Feature Request: Backup-To-Tape - filter options

[NNa]

It seems that only during initial (first) run of a Backup-To-Tape job you get the option to filter for only the latest Backup-Chain. (UserGuide pag 690).
Second time this Backup-To-Tape job runs, it will select ALL new restorepoints to archive to tape.
I only want to schedule this tape archive job to run only once per month to export only the latest FULL backup to tape.

Can you make an enhancement in the Veeam v8 tape support to force the existing Backup-To-Tape job to ALWAYS select only the LATEST Backup Chain?

This will make monthly tape archiving MUCH easier & faster!

[Dima P.]

Hello Nico,
Welcome to Veeam Forums!

Yes, currently this option allows selecting the last backup chain during the first backup to tape job run. We will discuss you request with the dev team, meanwhile, there is a possible workaround - please review this thread: Backup to Tape only last backup with reversed incremental
Thank you.

[veremin]

What backup mode you're using? And how often you're running full backup? Thanks.

[NNa]

Backup Jobs: Forward-Incremental + Active full per week with retention of 14 restorepoints.
With this schema you will get 2 or 3 full backups per month to be archived to tape, when using a monthly schedule of the Backup-To-Tape Job.

Switching to Reverse Incremental is not a good solution for us. This means you switch to a "incremental forever" backup, by injecting only incrementals during post-processing. As Veeam mention as bast practices, to make an Active Full at least per 2-3 months, you end-up with same situation, having multiple Full backups to archive to tape in a run. Reverse Incremenatal does require additional post-processing time, during which backup files are locked. This will cause additional delay for scheduling the Backup-To-Tape jobs and/or Backup Copy Jobs and IOPS.

So I'am looking to a way to TRICK / RESET the "Backup-To-Tape Job" administration to "Forece initial run, with filtering for latest Backup Chain".
Or the option for "Always filter for latest backup chain" as an option for the "Backup-To-Tape Job" in Veeam v8.
This combined with not to process incrementals, will do the job.

[veremin]

Haven't you thought of switching to the new forever forward incremental backup mode and using synthesized full backup to achieve what you're after? Thanks.

[NNa]

Vladimir,

I don't think "switching to the new forever forward incremental backup mode and using synthesized full backup to archieve" will fix the problem.
Using "synthesized full backup" means you will be processing incrementals. When running the "backup-to-tape" job this will result in "finding" more newly created restore points, which are created during the Backup-To-Tape job interval of 1 month. That's why we select NOT to process incrementals.
Our intention is to archive latest FULL backup per month to tape for with retension "never overwrite data". We want to run the Backup-To-Tape job directly after the creation of the monthly full backup and vault tape mediasets off-site directly after completion.

[veremin]

You can set monthly schedule for both synthesized full and backup to tape job. With this approach, once a month a new full backup file will be created on tapes out of existing backup chain that is present on disk. Isn't that what you're after? Thanks.

[NNa]

Vladimir,

Your suggestion to monthly schedule a backup to tape job with synthetic full backup option will ONLY work with ONE backup chain created by Forward-Incremental Forever in primairy backup jobs.

But with Backup Jobs based on Forward-Incremental + Active full per week with retention of 14 restorepoints, you get 2 or 3 backupchains per month.
So I expect that ALL chains will be processed the SECOND time the Backup-To-Tape job is run again. This is the current selection behavior as by design of the Backup-To-Tape jobs.

Need to do some testing to find out....

[veremin]

Yes, the approach described by me would work in case of source backup job using forever forward incremental mode. Thus, I recommend you to think about switching to it.

Otherwise (if active full backup is being performed regularly), sometimes there will be more than one full backup at disk, and those will be copied by monthly backup to tape job accordingly. Nevertheless, I think you can make backup copy job copy only the latest file by manually re-adding job source.

Thanks.

[gosnells]

Hi,

+1 for this Feature Request: Backup-To-Tape - filter options

Is this something coming in v9 ?

It seems very convoluted to have to remove and re-add the source backup jobs, being sure to select Latest backup chain only, every time one wants to tweak the backup job settings.
(When this is not done) Having the Disk to Tape job suck up multiple VBKs and not just the latest backup chain and try to write 30TB instead of 11TB is frustrating to say the least...


our setup: daily Forw Incr with weekly Active fulls with 28+day retention on DR4100. weekly offload of latest full backup to LTO6 tape.

[Dima P.]

Mike,

We will have something similar in v9 – don’t forget to join the beta and test it yourself