Multiple Issues with tape operation

[garybone]

Hi,

Unless i'm missing something (entirely likely) the tape support is missing a trick or 2.

1. Media Pools can only support 1 active job, I personally do not require a myriad of media pools to support me running simultaneous jobs to both the drives in my library. This limits my storage flexibility as I back off my entire 3.5 Tb to 3 x LTO 5 daily ,I have to be careful how I carve it up using the B&R tape support.
2. I have no option to "Force" full backups on the tape job. Even if my main Veeam backup is only an incremental I would like the tape to contain the last full and all forward increments? this doesn't seem possible agan unless i'm missing a trick.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Gary

[veremin]

Media Pools can only support 1 active job, I personally do not require a myriad of media pools to support me running simultaneous jobs to both the drives in my library. This limits my storage flexibility as I back off my entire 3.5 Tb to 3 x LTO 5 daily ,I have to be careful how I carve it up using the B&R tape support.

Yep, with the current implementation you have to use separate media-pools in order to utilize several drives simultaneously.

I have no option to "Force" full backups on the tape job. Even if my main Veeam backup is only an incremental I would like the tape to contain the last full and all forward increments? this doesn't seem possible agan unless i'm missing a trick.

Could you elaborate on it a little bit? You want to have ability to “force-copy” the whole backup chain, instead of only increments, even though the chain has been previously copied to tape medias, right?

Thanks.

[garybone]

Hi,

1. Would it be possible to ask that this be considered for future?
2. you've hit the nail on the head.

Cheers
Gary

[tfloor]

As far as i know Question 2 is already requested by internal support people of veeam.
So i hope to see that option soon

[veremin]

1. Would it be possible to ask that this be considered for future?

Yep, we usually take users’ feedback into account, while thinking about potential features or further improvements.

As far as i know Question 2 is already requested by internal support people of veeam.

There must be a slight misunderstanding - previously there has been a request for “copy latest .vbk” feature, meanwhile, the op's case is more about “copy latest .vbk, as well as, corresponding .vibs”. Thanks.

[garybone]

Ok so in terms of full backup chain copy can I request that this be submitted for a future version as it has advantages of recovery from multiple tapes given they are a fundamentally flawed (yet essential) media.

[veremin]

Yes, you can. Actually, you have already made such a request by creating this topic.

Also, assuming that you want each time to copy full backup chain to tape medias, one of the options would to create a different job each time. Though, in this case, the whole chain, indeed, will be copied, not just the latest .vbk with related vib files. If you find this scenario applicable, I can, probably, come up with the way how this process can be automated with PowerShell.

Thanks.

[tfloor]

Yep, we usually take users’ feedback into account, while thinking about potential features or further improvements.
There must be a slight misunderstanding - previously there has been a request for “copy latest .vbk” feature, meanwhile, the op's case is more about “copy latest .vbk, as well as, corresponding .vibs”. Thanks.

And we want both

[garybone]

Yes, you can. Actually, you have already made such a request by creating this topic.

Also, assuming that you want each time to copy full backup chain to tape medias, one of the options would to create a different job each time. Though, in this case, the whole chain, indeed, will be copied, not just the latest .vbk with related vib files. If you find this scenario applicable, I can, probably, come up with the way how this process can be automated with PowerShell.

Thanks.

I dont really want to go down the road of using powershell for something this simple. the other annoyance is I can't schedule a "copy files to tape" job to run after a regular backup job, that would be OK for the interim.

[garybone]

Also, what would happen if I were to switch my jobs to reverse incremental. would I get a full backup to tape daily?

[nhue]

Hi,

The repository gets filled from a 14 restore point incremental backup to disk, there is a Backup to Tape Job Repository following right after, if I deselect the "Process incremental backup files" check box the job runs with "There is nothing to backup" on the second day, even tho there is new incremental data.

My question is, is there a way to get the WHOLE repository everyday on every tape, with the full and incremental data?

Thanks,

[veremin]

"There is nothing to backup" on the second day, even tho there is new incremental data.

Actually, it’s expected, - you’ve disabled incremental processing, so, no incremental data is going to be copied to tape appliances.

My question is, is there a way to get the WHOLE repository everyday on every tape, with the full and incremental data?

What backup method is being used? Reversed or forward incremental one?

Thanks.

[veremin]

Yep, with reversed incremental mode there is always a new backup after each job cycle. And it will be copied as a whole to tape medias. Thanks.

[nhue]

Incremental with synthetic fulls.

Reading the description of Reversed Incremental I'm guessing I would at least have a single useable restore point going to tape, but if I want the whole repository to tape, should I be configuring a secondary target in my Backup to Disk job that goes to my backup to Tape job?

