Need help to understand retention policy and how to do 3-2-1 with VBO

[bryanLC]

Dear all,

I have questions regarding the retention policy of VBO and the 3-2-1 with VBO:

I’ve some trouble to understand the items-level vs snapshot-based retention policy.

• Items-level retention: in this case I understood that the items that have modified or created date before the retention date won’t be backup. For example, if my retention policy is 1 years all my files that were created or modified before the 26.04.2020 won’t be backup.

• Snapshot-based retention: in this case I understood that the whole data of my mailbox or onedrive are backuped in the actual state. So if my retention policy is set to 1 years I can restore my whole mailbox or whole onedrive from 364 days ago (with all the data including files/mails from 2010 for example).

Is my understanding correct ?

Another question regarding the 3-2-1 rule:
In VBO we don’t have an option to create an archive of the backup or a full copy of a backup (for example to move it to another location). Is that correct ?
Could anyone confirm that we can backup the VBO Repository (only) via VBR and if needed restore it, create a new backup repository and copy-past the restored data in it ? Would it be possible to use this backup repository with the restored data in VBO ?
Or should we backup the VBO server including the VBO Repository and restore both of them together to have access to the backup data ?

Thank you in advance for your help and have a nice day

Kind regards,
Bryan

[Mike Resseler]

For your first question: Correct!

For question 2:
If you have a JET DB based repository, then the best way to do it is to backup the VBO service as VMs (or with the agents as physical) with Veeam Backup & Replication. VBR has built-in knowledge that the backup is VBO and will allow you to do item-level restores from that backup.

When the repository is object storage, there we are working on a solution that will come this year

[bryanLC]

Dear Mike,

Thanks a lot for your answers.

Regarding question 1, as the first backup is always a full following by incremental backups, how Veeam will apply the retention policy ? Will it create a synthetic full to be able to remove the first one (when we hit the retention date) ?

Regarding question 2, I'm not sure to understood where a JET DB is used. In VBO or in VBR ?
Is the option to backup only the VBO files possible or we won't be able to access to the backuped data after the restore ?
If the customer have VBR and VBO on the same server, what is the best option to backup the VBO datas and keep it for 10 years for example ?
Do you have a documentation regarding the backup of VBO datas ?

Thank you in advance for your help and have a nice day.

Kind regards,
Bryan

[Mike Resseler]

Hey Bryan,

Let me first try to explain the 2 different types of of repositories that we have.

1. Jet DB repository
When items are downloaded they are stored in the Jet DB (which is also used in Exchange server). For example, an email comes in and is being split up in pieces (metadata) and stored in different tables of the Jet DB. There is more details which you can read here: https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/vbo36 ... tml?ver=50

So all data is in a Database.

2. Object Storage repository
Here we do the same thing (more or less), but we store all the different data in objects. We listed the different folders and explanation here: https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/vbo36 ... tml?ver=50

So all data is not in a database, but again it is split up and stored in separate objects.

This means, for your question 1, we don't need to do synthetics as we don't have an image level backup. We can simply remove the items from the database or objects which are not within retention anymore. Does that make sense?

For Question 2:

VBO is using a Jet DB, not VBR. So in the case of VBR backing up the VBO service, it will use its standard image-level backup of those servers. In the case that you have VBR and VBO on the same server, then it becomes a problem doing this. Are you using a separate proxy? Or is it an all-in-one installation?

[bryanLC]

Dear Mike,

1. OK understood now Thank you for the details !

2. Yes it is an all-in-one installation (VBR and VBO installed on the same server, server also used as backup proxies for both tools).
So the idea was to backup the VBO "Backup repository" folder with VBR. And in case of restore, create a new backup repository in VBO and copy-paste the restored backup (Jet DB repository).
But I would like to confirm first if it possible and supported before implementing that for customers.

Thank you in advance for your help and have a nice day.

Kind regards,
Bryan