Carbonite Server Backup

Portal
Version 8.84.0354
Release Notes, December 16, 2019
______________________________________________________________________
Contents
1 OVERVIEW
1.1 Release History
1.2 Compatibility
1.3 Supported Platforms
2 NEW FEATURES
2.1 New Features in Version 8.84
2.2 New Feature in Version 8.82
2.3 New Features in Version 8.81
3 INSTALLATION NOTES
3.1 Installation Requirements
3.2 Conditional Requirements
3.3 Licensing
3.4 Install/Upgrade
4 LIMITATIONS, FIXES, AND KNOWN ISSUES
4.1 Limitations
4.2 Fixes
4.3 Known Issues
5 PRODUCT SUPPORT
5.1 Technical Support
5.2 Product Updates
5.3 Documentation

© Carbonite Inc. 2019. All Rights Reserved.

The release notes are governed by the Terms of Service found at
htt ps://www.carbonite.com/terms-of-use/carbonite-general-enterprise-terms-of-service .
Carbonite, at its sole discreti on, reserves the right to modify or revoke these Release Notes at any
ti me, without noti ce.

______________________________________________________________________

1 OVERVIEW
Carbonite Server Backup Portal is a web-based interface for centrally managing server backups
and restores.
These release notes are provided for the installable version of the Portal, which can be
installed locally for your organization.
Portal is intended for use with:
 Windows Agent and Plug-in versions 6.7 and later
 Hyper-V Agent versions 7.30 and later
 vSphere Agent versions 6.91 and later
 AIX Agent version 6.00 and later
 HP-UX version 6.72 and later
 Solaris version 6.73 and later
 Linux Agent versions 6 and later
Note: The legacy Web CentralControl interface is no longer available.
IMPORTANT: Beginning with Windows Agent 8.71, when an agent tries to connect to Portal, it
checks whether the public key of the Portal AMP Proxy certificate is different than when the
agent first connected to Portal (i.e., when a new version 8.71 agent registered to Portal or an
existing agent was upgraded to version 8.71). Carbonite recommends updating the Portal
certificate before new version 8.71 agents are registered to Portal or existing agents are
upgraded to version 8.71. For more information, see security improvement information in
NEW FEATURES.

1.1 Release History

Version 8.84.0354, December 3, 2019
Version 8.83.0008, August 9, 2019
Version 8.82.0063, July 12, 2019
Version 8.81.0031, April 5, 2019

1.2 Compatibility
API – Monitoring Portal 8.84 is compatible with Carbonite Server Backup API – Monitoring
1.42 or later.
Director For computer and job data deletion, data must be stored in a Director
8.4x or later vault that is registered to the same API – Monitoring
 instance as Portal.
Reports Portal is compatible with Reports version 2.74.
Web browsers Portal is compatible with the latest version of Chrome, Firefox and
Internet Explorer.

1.3 Supported Platforms

Portal components are supported on the following 64-bit operating systems:
 Windows Server 2019 Standard
 Windows Server 2016 Standard
 Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard
 Windows Server 2012 Standard
 Windows Server 2012 Datacenter
 Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard (SP1)
 Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise (SP1)
 Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter (SP1)
The Portal is only supported on English versions of the supported operating systems. The
server should be kept up to date with the latest Windows updates.

2 NEW FEATURES

2.1 New Features in Version 8.84

Support for Rapid VM Restores

Portal now supports Rapid VM Restores with vSphere Recovery Agent 8.80. With Rapid VM
Restore, you can restore one virtual machine (VM) to a vSphere host in your configured
vCenter within minutes. Disks from a vSphere Recovery Agent backup are mounted on a VM
for immediate access. You can use Portal to migrate the VM to a permanent datastore at any
time.
For a Rapid VM Restore, the VM backup must be saved on an appliance or local Director 8.50
vault with the Rapid VM Restore feature enabled. This feature is enabled by default on
appliances (i.e., Satellite vaults). For complete requirements, see the Portal online help, Portal
user guide, or vSphere Recovery Agent User Guide.
Email Notification Settings for Child Sites
Admin users in a parent site can now specify a notification email address for each of their child
sites, and select the child site events for which the email address should receive notifications
(e.g., backup failures, backup cancelations, encryption password changes). The email address
for notifications does not have to be the email address of a Portal user.
IMPORTANT: For security reasons, be sure that the notification email address for each child
site is correct.

