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veremin
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by veremin »

Are these just different methods for getting to the VM?
Correct.
Existing Restore Points - When the Backup Copy job runs for the first time, will it sync all the available local restore points to the cloud, while observing the defined GFS parameters? I have a Full backup and a couple weeks of daily Incrementals, all of which I’d like to get uploaded to the cloud repository. It is about 60GB, and I expect it will take about three days to upload.
Backup copy job doesn't t copy backup chain as a whole, but rather synthetically creates required restore points in "target" location from VM data in source backup repositories. So, it means that a newly created backup copy job won't re-create the whole backup chain. Instead, it will synthetically create one restore point containing the latest state of the chosen source.

Thanks.
guitarfish
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by guitarfish »

v.Eremin wrote:Backup copy job doesn't t copy backup chain as a whole, but rather synthetically creates required restore points in "target" location from VM data in source backup repositories. So, it means that a newly created backup copy job won't re-create the whole backup chain. Instead, it will synthetically create one restore point containing the latest state of the chosen source.
OK, I follow you. I would like to increase the frequency of my backups on one server from once daily to 4 per day. How would this affect the Backup Copy job?
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

This would not affect backup copy, it will still copy the latest VM state according to its configured sync interval.
guitarfish
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by guitarfish »

Well I now have two VMs that are running Backup Copy jobs to a Cloud Connect repository. The full backup has been uploaded, and a couple incrementals. This is definitely a more elegant solution than DropBox.

I have a follow up question about the repository. With my local DAS and NAS devices, I can browse the folders and see the actual vbk & vib files, with Windows Explorer for example. Is there any way to browse the cloud repository in this way? Veeam lists the number of restore points available, but there is something about being able to view the actual data files, sizes, etc that just makes me as an IT person feel a little more confident about the whole process.
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

guitarfish wrote:With my local DAS and NAS devices, I can browse the folders and see the actual vbk & vib files, with Windows Explorer for example. Is there any way to browse the cloud repository in this way?
Only if your SP gives you access to the remote repository (via VPN, for example).
Vitaliy S.
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by Vitaliy S. »

guitarfish wrote:Is there any way to browse the cloud repository in this way? Veeam lists the number of restore points available, but there is something about being able to view the actual data files, sizes, etc that just makes me as an IT person feel a little more confident about the whole process.
I believe you can do that via Veeam ONE predefined reports, for example Veeam backup files growth, though I will double check on Monday if cloud repositories are displayed in these reports or not.
veremin
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by veremin »

Is there any way to browse the cloud repository in this way?
Have you tried to check the "Files" node? If I'm not mistaken, the content of cloud repositoriy should be reflected there. Thanks.
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by volnation »

Are the weekly, monthly, and yearly backup copy restore points labeled accordingly in the backup disk area? Can someone send a screen shot of a backup copy job that has weekly, monthly, and yearly jobs already created? There was nothing in the 800 plus pg user guide to give us a visual.

Thanks in advanced
veremin
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by veremin »

Starting from version 8, GFS restore points have special post-fix in their names (W, Q, M, Y). For instance, BackupCopy2013-12-30T171832_M.vbk. Thanks.
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by volnation »

I see it. I was looking in the Veeam Management Console. Thanks.
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[MERGED] Understanding the all confusing Backup Copy Job, a

Post by ceez »

Hi everyone,

So I think that I grasp the concept of the BCJ feature but need some clarification.
I understand that BCJ creates a copy of the backups that I already have in my backup repository and puts a copy in another backup repository. The BCJ does not affect production VM's since the BCJ is not touching the live VM's, it's making a copy from the original backup jobs in the backup repository.

So now I want to understand how to create 1 weekly job per week of the month. At the end of the month keep one monthly backup (and delete the previous weeks of the month), and at the end of the year only keep the last weekly backup as my yearly (and delete all the previous monthly backups) only leaving me with a December backup for the entire year..

This is how my BCJ looks like along with the schedule:
Image

Image

Image
Are these settings correct to achieve the above?

From the above the following questions arise:
On the first screenshot, why is there a "Copy every" option with if there's a weekly schedule that shows Saturday at 22:00 which is what I selected on the Schedule options?

