Tape backup job does not back up all files

[Elissen]

Hi,

As it turns out, a tape job to make a backup of a repository, does not copy everything in the repository to tape. Only vbk and vib (and I guess reverse incrementals as well) are written to tape. The following item types are ignored:
- Veeam configuration backup (.bco)
- SQL logs of a VM (.vlb)

I was told by support (01794591 during a phone call) to create a topic on the forum about this. They claim it works as designed, in my opinion it is a bug.

- Mark

[Dima P.]

Hi Mark,

The described behavior is expected. Backup to tape jobs operate with backup files only skipping the transaction log backup and configuration backup files. If that’s required, you can use file to tape jobs to fire these files to tape

[Elissen]

Dmitry,

In the UI you select a repository (and not a part of a repository). This gives the impression everything in the repository will be backed up. There is also no warning or hint in the software that things will be skipped. This gives a false sense of security, something that is very worrying. And that brings up the question what else is not backed up?

I wrote this in the hope you would actually pick it up in order to improve your software and solve issues your customers have with your software.

- Mark

[veremin]

This gives a false sense of security, something that is very worrying. And that brings up the question what else is not backed up?

Backup to tape job archives .vbk, .vbm and .vib files, everything else is skipped from processing.

I wrote this in the hope you would actually pick it up in order to improve your software and solve issues your customers have with your software.

Even though the current behaviour cannot be improved immediately, we do appreciate your taking time and sharing the feedback with us.

Thanks.

[Elissen]

So I created this new tape file copy job because of this. The first thing that is very confusing is the scheduling. Where on 'regular' jobs you set a schedule and then specify what days it needs to run a full backup, on this it has two different schedules? One for incremental and one for full backup? And why not allow it to chain behind a different job? 'Backup to tape' jobs can be chained behind other jobs, why not 'File to tape backup' jobs?

I switched it around and chained the existing 'backup to tape' job behind the new 'file to tape backup' job. On the file to tape jobs I set it to leave the tape in the drive and not export the media set. I assumed the second job would continue to write on the existing tape. There is like 1.3TB of free space left on the tape and yet this morning it is 'Waiting tape'. How can I convince it to do this?

[veremin]

The first thing that is very confusing is the scheduling. Where on 'regular' jobs you set a schedule and then specify what days it needs to run a full backup, on this it has two different schedules?

Yep, those schedules define how often should a job archive the whole directory (full backup) and how often should it backup only changed or new data (incremental backup).

I switched it around and chained the existing 'backup to tape' job behind the new 'file to tape backup' job. On the file to tape jobs I set it to leave the tape in the drive and not export the media set. I assumed the second job would continue to write on the existing tape. There is like 1.3TB of free space left on the tape and yet this morning it is 'Waiting tape'. How can I convince it to do this?

What retention and media set creation settings does a given media pool have?

Thanks.