Creating an image in 4 steps¶

1. Creating components¶

1. Start the UserClient.
2. Create a component of the Image Service component type in the PC Images folder and check it in without a base version. The procedure for this is described in the UserClient tutorial.

2. Creating jobs¶

1. Start the AdminClient and open the Jobs module.
2. Select the component you have created in the Project tree.
3. Click on the Create button in the menu bar or drag and drop the component into the Jobs area.
4. Make your usual settings in the general sections of the Job configuration. Please refer to the AdminClient tutorial for a description. The following information is particularly relevant for Image Service jobs:
   1. Number of backups retained (rollover): Here you enter the number of images that are retained. If the number is reached, the new image overwrites the oldest one.
   2. Compare policy: Select the value Previous backup <-> Backup here. This compares the device information with that of the previous job execution.

5. Make the desired settings in the Image Service settings section.

   Example

   1. In the Device field, enter the computer name or IP address of the device from which you want to create an image. If you want to create an image of the computer on which the job is running, enter the entry localhost.
   2. Enter the login information for the device in the Username and Password fields. You can enter the user name as follows: {domain}\{user name} or {computer name}\{user name}. You need administrative rights to access the device.
   3. If you enter a value in the Device alias field, this will be placed in front of the device name when the images are stored in the directory name. This may be necessary if images from a large number of computers are to be created automatically and the image creation is carried out using Upload and Compare agents, which are used directly on the target computers. Since in this case the device name for all images would be localhost, the storage of the images would quickly become very confusing.
   4. In the Operating system dropdown menu, select whether the device is a Windows workstation or a server.
   5. In the What to save dropdown menu, select which drives of the device are to be backed up. If you click in the Selected drives field, the remote installation of the Image Service starts automatically in order to determine the actual hard disks and partitions of the device. This also tests whether the remote installation works on the device. If a new version of the Image Service is available, the update to this version is performed automatically when the job is executed. This only applies if remote installation is possible. Alternatively, the update can also be performed manually using the web installer.
   6. In the Data transfer route dropdown menu, the default setting is that the created image of the device is saved to a configured storage location. In this case, the image itself cannot be versioned as it is not located in octoplant. If you create a version of the backup, only the metadata of the image is saved in it. To be able to version the image itself, you must store it in the server archive.

6. In the Storage section, specify the storage type, the storage location and the required credentials for the directory in which the created image is to be stored.

   

   1. In the Storage type dropdown menu, select whether it is a directory in the network to which you specify the UNC path or whether the image is to be stored on an SFTP server.
   2. Specify the Storage location according to the selected storage type.
   3. If you have selected UNC, enter the UNC path to the directory. Format: \\server name\share name\path
   4. If you have selected SFTP, enter the IP address of the SFTP server and the corresponding directory on the SFTP server. Format: sftp://server:port/path/...
   5. Enter the Username and Password for the selected storage location. The specified user must have read and write rights to the directory. You can enter the user name as follows: {domain}\{user name} or {computer name}\{user name}

7. Make further settings in the Additional information section:

   

   1. In the Excluded files field, you can enter paths to files that are to be excluded from the image creation.
   2. An admin share is required for the remote installation in order to access drives on the device that is to be backed up. This is the C$ share by default. To be able to back up devices that do not have a C$ share, such as KUKA KRC, enter the desired share name in the Admin share field.
   3. In the Limit IO rate field, you can specify the maximum amount of data in megabytes per second, to limit the network load and not overload the network during backup. The default value is 0, the means that the transfer speed is not limited.
   4. If you enter a password in the Image password field, the image file (SNA file) is encrypted. The password cannot be read from the log.

8. Select Save and execute the job directly if required.

3. Executing jobs¶

1. Execute the job in the AdminClient or UserClient as desired. You can find descriptions of this in the corresponding tutorials.
2. The generated image is stored in the configured directory in the following directory structure: {StorageLocation}\{device name}\{jjjj-mm-tt_hh-MM-ss}. A new directory {jjjj-mm-tt_hh-MM-ss} is created in the directory {device name} for each job run and image. If a device alias is used, this is written before the device name in the directory name. The image directory contains the following files:
   • HSH file: changes to the previous image
   • SNA file: the actual image that can be restored
   • snapshot.log: job log from Drive Snapshot

4. Accessing the image¶

To be able to access all elements of the created image and to be able to perform a restore with it, you must copy the job result in the UserClient as a backup into a directory.

1. Start the UserClient.
2. In the Project tree, select the component that you used to create the image.
3. In the Component details area, activate the Jobs tab.
4. Right-click on the job result of the job that you want to restore.
5. In the context menu, click on the Copy backup to directory directory entry. The corresponding dialog opens.
6. Select the directory to which you want to copy the image.
7. Select Next. The image is copied to the selected directory.

During this process, the following elements are also made available in the target directory:

• snapshot.exe: application for restoring the image
• imagename.txt: name of the directory created
• software_info: a list of the software installed on the backed up computer

The directory contains everything you need for a recovery.

You can also access the data directly using the Explorer, but in this case the additional elements will not be created.

Related topics¶

• AdminClient -> Job configuration
• Tips & assistance
• UserClient
• Additional functions of the Image Service