Feature Request: AAIP "Copy Only" Changes

[skrause]

Hello,

So We have been using AAIP on pretty much all of our Windows servers for years, and I have always done "Copy Only" on the transaction log settings. As the description in the menu says "Perform Copy Only (other applications can use logs)". I have always been reading this to mean that Veeam does not process transaction logs in any fashion. I came to learn during a conversation with another Veeam customer at VeeamOn that the log truncation happens (if your backup service account has the proper permissions in SQL) even with this setting.

I was, needless to say, a bit dumbfounded as to why that would happen as "Copy Only" does not in any way describe to me a process which is performing log truncation. Until 9.5U3a, my jobs never gave a warning or error on this step not being able to truncate the logs (our backup account does not have SQL permissions) so I never thought anything of it. Now, every job with SQL servers in it is throwing up an error. I talked to my DBA and he said that he has been seeing failed login attempts by the backup account to SQL for years and has been ignoring them because he knew it wasn't supposed to have permissions.

Which brings me to my feature request(s):

1) At the very least, rename "Copy Only" to something more descriptive that actually states that log truncation is part of this setting.
2) Give us a true "copy only" setting where truncation does not happen on transaction logs.

According to the user's guide:
https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... tml?ver=95 Section 5(b):

" Select Perform copy only if you use another backup tool to perform VM guest level backup, and this tool maintains consistency of the database state. Veeam Backup & Replication will create a copy-only backup for the selected VM. The copy only backup preserves the chain of full/differential backup files and transaction logs on the VM. For more information, see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms191495.aspx. "

And when you go to that link from Microsoft it states:

"The transaction log is never truncated after a copy-only backup. "

Why is Veeam's behavior not consistent with what is written in the Documentation?

[foggy]

Hi Steve, what errors do you see after updating to U3a? The thing is that even if you select the "Copy only" option, Veeam B&R still needs permissions to update the backupset for SQL Server instance (which apparently caused the login attempts your DBA was ignoring). Logs truncation doesn't occur in this case. In U3a, Veeam B&R as well started to give a warning in case this was not possible.

Besides, these warnings were switched to informational messages in a hotfix to U3a.

[skrause]

Sorry, I am seeing warnings not errors. I meant to type warning.

Code: Select all

7/25/2018 9:11:48 PM :: [TDB]Unable to update SQL backupset for instance  : Code = 0x80040e09
Code meaning = IDispatch error #3081
Source = Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server
Description = The UPDATE permission was denied on the object 'backupset', database 'msdb', schema 'dbo'.

I was seeing "truncating transaction logs" on another job which was backing up a server with SQL Express and now that I look at it, that job was set to process logs instead of copy only.

I guess I am a bit confused as to why Veeam needs to update anything in SQL when I just want to leverage VSS to give me a transaction consistent image level backup of the machine. I also do some magic with file exclusions which is setup in the application aware settings. Am I wrong to assume that file/folder exclusions require AAIP to be enabled?

I will look into getting the hotfix.

[foggy]

TDB]Unable to update SQL backupset for instance : Code = 0x80040e09

Yes, these are the warnings I was talking about.

I guess I am a bit confused as to why Veeam needs to update anything in SQL when I just want to leverage VSS to give me a transaction consistent image level backup of the machine.

It is a system table used by SQL Server to store database backup and restore history information, that's why it needs to be updated each time when the backup occurs.

I also do some magic with file exclusions which is setup in the application aware settings. Am I wrong to assume that file/folder exclusions require AAIP to be enabled?

Yes, this functionality is part of AAIP.

[skrause]

So if we give the SQL permissions listed in the updated user guide to the veeam service account to the msdb database, the warnings should go away?

[foggy]

Correct. As an alternative, the hotfix will turn the warnings into informational messages.