This is an archive version of the document. To get the most up-to-date information, see the current version.

Guest Processing

If you back up or replicate running VMs, you can enable guest processing options. Guest processing options are advanced tasks that require Veeam Backup & Replication to communicate with the VM guest OS. Veeam Backup & Replication offers the following guest processing options:

Application-aware processing. You can create transactionally consistent backups and replicas of VMs that run Microsoft Active Directory, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle. The transactionally consistent backup guarantees proper recovery of these applications without data loss. For information on system requirements for the applications, see System Requirements.

Pre-freeze and post-thaw scripts. You can use pre-freeze and post-thaw scripts to quiesce VMs running applications that do not support Microsoft VSS.
Transaction log truncation. You can set the backup or replication job to truncate transaction logs on the VM guest OS after the VM is successfully processed.
Transaction logs backup for Microsoft SQL Server and Oracle. You can set up the backup job to back up transaction logs from Microsoft SQL Server and Oracle VMs.
VM guest file system indexing. You can set up the backup job to create a catalog of files and folders on the VM guest OS. The catalog lets you search for VM guest OS files and 1-click restore in Veeam Backup Enterprise Manager.

VM guest file system indexing is optional. If you do not enable this option in the backup job settings, you will still be able to perform 1-click restore from the backup created with such backup job. For more information, see the Preparing for File Browsing and Searching section in the Enterprise Manager User Guide.

VM guest OS files exclusion. You can exclude/include individual files and folders from/to backup or replica.