Also why do I need restore points as well in the copy jobs? If I run all my backups only once a day at night then all I want is a once a night backup copy job a well, what is the advantage or disadvantage of this option? My regular backup jobs have restore points of anywhere between 7 days and 9 days but applying the same to a copy job is a bit confusing to me.

Sorry if it's confusing but the backup copy job creates more questions than answers while running through the wizard.

thanks
ceez
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

volnation wrote:I see it. I was looking in the Veeam Management Console. Thanks.
They are also marked correspondingly in the backup properties window, if you click the Backups node, right-click the corresponding backup and select Properties. Look at the Retention column.
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[MERGED] : Verify Backup Copy GFS/Restore Points

Post by lennis40 »

Is there an area where I can verify that my GFS retention is working for my backup copy jobs? Currently the backup job and the backup copy job both show 7 restore points. I would like to verify that my GFS settings are working correctly. Am I am able to see my weekly restore points, monthly, and so on listed anywhere in the B&R interface?

My backup copy job is set to save 7 restore points, but then I have 5 weekly, 12 monthly, and 1 yearly. I am concerned that only the 7 restore points are being saved.
lennis40
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by lennis40 »


Is there an area in the interface that I can see my actual restore points, instead of the number of restore points listed? I thought I clicked on something, don't remember what, and it brought up a window that showed me Full and Incremental restore points. Just curious is something like that is available for copy jobs, that might show weekly, etc. Thanks for the link above, it makes more sense to me now.
veremin
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by veremin »

"Backups" node should provide everything you're after. Select a required backup copy job, right-click on it -> "Properties" -> "Retention" column. Thanks.
pawel
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by pawel »

Sorry to add to this thread with what seems to be the same question over and over again. I read through the GFS documentation for retention policies and I'm still not all that clear on how the backups will be stored.

I need to keep a daily copy of my backups for 7 years. Meaning if in 6 years I want to restore files from today I'd be able to do that. To simplify things lets pretend I have enough storage for this and don't need to offload to tapes. For example lets say I have 1 VM that is 1TB in size.

So I create the regular backup job and set the restore points to keep to 7. If I understand correctly this will do incrementals each day and after 7 days create a new full backup.

Then I create a backup copy job and point it to my archive storage. The options I have for keeping restore points are: Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly.

How do I populate these so that I can have 2555 days of data? Simply putting in 2555 restore points seems like a bad idea (since there would only be one full backup and 2554 incrementals). This seems like any restore operation down the line would take a really long time.

If I set the restore points to 2555 and create 4 weekly backups, 1 monthly, and 1 yearly will I have a a total of 4 full backups (1 for the weekly, 1 for the monthly, and 1 for the yearly)? Or does Veeam just need one full backup to meet the retention needs of all the different job types?

I realize that in production I will need to offload to tape as 2555 days of data with 30GB changing each day is over 76TB (and I am looking in to offloading to tapes as I write this). But I'm trying to get an idea of some best practices when our regulatory needs require such a long chain of backups.

Thanks.
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by Gostev »

You definitely should not set recent restore points to 2555. Normally, I see customers keeping anywhere from 7 to 90 of recent restore points, and the rest of restore points are GFS restore points according to your requirements. Thanks!
guitarfish
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by guitarfish »

I need some help with GFS retention for Backup Copy jobs to the cloud repository. I thought I configured correctly, but what I'm seeing in the repository isn't what I expect.
In the Backup Copy job, Target screen, I have the following settings:
-Restore points to keep: 28
-"Keep the following restore points for archival purposes" is checked
-Weekly backup: 12
-Monthly backup:12
-Quarterly backup: 4
-Yearly backup: 1

I've been running Backup Copy jobs for about 35 days now. When I click "Restore" and proceed through, selecting the cloud repository, I see exactly 28 restore points. One Full, and 27 Incremental. Each day the full rolls forward a day. It doesn't appear to be keeping weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly.

