Expert GuideSpectrum Protect Plus - Hands On: How to delete an SLA when no system is assigned anymore.

Oliver Ladage — 05. January 2022
Reading time: 2 minutes

As experts in IBM Data Protection, we use IBM Spectrum Protect Plus in our production environment. All VMs are backed up with customized SLAs either once a day or every 4 hours. In addition, individual Windows servers are protected with the file system backup. Here we encountered the following problem during administrative work.

The problem

We found a schedule for the SLA silver in the file system area, which was not assigned to a server.

This schedule could not be removed from the system via the GUI because it was still assigned to this SLA for Spectrum Protect Plus. Not only was this scheduler still displayed, it was running daily and producing errors.

The solution

As a first measure, we set the schedule to "held". Since this behavior cannot be desired and there must be a way to remove schedules without an assigned system, we opened an IBM ticket.

During the problem analysis it was recommended to add the file system back and to link it to this SLA again. After that, the SLA had to be removed from the file system. This made it possible to delete it from Spectrum Protect Plus. The schedule could thus be successfully deleted.

So it depends on the order how to remove the last system to be able to completely remove an SLA and the resulting Schedules.

Expert tip

  • Remove all systems from the SLA and then delete the Schedule.
  • Deleting the SLA while systems are still assigned is not successful. This leads to the phenomenon that the schedule can no longer be deleted.

Since this behavior is not logical and also not predictable for the user, we asked IBM to describe this procedure in the documentation or better, to prevent it in the software. This engagement was welcomed by IBM and the following APAR was opened to address the problem.

This has resulted in the following APAR for Spectrum Protect Plus at IBM: APAR IT38293 - "Unable to remove the SLA from 'SLA Policy Status' when the last assigned resource is removed".

 

Go to APAR

Currently there is no version of Spectrum Protect Plus available that fixes this issue. To be notified when a new version is available that includes this APAR, you can click the button in the Subscribe section.

Until then, the problem can be worked around with the procedure described above.

If the last resource (Virtualized System, File System, ...) is removed from IBM Spectrum Protect Plus 'Manage Protection' view before it is disassociated from its SLA, the 'SLA Policy Status' will continue to show the SLA in the respective 'Manage Protection' view.

 

This also causes the SLA to run at its defined times, without any resource assigned to it.

 

This example shows the issue for a File Server, but this is valid for all resources that can be added to IBM Spectrum Protect Plus:

  • Navigate to 'Manage Protection' - 'File Systems'
  • Remove the last server from the 'File Systems' panel before disassociating it from any assigned SLA
  • The 'SLA Policy status' continues to show the SLA

Checking the schedule tab in 'Jobs And Operations' will still display the SLA, and it will continue to be started at the    defined time.

 

IBM Spectrum Protect Plus Versions Affected:

 

IBM Spectrum Protect Plus 10.1.x

 

Additional Keywords: SPP, SPPlus, TS006257620

 

Local fix

  • Add the last removed server back to the respective 'Manage Protection' panel
  • Disassociate it from its SLA
  • The SLA will now disappear from 'SLA Policy Status'
  • Remove the server from 'Manage Protection

Oliver Ladage

Oliver Ladage joined Empalis Managed Service in 2019. As a junior service engineer, the computer scientist is versatile in environments such as Windows, Microsoft and VMWare. In the area of backup and recovery management, his main focus is on IBM Spectrum Protect, IBM Spectrum Protect Plus and Veeam - also in the cloud.