Quadric Software

Alike Release Notes v4.5

Alike v4.5 includes some exciting performance improvements along with full support for Citrix XenServer 7. Now with Changed Block Tracking (CBT) on Citrix XenServer 6.5 and above, users can significantly improve job performance, and reduce the amount of I/O required to process them. Jobs that took hours in older versions have been reduced to a matter of minurtes by upgrading to Alike 4.5 and using the new features for enhanced backup and replication jobs. Please review our KB article on how to use these options.

All users are encouraged to install (upgrade) to this release. Please contact us if you have any questions about updates or downloading the current version/build. Below you will find the complete Alike v4.5 release notes.

Current Build v4.5.3.4 6702
Updated: 11/07/2016

Performance Improvements

• XenServer CBT Replication jobs can now be seeded remotely using a special procedure

Bug Fixes

Previous Builds

v4.5.3.3 Build 6695
Updated: 10/27/2016

Bug Fixes

v4.5.3.2 Build 6691
Updated: 10/13/2016

Bug Fixes

v4.5.3.1 Build 6689
Updated: 10/10/2016

Bug Fixes

v4.5.3 Build 6682
Updated: 10/06/2016

NOTE: Alike DR Customers vaulting to Amazon S3 will need to install Java 8 before upgrading. 

The Java 8 SE JRE can be downloaded from Oracle here:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html

Performance Improvements

• Faster more reliable Amazon S3 vaulting performance with SSL encryption
• Updated ABD template for XenServer users that includes a new Linux kernel, which could improve I/O performance in some environments

Bug Fixes

v4.5.2 Build 6629b
Updated: 9/08/2016

Bug Fixes

v4.5.2 6586
Updated: 8/09/2016

Bug Fixes

• Fixed issue where an S3 authorization problem was misreported as "ODS mismatch" in the UI, and root authorization problems were not handled or reported correctly

v4.5.2 Build 6584
Updated: 8/05/2016

*Mandatory Update for Users Running Enhanced CBT Backup Jobs for XenServer.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed serious issue in CBT backup jobs. Customers running CBT backup are recommended to update immediately, disable CBT, run a backup, and then re-enable CBT. CBT replication not affected.
• Fixed issue with "Shutdown of VM Prior to Backup" where VM is not always rebooted after the backup completes
• "Test" button for Add Hosts works properly now in all cases
• Erroneous .NET comparability message removed from Alike installer

v4.5.1 Build 6561
Updated: 7/27/2016

Bug Fixes

• Fixed issue with XenServer connectivity test button in Add Hosts dialog
• Fixed issue in Alike email notifications with invalid dates
• Now correctly shows statistics for all Enhanced Replication jobs
• Resolved issue in which an Alike Physical license could not be used against a host that is also being protected by Alike Virtual
• Fixed issue in which successful FLR jobs appear as failed
• Resolved issue with vaulting on single-pass backup and replicate

Other Improvements

• Improved job history display with "last 24 hours" job list
• Improved UI refresh on job lifecycle events
• Now hides offsite maintenance jobs from installations when offsite is disabled
• Add ability to failover to regular snapshots when a quiesced snapshot fails
• Improved error reporting in ABD FLR
• Now adds more information to a vaulting error of "HCL is poorly formed"

v4.5 Build 6542
Updated: 7/14/2016

Bug Fixes

• FLR Error message cleanup and clarification
• Removed unwanted job history 'refreshes' from UI

v4.5 Build 6538
Updated: 7/13/2016

Bug Fixes

• ABD based FLR stabilization preventing timing issue effecting certain environments

Other Improvements

• Minor UI job refreshing improvements

v4.5 Build 6531
Updated: 7/11/2016

Bug Fixes

• All Alike XenServer snapshots now work around VMs under active coalesce by requesting read-only snapshot access

Other Improvements

• Alike now exposes a setting to disable or enable database quick check, a feature shipped in 4.5.0 that could not be disabled and could cause contention on larger environments

v4.5 Build 6525
Updated: 7/7/2016

Bug Fixes

• Improved licensing error messages for trial customers installing Alike Standard keys
• Accurate statistics on Job Details page for CBT Enhanced Replicate jobs
• Fixed bug in database copy where Alike reports "Failed to archive backup copy of DBs. Error: Error creating query: PRAGMA journal_mode=WAL database is locked ( code 5), Ext. error code:5"
• Addressed 4.5.0 regression with Q-Hybrid Replication, which causes failure "Backup timestamp is invalid"

Other Improvements

• By default, new installations of Alike will now conduct validation in the background while jobs are running, instead of defaulting to not doing so; this setting can be changed at any time from the UI
• Alike now reports validation throughput in dashboard

v4.5 Build 6514
Updated: 6/27/2016

Bug Fixes

• Fixed occasional email report issue that caused malformed reports
• False error no longer causes CBT initial Replication to fail

v4.5 Build 6510
Updated: 6/23/2016

Performance Improvements

• Now offers Changed Block Tracking (CBT) on Citrix XenServer 6.5 and above
• Fully supports Citrix XenServer 7
• Default database backups is now every 6 hours, improving performance
• ABDs now boot in about half the time

Other Improvements

• Adds full support of international character sets in legacy FLR
• Commit process produces better error messages in the Alike logs
• New built-in quick check of Alike databases to prevent sqlite problems

Bug Fixes

• Validation of a backup will not proceed unless the backup could be committed to storage correctly first
• Fixed issues with installer use of temp directory
• Curtails extraneous dashboard/UI alerts 
• Relaxed revalidate times on fresh installs to improve performance
• Eliminated confusing false-positive corruption messages
• Diagnostic support log packaging now requires a service stop
  
• Commas now handled correctly in all input strings from UI
  
• Fixed various log text and typos