newbie question - purpose of inventory 1

[dfpaz]

Hi there

Just to explain how new to veritas backup exec I am - I have, for the first time, added a new 'catridge' to a media set (via the label media option). My first backup is in progress as I write.

However looking through the documentation I can't get a handle for when and why you would do an inventory.

Thanks in advance

 

[SQLBill]

You put a new tape in, but VERITAS doesn't know anything about that tape. Is it a tape that is already used, is it a new tape, is it a tape that can be used by VERITAS? The way that you let VERITAS know what it needs to know about the tape is to do an inventory.

-Bill

 

[dfpaz]

It is a new tape.

Therefore when I have a new tape that I want to do backups to, I have to do two things:
1. Add it to a media set
2. Do an an inventory

Then I can use the tape to do backups??

Thanks for your time

 

[SQLBill]

Yes and no. You don't HAVE to add it to a media set. But you MUST inventory it. The majority of my tapes are not assigned to a media set, I let Veritas assign them as it needs them. But I inventory every tape as it is added (if I add more than two or more, I just inventory them all together).

-Bill

 

[Zelandakh]

you can get the backup job to overwrite no matter what in which case you don't need to inventory every time you change the tape.