{"id":38544,"date":"2019-09-12T09:00:38","date_gmt":"2019-09-12T07:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nolabnoparty.com\/?p=38544"},"modified":"2023-04-12T10:53:30","modified_gmt":"2023-04-12T08:53:30","slug":"vsphere-replication-8-x-seeding-pt-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nolabnoparty.com\/en\/vsphere-replication-8-x-seeding-pt-4\/","title":{"rendered":"vSphere Replication 8.x: seeding - pt.4"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"vmware-vsphere-replication-seeding-01\"<\/p>\n

To reduce the network traffic generated by the initial synchronization, vSphere Replication provides the seeding capability to limit the data to transfer.<\/p>\n

This option allows to quickly perform the initial replication without transferring the entire virtual machine to the target datastore. This allows to reduce the required time<\/strong> to complete the task and limit the data to transfer<\/strong> especially if the network is busy<\/strong> or if the available bandwidth is poor<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Blog series<\/h2>\n

vSphere Replication 8.x deployment - pt.1<\/a>
\nvSphere Replication 8.x failover - pt.2<\/a>
\nvSphere Replication 8.x traffic isolation - pt.3<\/a>
\nvSphere Replication 8.x seeding - pt.4<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How vSphere Replication seeding works<\/h2>\n

To reduce the initial replication data transferred<\/strong> over the network, virtual disk files of VMs to replicate can be copied in the target datastore and used as replication seeds<\/strong> when the replication job is configured.<\/p>\n

During the replication procedure, vSphere Replication<\/a> compares differences<\/strong> occurred on the source and target site replicating only the changed blocks<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"vmware-vsphere-replication-seeding-02\"<\/p>\n

When the replication job is configured a target datastore must be specified<\/strong> to store the replicated VM. When the target datastore has been selected, the system checks if a disk with the same filename<\/strong> already exists in the datastore. If the same filename is found, you have the option to use the existing disk file as a seed<\/strong> for the replication. If this option is selected, a new page is available in the wizard where seeds for each disk of the VM can be specified. The result you can obtain is the reduction of the network traffic since only changed blocks will be replicated<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

If you don't want to use the seed option, replica files are placed in a new directory with a unique name<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Configure vSphere Replication seeding<\/h2>\n

The seeding process is composed by three main steps:<\/p>\n