Backup to Tape only last backup with reversed incremental

[alando]

Haven't seen the confirmation for next major release. Thanks.

[futureweb]

Hi,

correct me if I am wrong:
- If doing backup to tape jobs from a repository

- Veeam checks on per Job basis, if it has full backup files, that are not present on tape. It will copy over all VBK Files it finds, and the last synthesized full.
- Veeam checks on per Job basis, if all incremental are on tape, all missing ones are copied to tapes. (In case you have 3 weeks inc on disk, but only 1 week inc on tape, it would then copy over the old .vib files aswell.

Which is basically fine, you should keep in mind, that backup retention on tape is always higher than on disk.

But is it possible, to have a backup job where it only copies the last synthesized on tape?

On Tape we have:
1st Job: Does full and inc. Full are kept 8 weeks, done weekly sunday with synthesized full. Inc are done daily and kept 3 weeks.
2nd Job: Does monthly full on first thursday of month with synthesized full, also first thursday of the month. No inc.

So that we have retention:
3 weeks daily
8 weeks weekly
12 months monthly

So we noticed, the first time the 2nd Job ran, it copied over all VBK we have in the Media Pool, aswell as the last synthesized full. Thus using quite more tapes as necessary.
What if we only want the last full to be on tape? As we can't set this setting within one Job, we had to do 2 jobs.

Sure, it's just the first backup, that's so big, I assume, any additional backup will do one synthesized per month (even the 1st job does synthesized per week).
But still wondering if I am correct and this would be the correct way to do it.
And if there is a possibility to just have last synthesized Backup on Tape if I want for whatever reason.

Thanks
Patrick

[Dima P.]

Hey Patrick,
Correct you cant job push the latest full to tape. However, you can use a revered incremental source backup job to push the last full to tape. I’ve merged to you the existing discussions.

[quint4321]

Hi,

I have a question regarding what my tape jobs process that I can't quite find the answer to on the forum,
I first thought that by disabling "process incremental backup files" the tape job would just copy the last .vbk file of the corresponding backup job. But it looks like it copies all .vbk files since the last run of the tape job.

My question is simply: How do I get the tape job to only process 1 (specifically the second to last) .vbk file of a job? I can't seem to find a way to do this.
This is a tape job on a reverse incremental backup job which runs an active full once a month, goal is to copy only the active full vbk and not the latest restore point, which is also a vbk file.

Thank you in advance for your feedback!

[Shestakov]

Hi and welcome to the forums!
That is one the most frequently asked tape feature and it`s going to be implemented in the upcoming VBRv9.
Thanks!

[JaySt]

very nice!

[smarechal]

Hello,

You confirm we will be able to make easily full backup job to tape in Veeam V9 like i do it with Vranger and backup Exec now?

Thanks.

[Shestakov]

Hello Siegfried and welcome to the forums!
Could you clarify your question? Did you mean the source job for backup-ta-tape jobs?
In v9 just like in v8 backup-to-tape job copies existing backups to tapes. Thanks!

[veremin]

Option to always copy only the latest full backup is included in version 9, indeed. Thanks.

[LyleH]

Problem is that our End of Month (EOM) tape jobs are backing up all the VBK and VIB files in a repository to tape and we want it to only backup the latest chain of VBK and VIB files.

Our company policy is to have 1 month retention on End of Week tapes (EOW) and have 1 year retention on EOM tapes, so I have created different Media Pools and Jobs for EOW versus EOM. When the end of the month comes I disable the EOW jobs and enable the EOM jobs. When my EOM job just started running this week it is backing up all the VBK and VIB files instead of just the current chain. I know that if I were to create a new Tape Job it would prompt me that “One or more source backup jobs have multiple full backup chains already created. Should only the latest chain, or all existing chains be sent to tape upon the first job run”. Unfortunately the “Latest” chain button only works the first time the job is run and we would like this to be the option anytime a tape job runs.

Does anyone know of a PowerShell script or a better way to do this? I am trying to keep our backup process simple and quick.

[justind]

Hurrah! Last full backup to tape in v9 is awesome!

[WinstonWolf]

Hello ,
We want to create an Monthly Tape Backup Job at the end of the Month and every Month a new Media Set
At the Moment the Tape Job creates 2 vbk. Files in every new Media Set, the first vbk. File from the Start Date of the VM Backup Job and an virtual vbk File at the Backup Day ( or the day we choose )
The Problem now is that we need the double amont of Tapes and Backuptime for this Job because we must Backup two vbk Files.
Is there an other way to solve this Situation ?

Michael

[Shestakov]

Hello Michael,

Have you already upgraded to the newest version of our product, v9?
The issue is addressed there.

Do you backup fulls only or incrementals as well?
What backup mode does you source job have? You might need to switch to the simple incremental. Thanks!

[Aerospace]

Veeam needs for this Prolbem a quickly Hotfix... !quickly!

To get always a Fullbackup you need to move the current Backup-Tapes to a other Media Pool, so has Veeam no reference to the Backups before and makes a new Fullbackup.

[Dima P.]

Hello Martin,

I am not sure I understand you issue since this topic describes how to back up the latest full to tape. Previously, it was possible only with reversed incremental and now in v9 there is a corresponding checkbox in the tape job’s advanced settings, so that could be easily achieved. Can you please elaborate or post a case ID for reference? Thank you in advance.

[justind]

I think what Martin is referring to is the fact that if a full backup is on a tape then you can't back it up to another tape unless the VBK has changed.

[Aerospace]

thats correct justind, thank you
My currently workaround is, move all Tapes after each backup in a temporary Mediapool, to get a new fullbackup. but thats only a workaround...
i think many persons don't know this and have no fullbackups each day ^^

[Dima P.]

Thanks for the clarification. So you want to have a multiple copies of the same .vbk even though it was not changed?

[Aerospace]

Yes