Legato Back Up Planning 2

[jhala]

I need some insight on how to recover data from more than a month back.

Current scenario:

Windows 2000 SP4 and Legato Networker 7.0

I have some clients with a month of Browse Policy and a month of Retention Policy.
I have other clients with a month of Browse Policy and a year of Retention Policy.
A. My understanding of the Browse Policy is the timeline of what the 'change browse time' in Networker User can be changed to and recovered from. For example, my browse policy is set for a month, and I can recover a file from a month back.
B. My understanding of the Retention Policy is the timeline of how long Legato will be able to back up to overall. Say the Retention Policy is a year, then I somehow should be able to select a date a year back and recover from it. However, I do not know how to do this.

Now, 'A' seems to work, but 'B' doesn't when I use the Networker User and 'change browse time'.
I believe I am confused at how to retain the information for how far back I want to recover from. Is there a way to just put a tape in the library from three months back and be able to view what is on the tape?

Please help me clarify these uncertainties and begin a solid back up process.

Thanks

 

[605]

The browse policy controls the size of a client file index. After the BP has expired, the infor for that save set will be deleted automatically.


The RP only defines how long the save set is "write protected" with respect to automatic media recycling. A media can not be automatically recycled by NW until the RP for ALL save sets have expired. ONLY AT THIS POINT IN TIME, info will be deleted from the media index (in this case, the save set info for all save sets of that media and the old media info as well).

Consequently, you will be able to recover until the media has been relabeled, whenever this will be the case. Of course, as a NW administrator, you may override the automatism at any time.


The RP policy does not have anything to do with a "backup possibility".

 

[jhala]

Thanks for the quick response. I'm still a little confused, comparing BP to RP...

My idea of RP is that if a tape stays in the drive for many months, it will not be overwritten if the RP is set to a year... is that correct for RP?

Note, I have three weeks of tapes before the first week is overwritten. However, every month I ship a night of back ups off site and keep them for six months.

So if I if I want to get a back up from 3 months back, then I should change the BP from a month to a year?

Also, the RP doesn't really matter because I manually do the labeling?

Thanks

 

[goony]

Answer from a semi-newbie (i.e. I think this at least 90% correct):

Browse Policy: How long you want to be able to do a selective restore by using filename(s). This info is kept in the client index files and figure out which savesets have the desired filename. Client indexes take up a lot of space on disk and that is why some people limit the browse period.

Once the browse time has passed then Networker will no longer try to maintain the file-to-saveset relationship in the client indexes. Trying to restore individual files at this point becomes a bit of a task.

If the retention period has not passed then whole savesets can still be restored from volumes if needed.

Retention Policy: How long to keep the savesets on the media. Once the retention policy has passed that saveset can be declared as "no longer needed".

Once all savesets on a particular volume have expired then that volume is eligible to be recycled.

 

[goony]

If the retention period has not passed then whole savesets can still be restored from volumes if needed.Ooops... forgot that you can still get expired savesets from a volume as long as it has not been relabeled. (As 605 has stated).

 

[jhala]

So I can recover an entire saveset from a RP. And then from that saveset I can recover individual files? Or does recovering from a RP mean I just recover everything, meaning all servers and the files from those servers?

I'm trying to think of the best way to configure my back up process now. As I mentioned earlier I overwrite the tapes every three to four weeks, and each month I ship a night's back ups off site. So should I be able to grab those off site tapes and recover a RP saveset back up and then recover the BP from that?

Thanks Again

 

[605]

Look at the saveset info with mminfo. The largest save set will be a volume. Consequent if you recover one save set you can only recover one complete volume as largest entity.

With respect to your policy it all depends how big your client file index can grow. If your disk space does allow it, do it.

 

[jhala]

OK, so make the BP as large as I possibly can. How can I monitor how big it is getting, and can I redirect where it is stored on the server? It being the client file index, if that makes sense.

I have a catch-22, if I enlarge the client file index, it just enlarges on my Networker server, which is my file server. I back up my file server so I would just be backing that up to tape as well. How big can these things get. I use about 18 tapes per week, they're Fuji LTO 100GBnative/200GBcompressed. Another story, is how to force the 200GB compression on the tapes, but I need to do some reading.

 

[605]

To check the index size, just use the INDEX tab in the NW admin GUI. This is where you can estimate how big the file indexes can become. Their size does not depend on the amount of backup data but on the number of files and how often they will be saved.

Yes, the file indexes can easily be relocated.

Compressed mode is automatically selected for the devices.

Using a file server as a backup server is not ideal but possible as everything works on only one machine. In this case i strongly recommend to move NetWorker (indexes) onto a separate physical drive.

 

[jhala]

Under c:\nsr\index\server\db6, there are three types of files:
.k0, .k1,. rec - is the .rec the index?

To relocate, do I just copy and paste??? lol
To change the location of where the indexes will be saved, edit one of the clients, go to the index tab and specify the path of the index?

 

[605]

In principle you are right. However, you need to copy the whole tree for a CLIENT.

Please have a look at the NW/Windows Admin Guide on "how to move a client file index".