If emails cannot be delivered to a child site's notification email address, the email address will
be blocked and a message will appear for the site in Portal. An Admin user in the parent site
can either enter a new notification email address or unblock the email address if messages can
now be delivered.

Email notification settings for child sites are only available when backup and/or encryption
password change notifications are configured centrally in the Portal instance (i.e., instead of
separately for each computer).

Usage Summary Report Change

In the Table view of the Usage Summary Report, the Site column now appears before the Vault
column.

Localization
Portal text has been updated in non-English languages for recently-added features.

Performance and Security Improvements

Performance and security improvements have been made throughout Portal.

2.2 New Feature in Version 8.82

Performance Improvements
Performance improvements have been made, particularly for the Dashboard, Users,
Computers and Monitor pages.

2.3 New Features in Version 8.81

Automatic Windows Agent Upgrades

Installers for automatically upgrading agents on Windows computers can now be provided
through Portal.
After specifying a UNC location for saving agent installers, Super users can upload and activate
Windows agent installers in Portal. Admin users receive email notifications when new agent
installers are available.
After an installer is activated, Super users and Admin users (if allowed) can use a new "Agent
Upgrade Center" in Portal to start the upgrade process on all eligible computers in selected
sites. Admin users can start the upgrade process on specific computers on the Computers
page.
Eligible agents then download the installer and upgrade themselves automatically; you do not
have to manually run the installer on each computer. To be eligible for an automatic upgrade, a
computer must have Windows Agent 8.70 or later installed, must have the same platform (64-
bit or 32-bit) as an agent installer in Portal, and cannot have the Cluster plug-in installed.
Agents with the Cluster plug-in must be upgraded manually.
On the Computers page, Admin users can now view the upgrade status of each computer
where Windows Agent version 8.70 or later is installed. Available upgrade statuses include:
 Up to date
 Pending upgrade
 Upgrade in progress
 Upgrade error
 New agent version available
 Reboot required
Admin users can also filter computers by upgrade status.

Computer Deletion
When deleting a computer in Portal, an Admin user can now request that backup data for the
computer be deleted from all vaults. The deletion is scheduled for 72 hours after the request is
made, and an email notification is sent to Admin users for the site and any parent site and to
Super users.
During the 72-hour period before a computer is deleted, Admin users can cancel the scheduled
deletion. If a scheduled computer deletion is canceled, an email notification is sent to Admin
users for the site and to Super users. The snapshot on the Portal dashboard also shows the
number of computers that are scheduled for deletion.
If a scheduled computer deletion is not canceled during the 72-hour waiting period, the
deletion request is sent to vaults that are registered to the same Carbonite Server Backup API
– Monitoring instance as Portal. In response to the request, Director deletes the computer
data from any standalone, Base or Active vault where the data is stored. Replication processes
then delete the data from any associated Satellite or Passive vault.
Note: Satellite and Passive vaults do not need to be registered to API – Monitoring to enable
data deletion; replication processes delete data on these vaults. However, Satellite and Passive
vaults need to be registered to API – Monitoring if you want to provide data for these vaults
through API – Monitoring calls.
If a deletion request fails, an email notification is sent to a vault administrator whose email
address is specified in Portal. The vault administrator can then manually delete the computer
from vaults.
WARNING: Computer deletion is permanent. After a computer is deleted from vaults, it cannot
be recovered or restored.

