reducing tapes usage 1

[sentmemail]

Hi,
My data size is about 100GB and i am scheduling culmulative incremental backup on weekdays and full backup on weekends to reduce tapes usage...
However, i found that culmulative incremental backup is using the same amount of tapes as full backup?
pls help.
thanks

 

[defstar]

You should try switching to Differential Incrementals. Cumulatives grow with each backup and dpepending on what you change on a daily basis, these backups could rival the FULLs in size. Differential only backs up what has changed since the last backup. Cumulatives backup once has changed since the last FULL.

The caveats to this are normally seen in full recovery:

-To perform a full restore with Cumulative Incrementals, you need only restore the full and the latest cumulative backup.

-To perform a full restore with Differential Incrementals, you must restore the FULL and all subsequent differential sobs in succession.

You can find more information on this in the NetBackup System Administrator's Guide.

Download the PDF at

http://www.support.veritas.com

!

 

[sentmemail]

defstar,
do you recommend Differential Incrementals or Cumulatives Incrementals ??

 

[defstar]

I recommend neither. Each has a good point and a bad.

Cumulative Incr:

Good- Only need to Cum Incr backup to recover.

Bad- Takes up a lot more space on tape, and the backups take a lot longer.

Diff Incr:

Good- Takes up minimal space on your tapes, and backs up in a lot less time.

Bad- You must restore each diff incr in succession post a full backup restore to get completely restored.


Your decision has to be based on your environment. Now that you know the basic pros and cons, you should be able to easily make your decision.

*Check your other posts- I have answered other questions.

 

[sentmemail]

the strange thing i found out today is that the culmulative incremental backup actually runs as a FULL backup !!
thats why its using the same number of tapes as FULL backup schedule.
any help??

 

[PGPhantom]

Do you have the cumulative incremental in the same policy or a different policy? If they are in different policies - It will always be a full. The way it works - Make a full backup schedule and a cumulative backup schedule in the same policy. When the schedule is run for cumulative, it checks if there has been a full backup in the same policy - If not, the archive bit is ignored and you get a full.

In the "Admin GUI" - Click on the client and bring up it's properties - Under the "Windows Client" tab - "Perform Incrementals Based on Archive Bit" - Is this checked off or not?

 

[sentmemail]

i have put both into the same policy now.
how do i specify additional files to be backup for FULL backup schdule??
thanks

 

[PGPhantom]

You don't. What you can do it to create an exclusion list for the incremental schedule and exclude C:\ from it and only it - Remeber that an exclude list though the console is first defined by class and then, if necessary, by schedule. So you can have different excludes in different scedules but you cannot specify different files for backup in each.

Does that make sense??

 

[sentmemail]

can i use include C: for FULL BACKUP instead?

 

[defstar]

You should be able to, however; If you do not use ALL_LOCAL_DRIVES on a win2k client, and y ou only specify C:\, then you will not backup the System_state- which is needed to perform disaster recovery of a win2k server.

-d-

 

[PGPhantom]

If I follow correctly - You want to be able to use an include for Drive-C? Just to clarify, if it is the actual include lists that you are talking about - An include will only include something that has been excluded.

i.e. Say you exclude Drive-C with an exclude list for a specific schedule after using the "All Local Drives" directive, and you want to still backup c:\winnt for example. The include list will have c:\winnt in it so the rest of drive-C will be backed up.

 

[sentmemail]

PGPhantom, i don't understand what you are trying to say.
my current backup file list has D: and E:, 1 Full backup schedule and 1 incremental backup schedule.
can i use the option include to backup C: in addition, when the Full backup runs?

 

[PGPhantom]

No.

Do this ... Set up a policy. In that policy create a schedule for a full backup and one for an incremental backup.

e.g. Say the server name is server1, policy would be called location_server1_nt <<== This is just a naming scheme that we use for policies.

In the policy named location_server1_nt create a schedule named system_full and another named system_cumu <<== Once again just how we name things. For this entire policy ... In the &quot;Files&quot; area - Specify ALL_LOCAL_DRIVES - This will prevent the registry etc from being missed - DO NOT specify individual drives.

Next step ... In the backup/archive/restore GUI on the client, Under &quot;NetBackup Client Properties&quot;, click on the &quot;Exclude List&quot; tab. Click on &quot;New List&quot; and int he policy field type in location_server1_nt and int he schedule field type in system_cumu. In the exclude file box type in C:\ and then click on add and OKAY.

What this means is that every schedule will backup all drives, registry etc on that server with the exception of thesystem_cumu which will not backup C:\.

Does this make sense?

 

[defstar]

PGP is correct on this. &quot;You must have an exclude in order to do the include. I know that it is kinda silly, however that is just how they made the product so many moons ago. Also, do not forget that you can do all of this administration from the master server itself. You need not go to each client individually.

This can be accomplished from the client properties for each specific client.

Which version of NBU are you running? 3.4.x or 4.5?

 

[JanEnEm]

Hard to give accurate response when mixing up the actual problem defs.
All about include/exclude is true, but first determine what you wanna do. sentemail asked how to specify additional files. I read from this, he(she?) wants to extend the filelist. So just do it. Don't get mixed up with includes or excludes.
second (sentemails first question) why is my incremental taking the same amount of tape? defstar already recommended to use the same policy, true. But als look at the amount of data being modified. Are you doing flat file backup of e.g. Lotus replicated database, modifying every 5 minutes, no incremental should be used, since that will always result in the whole bunch of files being part of the backup (archive bit will be on for all files). Jan Meijer
COMPAREX Nederland BV

 

[sentmemail]

i have another problem now, is that the daily incremental backups always writes to the same tape.
any help??

 

[sentmemail]

guys any help?

 

[Sekhar]

You can use the bpmedialist command to see the media contents.