HyperVBackup

HyperVBackup is, as you can guess, a utility that can perform backups of HyperV virtual machines. It uses Volume Shadow Services (VSS) so it can back up running virtual machines.

It started as a fork of http://hypervbackup.codeplex.com, as it was evident that the original creators weren’t going to update it anymore. So we added some features that we and the community were needing.

Beware that this project is a heavily modified version of the original source code with a lot of features added (7zip format support, individual files filter, updated to .Net Framework 4.6.1, etc.). If you want a closer version to the original code visit http://hypervbackup.codeplex.com/discussions/567463.

Note: Version 3 includes a lot of breaking changes, if you are still using version 2 you can find the previous documentation in the Wiki (https://github.com/ColiseoSoftware/hypervbackup/wiki)

You can see all options executing the program without arguments, currently those are:

f, file              Text file containing a list of VMs to backup, one per line.
l, list              List of VMs to backup, comma separated.
x, exclude           List of VMs to exclude from backup, comma seperated.
v, vhdinclude        List of VHDs file names to backup, comma separated.
i, vhdignore         List of VHDs file names to ignore, comma separated.
a, all               (Default: True) Is set, backup all VMs on this server.
n, name              (Default: True) If set, VMs to backup are specified by name.
g, guid              If set, VMs to backup are specified by guid.
o, output            Required. Backup ouput folder.
p, password          Secure the backup with a password.
z, zip               Use the zip format to store the backup.
d, directcopy        Do not compress the output, just copy the files recreating the folder structure.
outputformat         Backup archive name format. {0} is the VM's name, {1} the VM's GUID, {2} is the current date and time and {3} is the extension for the compression format (7z or zip).
                     Default: "{0}_{2:yyyyMMddHHmmss}{3}"
s, singlevss         Perform one single snapshot for all the VMs.
compressionlevel     (Default: 3) Compression level, between 0 (no compression, very fast) and 9 (max. compression, very slow).
cleanoutputbydays    (Default: 0) Delete all files in the output folder older than x days. TOTALLY OPTIONAL. USE WITH CAUTION.
cleanoutputbymb      (Default: 0) Delete older files in the output folder if total size is bigger then x Megabytes. TOTALLY OPTIONAL. USE WITH CAUTION.
onsuccess            Execute this program if backup completes correctly. You must provide a full path to an executable file.
onfailure            Execute this program if backup fails. You must provide a full path to an executable file.
mt                   (Default: off) Enable multi-threaded compression (only for 7zip format). In multicore processors use all the processing power available. The backups are faster at the cost of high processor usage.

For example, if you want to backup the Mail Server virtual machine on \\shared\backups folder you use:

HyperVBackup -l "Mail Server" -o "\\shared\backups" --compressionlevel 0

Note: short switchs use one dash (-) / long switches use two dashes (--). Not all options have a short switch available.

HyperVBackup only works on HyperV Server (Windows Server 2012, 2012 R2 and 2016 supported) and DOESN’T work on HyperV Client (Windows 8, 8.1 or 10). Client Windows doesn't include the necessary OS level support, so it's a Windows limitation and HyperVBackup cannot do anything about it.

By default the output is stored in 7zip format (you must provide the 7z.dll file corresponding to the version you want to use, included is version 16.04). You can use the zip format for the output, in this case an internal compression engine is used. The backups take more time and the resulting files are slightly bigger if you use the zip format.

Cluster Shared Volumes are supported.

How to configure logging:

The logging functions are based in NLog (http://nlog-project.org/), so you can configure the output using the nlog.config file. The official documentation (https://github.com/NLog/NLog/wiki/Configuration-file) shows you how to build one.

The included nlog.config file writes the output to:

• The console window
• A file located in the logfiles subfolder (check that HyperVBackup has write permissions to this folder)
• A log server, which allows you to monitor the backup in real time from another machine. For security, the default configuration uses a localhost address. You can use Sentinel (https://github.com/pablopioli/Sentinel) to watch the logs.

Requirements

• .Net Framework 4.6.1 (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49981)
• Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable (https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/e653a57a-bc32-4134-87bf-df33058f0531/download-microsoft-visual-c-2017-redistributable)
• Only 64 bit binaries are provided, if you need a 32 bit version you must download and compile the source code using Visual Studio 2017

Troubleshooting

• If you find the following error when you run the program: System.MissingMethodException: Method not found System.Array.Empty() you are probably running the Net Framework 4.5, you need to install version 4.6.1.

• If you find the following error when you run the program: Could not load file or assembly AlphaVSS.60x64.dll you need to install the Microsoft Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable Package.