Updated Data Deletion Emails

Emails that notify vault admins when data deletion requests need attention, have failed or are
not supported by a vault have been updated. The subject line of these emails now:
 Starts with "Failed Deletion - Computer" or "Failed Deletion - Job"
 Lists the company name, vault address and computer name
 (for job data deletion emails only) Includes the job name
The body of these emails now includes the:
 DNS name of the server where the Portal UI is installed
 Agent ID on the vault
 (for job data deletion emails only) Job ID on the Portal and vault
 Base Vault ID in an N:1 replication configuration, Active Vault ID in a 1:1
replication configuration, or Active Base Vault ID in an N:1:1 replication configuration

Security Improvement
When you install Portal, a self-signed certificate is generated for verifying connections between
agents and Portal. Using tools provided with Portal, you can now replace this AMP Proxy
certificate with an RSA certificate from a Certificate Authority, or extend the validity period of
the self-signed certificate. Carbonite recommends replacing the self-signed certificate with an
RSA certificate from an enterprise or commercial Certificate Authority.
Three tools are provided for managing the Portal AMP Proxy certificate:
 Certificate Import tool. Using this tool, you can replace the existing Portal AMP
Proxy certificate with a new RSA certificate in .crt or .pfx format. This tool also backs up
the existing AMP Proxy certificate.
 Certificate Signing Request tool. Using this tool, you can generate a Certificate
Signing Request (CSR) with the same public key as the current Portal AMP Proxy
certificate. You can then submit the CSR to the Certificate Authority to obtain a new
RSA certificate with the same public key.
IMPORTANT: Beginning with Windows Agent 8.71, when an agent tries to connect to Portal, it
checks whether the public key of the Portal AMP Proxy certificate is different than when the
agent first connected to Portal (i.e., when a new version 8.71 agent registered to Portal or an
existing agent was upgraded to version 8.71). Do not change the public key of the Portal AMP
Proxy certificate after Windows Agent versions 8.71 and later are registered to Portal, or you
will have to re-register the agents to Portal.
 Certificate Renew tool. If you choose to use the generated self-signed AMP
Proxy certificate in a Portal instance (not recommended), you can use this tool to
extend the certificate validity period for 824 days. This tool also backs up the existing
AMP Proxy certificate.
These tools are installed in the ...\Portal Services\AMP Redirector Service\Tools folder
(C:\Program Files\Carbonite Server Backup\Portal Services\AMP Redirector Service\Tools, by
default) when you first install or upgrade to Portal version 8.81 or later.

Data Archiving can be disabled

Super users can now disable data archiving in a Portal instance where backup data is never
saved in archive storage. When data archiving is disabled, the Archive Days setting is not
available in retention types and the "Keep Archives for x days" setting does not appear in
policy retention types.

Times in 24-hour format for UK English

Times can now appear in 24-hour time format when you are viewing Portal text in English. To
display times in 24-hour format, choose the en-GB language when installing Portal and choose
en-GB in the language list at the top of a Portal page. You can also add separate custom feed
status messages for American English (en-US) and UK English (en-GB).

File Overwrite option renamed

In the Restore dialog box, the "File Overwrite" option has been renamed "Overwrite Option"
because it does not only apply to files. A restored file, folder or symbolic link can overwrite a
file, folder or symbolic link with the same name in the destination location.

Longer file filters in policies

When specifying file inclusions and exclusions in a policy, the maximum number of characters
in a Files field has been increased from 50 characters to 400 characters.

Data Read Error Handling

You can now specify how Windows Agent versions 8.70 and later handle data read VSS errors
during backups. When a new Windows Agent 8.70 registers to Portal, the data read error
handling method is set to "Log and Halt" so that the Agent will stop a backup if it encounters a
VSS error that might result in missing data. If a Windows Agent was upgraded to version 8.70,
the data read error handling method for the agent is "Log and Continue". You can change the
Data Read Error Handling method for each Windows Agent version 8.70 or later.

Localization Improvements
Portal text has been updated in non-English languages for recently-added features such as
computer data deletion.