[veremin]

You request seems to be similar to the one discussed in this thread, so, I’ve decided to merged your posts into it.

Currently there is no such functionality that allows you to force tape copying of whole backup chain. After initial run, only incremental data is being processed.

So, if you want to have every day, at least, one independent restore point on tape media, then, you should switch to reversed incremental mode, indeed. Thanks.

[BriFar]

I dont really want to go down the road of using powershell for something this simple. the other annoyance is I can't schedule a "copy files to tape" job to run after a regular backup job, that would be OK for the interim.

If I understand you correctly, you might be able to set the VM back job, that finishes last, to run a post script. The post script would run the copy files to tape command. This command is provided by Veeam B&R when you setup any backup job in the summary view.
I use post commands to initiate backup to tape via backup exec immediately after the last job finishes. Avoiding playing with schedules. Unfortunately Bexec didn't give you the command to just copy/paste in veeam

[veremin]

the other annoyance is I can't schedule a "copy files to tape" job to run after a regular backup job, that would be OK for the interim.

As mentioned, the post-job activity of a normal backup job would be the best option, indeed. There you can specify either the command that is shown in the backup job summary or the PS one-liner responsible for job execution. Thanks.

[mattdwyerva]

Not sure my request is identical, but similar, so using this thread. My full backup of active data is 500 GB total and I have a large repository for the backup, and LTO 5 tape for secondary target. I was experimenting with synthetic fulls, and they are pretty quick (2 hrs), so I set it on syn full every day (yeah, overkill) and then dup to tape. What I expected was one syn full on every tape, but... the dup to tape job asks for multiple tapes and goes to multiple TB, so apparently not.

My main question is.... When I ask to copy a VBR7 backup job (not file) to tape, what exactly gets copied? Every VBR backup ever for that job that is within retention range? Everything back to the last true full? Just the latest and greatest? It would be nice if I could pick any of those, but for now, what is it trying to do?

My secondary question is that the software indicates reverse incremental will not work for copies to tape but you seem to be saying the opposite here? I must be missing something basic.

[veremin]

When I ask to copy a VBR7 backup job (not file) to tape, what exactly gets copied?

Backup to tape job copies every .vbk and .vib files that can be found in a given “source”: be it backup job or backup repository.

My secondary question is that the software indicates reverse incremental will not work for copies to tape but you seem to be saying the opposite here

Backup to tape job will work in case of reversed incremental mode, though, .vrb files will be skipped from processing. Also, be aware that with reversed incremental mode, each day there will a whole full backup copied to tape medias; thus, it’s recommended to utilize incremental mode, instead.

Thanks.

[mattdwyerva]

Um, that is stunning logic of copying everything ever done to tape. IMO, choices should be type (full;syn full;incr;rvse) and date range (last xx days), so this is an enhancement request.

If I select reverse incremental for the backup job with secondary to tape, "a whole backup to tape" means what? - the most recent vbk to tape with no other files?

[foggy]

If I select reverse incremental for the backup job with secondary to tape, "a whole backup to tape" means what? - the most recent vbk to tape with no other files?

Correct.

And thank you for the feedback. We are going to considerably improve tape functionality in future releases.

[mattdwyerva]

Checking directories and job and job history, I see
1) Repository has 7.5 TB in the directory for this job (mix of file types, vbk and vib)
2) Job on 17th (syn full) processed 787 GB and created a 510 GB vbk file. Tape step pushed 2.5TB to tape. Day before was 1.5TB to tape (same job GB).
3) Looking back over the past couple weeks, I see no pattern, pushing 510GB to tape, but occasionally 1.5TB or more. Occasionally.

Sorry to beat this to death, but just trying to get a grip on logic. Tapes have only saved me from total data loss twice in 25 years, but those were 2 good saves. I have used cloud backups from others and the seeding process was excruciating plus I know a company that did not renew their offsite storage once upon a time. I already own a pretty decent tape drive, so thought I would use it.

I want the latest vbk full+inc (or syn full) on tape. I guess I need to figure out powershell until VBR is updated?

[veremin]

As mentioned in the adjacent thread, it’s not possible with the current implementation to push only latest .vbk to tape, using “backup to tape” job. So, for now you can, probably, put into use the script that utilizes file to tape job in conjunction with hard links.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback; much appreciated. We will consider how existing functionality can be improved in the future product releases. Thanks.

[mattdwyerva]

I set up the script and that was much easier than expected, and worked just fine. Changed delete to *.vbk instead of *.* just because that makes me less nervous.

[veremin]

Additional precaution won’t be harmful, indeed.