Tivoli Storage Manager®Conversion
About Tivoli Storage Manager
IBM Tivoli's Storage Manager (TSM ) ® is an enterprise storage management for heterogeneous computing environments. TSM supports a broad range of platforms, devices and protocols, and it offers automated backup and recovery, archiving, hierarchical storage management (HSM) and disaster recovery. With TSM you can schedule backups to take advantage of off-peak times, prioritize the order in which various data is backed up, and store only new or changed files to reduce network traffic.
Conversion
The architecture of Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM) ® system with its relational database and transaction log can make data conversion complicated. While the relational database is very much a strength of the TSM system compared to the flat file catalogue found in many other backup products when taking care of your data, it can often make life difficult when attempting non-native TSM data conversions.
Probably the simplest method of conversion from a TSM system would start with an export from the client system onto tape. The export allows more flexibility during the conversion process as the data center is no longer restrained by the link between the backed up TSM data and the TSM database.
In some circumstances, like in large enterprise environments for example, a TSM export is impossible due to sheer number of client nodes within a client environment which can number into the hundreds. In this instance, there is no option but to get the latest copy of the database onto tape as well as the most current volume history to allow for the creation of data, more often that not via a native TSM system in the first instance.
Once the data is available, the conversion can be done in two ways. The restore from the native system can be done but at a cost. The TSM server is not only duplicated, but the data is also recovered. Large TSM systems could conceivably be managing hundreds of terabytes of data which has to be landed somewhere (disk most probably) before the native conversion can be done.
Non-native restores would offer specialized data centers unparalled flexibility in recovering and converting data. These specialised recovery tape routines would need to be able to break apart the encryption method that Tivoli applies to TSM data (56bit) and the control data on the tape, thereby allowing a raw read of all or any of the files held on the volume. Similar, specialised 'handling' routines can then be used to convert this raw data to any backup format required.
Much is made of the inbred security of the TSM system since the backed up data is so closely linked with the TSM database. While, to the layman this is true, and it is almost impossible to reconstruct TSM data without the database, it is possible in the right scenario, with the right skills at your disposal.
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