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Quiesce (before snapshots)

While your external backup software (Veeam and so on) takes a disk snapshot, database and directory writes are frozen briefly and then thawed, so the snapshot is consistent at application level.

System administrator with root accessServer command line

Quiesce is not an admin console screen. It runs from the command line or from your backup software's hooks; the admin console only shows its status.

Viewing the status in the admin console

  1. In Tools and Migration › Profelis Backup press More Actions.
  2. Choose Application Consistent Backup.

More Actions › Application Consistent Backup

More Actions › Application Consistent Backup

The window is read-only:

  1. The Status row shows Thawed (normal operation) during normal work; during a freeze the freeze time, the watchdog deadline and the process holding the lock appear.
  2. The Last run section shows the start, duration and result of the last freeze/thaw. At the bottom of the window there are ready-made pre-freeze / post-thaw scripts to paste into your backup software.

The Application Consistent Backup status window

The Application Consistent Backup status window

Connecting it to the backup software

  1. As root, verify the configuration: /opt/zimbra/libexec/prfl-quiesce selftest
  2. Set the backup software's pre-freeze command to: /opt/zimbra/libexec/prfl-quiesce freeze --timeout 120 --json
  3. Set the post-thaw command to: /opt/zimbra/libexec/prfl-quiesce thaw
  4. Start a test backup. When it finishes, prfl-quiesce status --json should return thawed.

During the freeze the database takes a short read lock and a consistent copy of LDAP is produced. An LVM, ZFS or Btrfs snapshot driver can be used optionally.

If the watchdog stepped in

If the freeze runs too long, the watchdog releases the lock itself; that backup is not considered consistent.

  1. prfl-quiesce status --json shows watchdog_released or exit code 60; the Application Consistent Backup window also shows a warning.
  2. If needed, clear the state with prfl-quiesce thaw --force.
  3. Take the backup again.

Try it first

Before connecting it to scheduled backups, measure the time with a few manual runs and choose the --timeout value accordingly.