GFS Retention Policy

[aquegles]

Hello everyone.

I´m new with veeam, and i want to make a backup plan, and i´m still trying to undestand backup copy jobs and GFS retention
I have my backup job running every night, keeping 30 restore points.
My backup copy job runs also every night, but what i don´t understan is how GFS retention policy works.

Let´s say that i want a weekly copy for each week, and a monthly for each month, and a yearly for each year.

I start my backup copy job on monday and keep 6 restore points. On Sunday backup copy creates the weekly backup, and then it deletes the previous backup files to start a new chain?

Help please!!

Thanks a lot

[Shestakov]

Hello Alejandro and welcome to the forum!

GFS feature is fully described in the User Guide. Please take a look.
GFS is a tiered retention policy scheme which uses a number of cycles to maintain backups at different tiers, in your case Regular, Weekly, Monthly, Yearly.

...On Sunday backup copy creates the weekly backup, and then it deletes the previous backup files to start a new chain?

You just go to target section in backup copy job settings, set keep the following restore points for archival process on and pick weekly backup=1, monthly backup =1, quarterly=0, yearly=1. Also, by clicking schedule.. you can specify days.
You will not loose any restore points using GFS.

Thank you.

[foggy]

I start my backup copy job on monday and keep 6 restore points. On Sunday backup copy creates the weekly backup, and then it deletes the previous backup files to start a new chain?

GFS restore points are created aside the main backup copy job chain and have separate retention, so they do not affect existing regular restore points in any way.

[aquegles]

Hello everyone and thanks for replying.

I have a few doubts : When i create the backup copy job, it asks me "Restore points to keep". These restore points are the restore points the backup copy job will keep? or are the restore points i want to keep from my original backup job?

You just go to target section in backup copy job settings, set keep the following restore points for archival process on and pick weekly backup=1, monthly backup =1, quarterly=0, yearly=1. Also, by clicking schedule.. you can specify days.
You will not loose any restore points using GFS.

Whit this configuration, at the end of the month, i will have 4 weekly backups, and one monthly backup? and at the end of the year, i will have 12 monthly backups and 1 yearly backup?

I need to keep a year of historical backup.

Thanks a lot!

[veremin]

I have a few doubts : When i create the backup copy job, it asks me "Restore points to keep". These restore points are the restore points the backup copy job will keep? or are the restore points i want to keep from my original backup job?

There are two different retention schemes in case of backup copy job: simple and GFS. The former is related to restore points created by backup copy job in accordance with sync interval. The GFS applies to restore points created for long term archival purposes.

Whit this configuration, at the end of the month, i will have 4 weekly backups, and one monthly backup?

Not at the end of the month, but at the time when the oldest restore point (.vbk) reaches a day specified for GFS restore point creation.

Thanks.

[Shestakov]

Whit this configuration, at the end of the month, i will have 4 weekly backups, and one monthly backup? and at the end of the year, i will have 12 monthly backups and 1 yearly backup?

No, with the configuration we discussed above: weekly backup=1, monthly backup =1, quarterly=0, yearly=1 you will have just 1 restore point of weekly jobs and 1 of the monthly jobs.
So if you want to keep backups of all weeks of the year, you need to set weekly backup=52, for all months, monthly backup=12 etc.

You can find more info here. Thanks

[aquegles]

What i need is to keep 1 monthly backup for each month of the year, and 1 yearly backup per year.

For this purpose, is this configuration correct ? :

Weekly backup = 0
Monthly backup = 12
Quarterly backup = 0
Yearly Backup = 1

Thanks!

[foggy]

Considering you need to keep backups just for the last year, yes. If you need to keep several years, you need to specify the number of yearly backups correspondingly.

[aquegles]

One last question : with this configuration :

Weekly backup = 0
Monthly backup = 12
Quarterly backup = 0
Yearly Backup = 1

Thanks!

How does veeam makes the daily backups, and how does eliminates the restore points? I configure that in "Restore points to keep?

Thanks!

[foggy]

Yes, daily restore points are handled according to the "Restore points to keep" setting.

[aquegles]

Thank you very much everyone for the help!

Now, i promise, last quiestion!