3 INSTALLATION NOTES

3.1 Installation Requirements

Portal components can be installed as a distributed system (recommended) or on a single
server.

3.1.1 Hardware Requirements: Distributed System

The following table shows hardware requirements and recommendations when Portal is
installed as a distributed system (recommended):
System Hardware Minimum Recommended
Web Server Processor Xeon/Opteron 1.4 GHz Xeon / Opteron 2+ GHz
quad core
Memory 4 GB 8+ GB
HDD 20 GB 40+ GB
Database, Processor Xeon/Opteron 1.4 GHz Xeon / Opteron 2+ GHz
Notification, quad core
Registration and
Memory 8 GB 12+ GB
Status Server
HDD 120 GB 140+ GB
AMP Proxy (and Processor Xeon/Opteron 1.4 GHz Xeon / Opteron 2+ GHz
optional quad core
Redirector)
Memory 4 GB 16 GB
HDD 20 GB 60+ GB

3.1.2 Hardware Requirements: Single System Deployment

The following table shows hardware requirements and recommendations when Portal is
installed on a single system. The single system configuration is not recommended, but can be
used for environments with fewer than 500 Agents.
Hardware Minimum Recommended

Processor Xeon/Opteron 1.4 GHz Xeon / Opteron 2+ GHz quad core

Memory 8 GB 16+ GB

HDD 120 GB 120+ GB

 3.1.3 Software Requirements
The following software must be installed before you can install Portal:
 Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 7.0 or later, including all role
services that are installed by default, plus the following available role services and
features:
o Under Common HTTP Features:
 Static Content
 HTTP Errors
 HTTP Redirection
o Under Application Development:
 .NET Extensibility 3.5
 .NET Extensibility 4.5
 ASP.NET 3.5
 ASP.NET 4.5
 ISAPI Extensions
 ISAPI Filters
Note: Make certain that ASP.NET and .NET Extensibility are turned on in
Windows features, particularly if IIS is installed before ASP.NET.
o Under Security:
 Windows Authentication
o Under .NET Framework Features:
 HTTP Activation
 On Windows 2012, HTTP Activation must be installed under both
.NET Framework 3.5 Features and .NET Framework 4.5 Features.
 On Windows 2008, HTTP Activation must be installed under .NET
3.5.1 Features.
 .NET Framework 4.6.2
 .NET Framework 3.5
 SQL Server or SQL Server Express 2017, 2016, 2014, 2012 or 2008 R2 (64-bit),
installed with mixed mode authentication and case-insensitive collation and running.
The latest SQL Server service packs and updates are recommended.
Note: Anti-virus software can have a negative impact on the performance of some Portal
system components. The effect of anti-virus software on SQL Server should be minimal.
 3.2 Conditional Requirements
If you install Portal as a distributed system (recommended), the software required on each
system depends on the Portal components installed. For more information, see the Portal
Installation and Configuration Guide.
For increased security, we recommend that you:
 Disable some older cipher suites on Portal systems which are exposed to the
Internet. This could cause older Agents to lose connection with Portal, but newer agent
versions will continue to work.
 Configure IIS to enforce HSTS for the Portal website.
 Prohibit unprivileged access to Portal front-end servers. Bind the Portal Services
Website only to 127.0.0.1 (localhost) and do not expose it on the Internet.
For more information about these security recommendations, see the Portal Installation and
Configuration Guide.
We recommend using Window authentication for Portal database access. To use Windows
authentication for Portal database access in a distributed system, all systems where Portal
components are installed must be members of the same domain. For more information, see
the Portal Installation and Configuration Guide.
To install Portal with a remote SQL Server, install SQL Management Studio on the machine
where you are installing Portal. Otherwise, a “failure to create database” error might occur
during the installation.
Carbonite recommends turning off macros in Microsoft Excel when using Portal, particularly if
you export reports in XLS or CSV format and open these reports in Excel.

3.3 Licensing
You do not require a license to use Portal. You do require licenses from the vault for Agents
and features such as plug-ins.

