Validator CLI Tool Fails to Process VMs in Per-machine backup with separate metadata files

Challenge

When attempting to use the Veeam Backup Validator command-line tool to validate the VMs contained within a job that was using the Per-machine backup with separate metadata files (aka True Per-VM) backup chain format, the Veeam Backup Validator tool throws the error:

Cannot find last point for backup "<job-name>".

Cause

This is a known issue and may be fixed in a future release of Veeam Backup & Replication.

As noted in the Veeam Backup Validator User Guide regarding the /backup parameter:

• Starting from Veeam Backup & Replication 12, per-machine backup with separate metadata files is the default format of backup files. To validate these backup files, you must specify the child backup name – backup of a specific VM. To get the child backup name, use the following PowerShell commands:

  $backup = Get-VBRBackup -Name "<backup_name>"
  

  $child_backups = $backup.FindChildBackups()
  $first_child_backup_name = $child_backups[0].Name

Solution

The following PowerShell script can be used to validate the latest restore point for all VMs within a job when it is using Per-machine backup with separate metadata files.

Notes:

• Edit the scriptand replace<job-name> on line 2 with the actual backup job name.
  Failure to do so will cause the script to fail with “You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.” because there is no job with the name specified.

• The script must be run in an Administrative PowerShell prompt.

• The script will output the reports to C:\temp\. If that folder does not exist, either create it or update the script to output to a different existing folder.

  #Get backup job information based on name.
  $backup = Get-VBRBackup -Name “<job-name>”
  #Find child backups for job.
  $child_backups = $backup.FindChildBackups()
  #For each child backup found validate the latest restore point, output the results to an HTML file in C:\temp\
  ForEach ($sub_child in $child_backups) {
  $id = $sub_child.Id
  $name = $sub_child.name
  Write-Output “Processing VM $name $id”
  cmd.exe /c ‘“C:\Program Files\Veeam\Backup and Replication\Backup\Veeam.Backup.Validator.exe” /backup:’$id’ /report:“C:\temp\report_‘$name’-‘$(get-date -f yyyy-MM-dd_HH.mm)’.html” /format:html’
  }

Copy

To submit feedback regarding this article, please click this link: Send Article Feedback
To report a typo on this page, highlight the typo with your mouse and press CTRL + Enter.