, was being able to backup, restore and replicate Writeable Volumes and AppStacks. Not being able to backup and replicate Writeable Volumes meant were unable to use Writables to capture our user’s data as we were unable to copy the data to an offline backup array for archive or replicate the data to our other data centers to be used in the event of a site failure.

This is no longer a challenge using Datrium DVX.

App Volumes

App Volumes is a product offered by VMware that has two main features:

• AppStacks – Packaged applications that get connected/disconnect to a user’s virtual desktop during login/logoff.
• Writable Volumes – Virtual disks that get connected/disconnect to a user’s virtual desktop during login/logoff. These virtual disks capture any changes made to the virtual desktop, giving a persistent user experience in a non-persistent VDI environment.

If you are not familiar with App Volumes, have a look at this great video – VMware App Volumes Technical Overview

Both AppStacks and Writable Volumes live their lives as VMDK files. This makes it very easy to connect/disconnect them to virtual machines during the login/logoff process. However, there is a massive downside to using VMDK files. AppStacks and Writeable Volume VMDK’s are not permanently associated with a virtual machine, which makes it is almost impossible to back them up using traditional vSphere backup software. Due to limitations in the vSphere API, traditional backup solutions can only back up virtual machines and virtual disks connected to the virtual machines. If a VMDK is not connected to a virtual desktop, it cannot be backed up at scale…. Until now.

Datrium DVX

Backup and Restore Writable Volumes and AppStacks

Running your Horizon environment on a DVX platform makes backing up and restoring App Volumes AppStacks and Writable Volumes almost a single click process. Don’t believe me? Check out this video I recently captured showing the backup and restore of a Writable Volume.

Replicate Writable Volumes and AppStacks

Replicating Writables and AppStacks is also just as easy as backing up and restoring them with Datrium DVX. I’ve also created another video below to show you how simple this process is.

Summary

Using the built-in Snapshot and Replication functions of Datrium DVX will make the management of your App Volumes deployment extremely simple and straightforward. I really wish I had this technology available to me when I was running VMware’s global VDI environment as I’m pretty sure I’d have a few less gray hairs than I do now 😉