3.4 Install/Upgrade
The Portal installation kit file name is: CarboniteServerBackupPortal-8-84-0354.exe
You can use this installation kit to install Portal 8.84, or to upgrade Portal from version 8.81 or
8.83 to version 8.84.
To upgrade to Portal 8.84 from a version earlier than 8.81, first upgrade Portal to version 8.81
and then upgrade to version 8.84. For installation and upgrade instructions, see the Portal
Installation and Configuration Guide.
Before upgrading Portal, make sure that there is enough free space on the system for backing
up the Portal databases. Portal databases are backed up automatically during an upgrade.
 4 LIMITATIONS, FIXES, AND KNOWN ISSUES

4.1 Limitations
Issues can arise if you manage an Agent using both Portal and Windows CentralControl. Do not
manage the same Agent with both Portal and Windows CentralControl.
Agents can only register to Portal using IPV4 addresses. IPV6 addresses are not supported.
When you restore a job from another computer, the target computer must have the correct
plug-in installed. For example, you can only restore a SQL job to a computer where the SQL
Server Plug-in is installed.
Compatibility View in Internet Explorer is not supported.

4.2 Fixes

4.2.1 Fix in Version 8.84

Daily Status reports that have been scheduled for a child site by a Support user are now
deleted when the child site is deleted. When you upgrade Portal to version 8.8.4, report
schedules for sites that do not exist are deleted. (EV-35110, EV-35802)
An issue has been resolved where some computers could not be deleted from Portal. (EV-
36070, EV-34109)
Site names are no longer missing from some computer and user records in Portal. Related
exception messages do not appear in the TaskScheduler log. (EV-36603)
Portal two-factor authentication now works with the default TeleSign API. You do not need to
contact TeleSign to enable the "resource_uri" feature. (EV-34950)

4.2.2 Fix in Version 8.83

The Monitor page now correctly indicates when agents are online. In Portal 8.82, online
computers sometimes appeared as offline on the Monitor page. (EV-34961)

4.2.3 Fixes in Version 8.82

Portal now loads data more efficiently on pages such as the Dashboard, Users, Computers and
Monitor pages. Changes were made to address issues in version 8.81, where Portal was
sometimes slow or unresponsive, "Unknown exception" or "Timeout expired" errors appeared
in the UI, and SQL execution timeout errors appeared in the logs. (EV-33908, EV-33735, EV-
33575, EV-31228)

4.2.4 Fixes in Version 8.81

Extremely high usage values no longer appear in the Usage Summary report in some Portal
instances. (EV-30223)
Portal installations now succeed if the SQL Server password includes special characters other
than ampersands (&) and less-than symbols (<). (EV-29875)
An Email notification is now sent when Hyper-V job data is not deleted from a vault in
response to a data deletion request. (EV-30261)
When a job is scheduled for deletion but the associated agent is no longer present in the
Portal database, Portal does not continuously log failures. (EV-30880, EV-30878)
In new Portal installations, self-signed certificates for the AMP Proxy and Redirector are now
valid for 824 days. (EV-32413)
When a job is scheduled for deletion, a separate email is now sent to each Admin user and
Super user so that recipients cannot see each other's email addresses. (EV-27210)
When viewing Portal in German, English words no longer appear in some UI text. (EV-29026)
A policy cannot be applied to or reconciled with an agent if it would result in the agent having
more than ten retention types. (EV-27196, EV-27183, EV-26657)
When viewing Portal text in a non-English language, days of the week now appear in the
correct language and order when you are scheduling a backup job, scheduling a custom
command, or specifying bandwidth throttling settings. (EV-13718)
When you first try to save a Hyper-V job schedule, the days of the week and time are saved.
(EV-27570)
A validation message now appears if you leave the vCenter Address box blank on the vCenter
Settings tab for a vSphere Recovery Agent. (EV-26103)
vCenter credentials for a vSphere Recovery Agent no longer fail if a blank space appears at the
start or end of the user name. (EV-25930)
On the Computers page, a computer's backup jobs are now sorted in alphabetical order by job
name. (EV-23424)
The maximum length of a new VM name when you restore a Hyper-V VM is now 100
characters. The Hyper-V Agent could not reliably restore VMs with longer names. (EV-16160)
Security and privacy improvements have been made, including changes to how user names
and IP addresses are reported in logs.

