Preserving management services with distributed metadata through the disaster recovery life cycle

A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising computer executable instructions which when executed by a computer cause the computer to perform the method of:

• during normal operation, at a first site, of a disaster recovery management unit comprising at least one customer workload machine and at least one management service machine implementing at least one management service, replicating to a remote disaster recovery site said at least one customer workload machine, said at least one management service machine, and metadata for said at least one management service, at least a portion of said metadata not being isolated within said at least one management service;
• after a disaster at said first site, initiating a failover process comprising:
• bringing up, at said remote disaster recovery site, a replicated version of said at least one customer workload machine;
• bringing up, at said remote disaster recovery site, a replicated version of said at least one management service machine;
• operating, at said remote disaster recovery site, said replicated version of said at least one customer workload machine and said replicated version of said at least one management service machine, in accordance with said metadata for said at least one management service;
• and
• creating an initial snapshot of a distributed metadata state of said metadata for said at least one management service implemented on said replicated version of said at least one management service machine;
• subsequent to initiating said failover process, initiating a failback process comprising:
• creating a representation of state changes for said at least one management service implemented on said replicated version of said at least one management service machine made in said remote disaster recovery site since said failover process and calculating therefrom a delta description from said initial snapshot;
• transmitting said delta description to said first site;
• and
• creating a reverse replica of all the workload components from the remote disaster recovery site at the first site and playing back the delta description to restore a distributed metadata state that existed in the remote disaster recovery site and re-create it in the first site.

An apparatus comprising:

• a memory;
• and
• at least one processor, coupled to said memory, and operative to:
• during normal operation, at a first site, of a disaster recovery management unit comprising at least one customer workload machine and at least one management service machine implementing at least one management service, replicate to a remote disaster recovery site said at least one customer workload machine, said at least one management service machine, and metadata for said at least one management service, at least a portion of said metadata not being isolated within said at least one management service;
• after a disaster at said first site, initiate a failover process comprising:
• bringing up, at said remote disaster recovery site, a replicated version of said at least one customer workload machine;
• bringing up, at said remote disaster recovery site, a replicated version of said at least one management service machine;
• operating, at said remote disaster recovery site, said replicated version of said at least one customer workload machine and said replicated version of said at least one management service machine, in accordance with said metadata for said at least one management service;
• and
• creating an initial snapshot of a distributed metadata state of said metadata for said at least one management service implemented on said replicated version of said at least one management service machine;
• subsequent to initiating said failover process, initiate a failback process comprising:
• creating a representation of state changes for said at least one management service implemented on said replicated version of said at least one management service machine made in said remote disaster recovery site since said failover process and calculating therefrom a delta description from said initial snapshot;
• transmitting said delta description to said first site;
• and
• creating a reverse replica of all the workload components from the remote disaster recovery site at the first site and playing back the delta description to restore a distributed metadata state that existed in the remote disaster recovery site and re-create it in the first site.