Which ports do i have to open between my veeam server and the remote server (the remote repository) to transport the data?

Thanks again

[foggy]

You can find all the required ports in the corresponding user guide section. And feel free to ask any further questions.

[aquegles]

Thank you very much.

I have another doubt. I have my regular backups with 30 restore points. If i make a backup copy jpb in order to keep all of this RPs, it will make a full backup of all of this 30 restore points, and the it will star doing the incrementals?

Thanks!

[Shestakov]

Alejandro,

If you start backup copy job of a backup job with 30 restore points, Veeam B&R will synthetically create the first full restore point in target location from VM data stored in source backup repository for a first backup copy job run and then continue doing incrementals in accordance to the retention policy. Thanks.

[aquegles]

Friends, i´m kinda lost here...

I performed a backup cop job today, and when it finished and i try to make a flr, i do not see all my 30 restore points, i only see the one from today.

So, backup copy job did not backup all the restore points in my regular backup, but only the restore point from today.

Is this ok? or i´m doing somethin wrong?

What i need is to back up all my restore points in another location. I have to copy/paste the files?

Thanks again

[foggy]

Alejandro, backup copy job does not copy files but rather synthetically creates restore points on target repository using data available in the source repository. It is always incremental and copies the latest VM state during each synchronization interval. So the behavior you're observing is totally expected. I encourage you to read the user guide section Nikita has referenced above to get better understanding of how backup copy works, the description there is pretty detailed. If you still have questions after reviewing it, feel free to ask them here.

[veremin]

What i need is to back up all my restore points in another location. I have to copy/paste the files?

That wouldn't work, as currently it's possible to map a backup copy job only to a chain created by other backup copy job. Thanks.

[aquegles]

That wouldn't work, as currently it's possible to map a backup copy job only to a chain created by other backup copy job. Thanks.

Eremin, if i can't copy/paste my backup files, how can i save them for future restore requests?

Thanks!

[foggy]

You can just keep them anywhere and then import when required.

[aquegles]

Ok, thank you very much.

I will then copy all my backup files to a tape, and then start backup job and backup copy job simultaneously, so the 2 backup jobs are consistent.

[veremin]

The best strategy, indeed. Don't hesitate to ask, should other questions arise. Thanks.

[aquegles]

Friends, i´m currently doing the backups and backup copies just fine, but i have a question regarding data transfer speed.

The backup copy transfers data at 20 Mb/s. I was wondering if this is a lan issue, or should i install a proxy server on the remote repository server?

I have the enterprise license, so i have no access to wan accelerator.

Thanks a lot!

[foggy]

Alejandro, what kind of target repository are you using and what are the bottleneck stats for the backup copy job?

[aquegles]

My target reposiroty is a windows server, with vPower NFS enabled, and the final bottleneck stat shows "Source". But when you check on each vm, the bottleneck was the proxy (5%).

Regards

[foggy]

5% is too small value to be the bottleneck. Anyway, the weakest point seems to be on the source repository side. Is the source storage probably busy with other tasks when doing the backup copy?

[veremin]

Also, what type of source you have? Is NAS configured as a CIFS share by any chance? If so, then, it's recommended to have a windows machine in front of it ("proxying server") in order to speed up the process. Thanks.

[aquegles]

The source is a local hard drive on veeam server.

I will try to install a proxy on the windows server that has the remote repository. The thing is that when i configure the backup copy job, there is no option for selecting the proxy server. I have to configure it on the backup job?

PS: Sorry mi awful english through all posts ....

[veremin]

The thing is that when i configure the backup copy job, there is no option for selecting the proxy server.I have to configure it on the backup job?

You don't have to configure a remote proxy, as the connection will be established between source and target repositories. The case with CIFS share is different, as the latter requires a windows server in front of it in order to increase performance. Thanks.

[aquegles]

Ok, thanks a lot.

I just checked today's backup (was an incremental), and it finished within an hour.

Probably the delay on the full backup copy is because of a LAN issue. I will check this out.

Thanks a lot!

[veremin]

The initial run might take some time indeed as the whole image should be synthetically created in target location. Only changes should be transferred during subsequent runs, though. So, I recommend you observing the job for a while and raising a question if performance leaves much to be desired. Thanks.