Migrating Rancher to New Cluster without S3

This document (000021156) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

Rancher 2.5.0+

Situation

You need to migrate Rancher to a new cluster but do not have access to an S3 endpoint.

Resolution

Copy your backup file onto all the nodes in the new cluster. This is to ensure that the backup-operator can find the file no matter where it is scheduled.

Create a hostPath PV that mounts the directory where you copied your backup:

apiVersion: v1
kind: PersistentVolume
metadata:
  name: migration
spec:
  accessModes:
  - ReadWriteOnce
  capacity:
    storage: 10Gi
  hostPath:
    path: /migration-backup
    type: ""
  persistentVolumeReclaimPolicy: Retain
  volumeMode: Filesystem

Install or update the rancher-backup Helm chart on the new cluster, adding the option to use an existing PV with the following options:

--set persistence.enabled=true --set persistence.volumeName="migration"

Confirm that the backup operator successfully mounted the hostPath and your backup is present

kubectl -n cattle-resources-system exec deploy/rancher-backup   -- ls /var/lib/backups

Create a Restore object

apiVersion: resources.cattle.io/v1
kind: Restore
metadata:
  name: restore-migration
spec:
  backupFilename: migration-adb5ba4a-ace3-4e53-878b-895170c9615c-2023-08-02T19-43-26Z.tar.gz
  prune: false

Apply the Restore object

kubectl apply -f restore-migration.yaml

Watch the Restore logs

kubectl logs -n cattle-resources-system --tail 100 -f -l app.kubernetes.io/instance=rancher-backup

Additional Information

Rancher Migration Documentation: https://ranchermanager.docs.rancher.com/how-to-guides/new-user-guides/backup-restore-and-disaster-recovery/migrate-rancher-to-new-cluster

Additional Options for to use during the installation of the backup operator can be found here: https://github.com/rancher/backup-restore-operator/tree/release/v3.0/charts/rancher-backup

Disclaimer

This Support Knowledgebase provides a valuable tool for SUSE customers and parties interested in our products and solutions to acquire information, ideas and learn from one another. Materials are provided for informational, personal or non-commercial use within your organization and are presented "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.