4.3 Known Issues

A Portal upgrade can fail or an error can occur if there are read-only Portal files in a Windows
temp folder or in the C:\inetpub\Portal Services Website folder.
WORKAROUND: Before an upgrade, delete any Host_Protect or Portal_Service_Connector
folders in the Windows %temp% directory, in any subfolders named with a single digit (e.g.,
"2" or "3"), and in any folders named with a single digit at the same level as the Windows
%temp% directory. If any files in the C:\inetpub\Portal Services Website folder are read-only,
make them writable. (EV-38704)
In the Usage Summary report, job names may be missing if a job was moved from one vault to
another.
WORKAROUND: Run a hotfix for DTS-28838 on the EVault Reports database. This hotfix is
available from your service provider.
If a configuration file is missing, locked or read-only when you upgrade the Portal UI, the
upgrade may appear to finish successfully but a new configuration file may be created. If this
occurs, you can uninstall Portal, leaving the database intact, and then reinstall Portal 8.40 or
later. (33397)
An Admin user in a parent site cannot assign computers to groups in a child site.
WORKAROUND: Have an Admin user in the child site create the group and add at least one
computer from the child site to it. After that, Admin users in the parent site can add other
computers in the child site to the group. (32012)
Portal time zone handling can result in confusing process dates and times. Some dates are
shown in the Agent time zone and some dates are shown in the browser time zone. For
example, Portal shows backup dates and times in the user's time zone, but log information
appears in the Agent's time zone. (31881, 31107)
Some Agents cannot register because of issues related to SSL cipher suite reordering. Affected
Agents are:
 Windows Agent versions 7.20 - 7.33
 Hyper-V Agent version 7.30
 vSphere Agent versions 7.32 and earlier
 Linux Agent versions 7.20 and earlier
We strongly recommend upgrading to the most recent Agent versions to avoid this issue. If you
cannot upgrade an Agent, a less desirable server-side workaround will allow affected Agents to
register to Portal. For details on the workaround, please contact Support. (28059)
The storage total shown in the Usage Summary report does not match the storage total shown
in the Usage Summary chart. (30756)
When restoring files from multiple UNC jobs, files can be restored from a maximum of 50
safesets. If the system finds files in more than 50 safesets, not all of the files are restored but
no warning message appears.
WORKAROUND: Reduce the number of files that you request when restoring from multiple
UNC jobs. (30691)
When scheduling the Daily Status report, the time zone defaults to the user's time zone offset,
but does not necessarily show the correct time zone name. (30636)
If you try to restore a vSphere VM from an alternate location, an error states that the safeset is
offline and the restore cannot be completed.
WORKAROUND: Manually synchronize a vSphere Agent job before trying to restore a VM from
an alternate location. (27833)
The tooltip that shows a VM's task name on the vault only appears if an updated Flash plug-in
is installed in the browser. This Plug-in is installed automatically with the latest versions of
Chrome and Firefox, but must be installed explicitly in other browsers. (26513)
Portal sometimes becomes unresponsive when you try to browse for virtual machines in large
vSphere environments. For more information, please contact Support. (23550)

5 PRODUCT SUPPORT

5.1 Technical Support

Complete contact information for your provider is available through the "Support Website"
link. You can access this link through the "Need Help?" menu.

5.2 Product Updates

Product updates are available from your provider.

5.3 Documentation
The following documentation is available for Portal:
- Portal online help: onlinehelp.evault.com
- Portal release notes (this document)
- Portal Installation and Configuration Guide
- Portal Administration Guide
- Portal User Guide