Synchronizing machines with a text file

During synchronization, the management server adjusts the All machines with agents group in accordance with the list of machines provided in a .txt or .csv file. The management server:

• Adds machines that are present in the list but are not registered
• Deletes registered machines not present in the list
• Deletes and then tries again to add registered machines that are present in the list, but their current availability is Withdrawn.

As a result, only those machines that are listed in the file will be present in the All machines with agents group.

Text file requirements

The file should contain machine names or IP addresses, one machine per line.

Example:

Machine_name_1
Machine_name_2
192.168.1.14
192.168.1.15

Specifying an empty file leads to deletion of all machines with agents from the management server.

A registered machine has to be specified by its registration address: that is, you need to provide exactly the same host name, fully qualified domain name (FQDN), or IP address as was specified when the machine was initially added to the management server. Otherwise, the machine will be deleted and added again as if it were another machine. This means all centralized backup plans, both inherited and directly deployed, will be removed from the machine and its static group membership will be lost.

The registration address of each machine can be found in the Registration address column in any management server view that contains the machine (the column is hidden by default).

To avoid a discrepancy, you can initially import the machines from a text file. Modify this file later as required, by adding and removing machines, but do not change the names/addresses of the machines that have to remain registered.

To synchronize machines with a text file

1. In the Navigation tree, select Machines with agents, or All machines with agents.
2. Click Synchronize with file on the toolbar.
3. In the Path field, enter a path to the .txt or .csv file, or click Browse and select the file in the Browse window.
4. Under Logon settings, specify the user name and password of a user who is a member of the Administrators group on all machines that are listed in the file.
5. Click OK to start import.

Synchronization command-line tool

Acronis Backup Management Server has a command-line tool that enables you to create a batch file and schedule the synchronization task using Windows scheduler.

To synchronize machines with a text file using command line

1. Log on as a member of the Acronis Centralized Admins security group.
2. In the command prompt, change the directory to the folder where Acronis Backup Management Server has been installed—by default: C:\Program Files\Acronis\AMS.
3. Run the following command:

   syncmachines [path_to_the_file] {username password}

   where:

   • [path_to_the_file] is the path to a .txt or .csv file containing the list of machines. The tool does not accept spaces in the path name.
   • {username password} belongs to a user who is a member of the Administrators group on all machines listed in the file. If not specified, the single sign-on mechanism is used to operate on all the machines.