Do I have it configured incorrectly? Thanks!
veremin
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by veremin »

Based on the provided settings, first weekly restore point should have been created already (or it should be created today). If that doesn't happen, please open a ticket with our support team. Thanks.
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

pawel wrote:If I set the restore points to 2555 and create 4 weekly backups, 1 monthly, and 1 yearly will I have a a total of 4 full backups (1 for the weekly, 1 for the monthly, and 1 for the yearly)? Or does Veeam just need one full backup to meet the retention needs of all the different job types?
You will eventually have 7 full backups, since each GFS restore point is stored as a separate full VBK file, not dependent on the regular chain of increments. Besides, there's no ability to set the number of restore points above 999, so if you really need to be able to restore to any single day within 7 years, you will have to offload the chain periodically to some other storage.
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by doggatas »

Would like to run something by the Veeam community

I will have two backup repositories: one for the current month's backups; and one for archiving purposes.

The current month's repository will contain a forward incremental forever chain with a retention period of 32 days. This storage subsystem backing this repository would be fast RPM disks, RAID level: yet to decide. Budget will influence decision.

I would then like to setup the archive repository to contain a full backup for each month of the current year (the following year's monthly can overwrite the previous year's monthly for the respective month) and also contain a bi-annual (end of financial and calendar year) backup, which would be kept for 7 years.

I hope this is achievable using backup copy jobs and GFS settings.

My understanding of retention periods would mean the following:

Current Month Repository
After one month:
1 vbk + 31 vibs
On the 33rd day a forward incremental will run, the 1st vib in the chain will be synthesised into the vbk and [the 1st vib in the chain]subsequently deleted.

Archive Repository
After 1 full year:
12 Monthly vbk's
2 bi-annual vbk's
Total of 14 vbk's

After two full years:
12 Monthly vbk's
4 bi-annual vbk's
Total of 16 vbk's

And so on for subsequent years until the 7 years is up and then the first of the bi-annual vbk's will be deleted.

My question is for the monthly and bi-annual fulls: Will the Veeam Copy Job process make (synthesise) the full backup files for the archive out of the current month's vbk and vib files?

Note: The LUN(s) backing the repositories will be replicated to an alternate datacentre over 1gb fibre.
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

David, the first thing to note is that there's no ability to specify bi-annual backups, you would need to use quarterly ones, so consider additional space is required.

Yes, full backup from the regular backup chain is re-used and propagated to the required GFS retention tier (weekly, monthly, etc.). Here's an intuitive description of how GFS retention works.
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[MERGED] Weekly backup not created

Post by mjah »

Hello,

My requirement is to have 7 restore points on-site and 52 weekly + 60 daily Offsite. (no tapes, just disk).

The backup job is a normal backup job with 7 restore points using the forward incremental method.
De Offsite backup is a copy job configured with:
Copy every: 1 day @ 8.00
Restore points to keep: 60
Weekly Backup: 52 (run every sunday) @ 22.00

My first full backup for the copy job was created on 22-02-2015. What i would have expect is that on 01-03-2015 and 08-03-2015 a weekly (full) backup is created. The problem now is that i only see incremental backups created for the copy job. I am missing something to get this working.....

Another question, Does it matter when the copy job is still running when passing the moment (sunday 22.00) for creating the weekly full?

Thank you.
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

Weekly fulls will start appear after reaching the regular retention (60 restore points), please see above for more detailed explanation.
mjah
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by mjah »

Foggy,

When i take a look at the GFS scheme on the veeam site http://helpcenter.veeam.com/backup/80/v ... y_gfs.html.
That picture is telling me that i am able to create a weekly full every week and have 20+ daily backups created. Almost the same scheme what i want.
Is is not working for me because of the 60 days configured in the copy job instead of in the normal backup job? So when i put 60 restore points in the regulair backup job and 7 restore points in the copy then everythin should be ok?
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

Not actually, it will work with your current settings as you want right after reaching 60 restore points in the regular chain. Weekly backups will be offloaded every week according to your schedule.
mjah
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by mjah »

Ok, i will wait for the 60 retention points to pass and see what happends.
Basically it is not possible to have 52 weekly and the last 60 daily for one year because you need to pass the 60 recovery points first before a weekly can be created. In the end for one year i am missing like (60\7days) 8/9 weekly backups because of this.

Isn't there any way to create the weekly within the 60 restore points period? Maybe true powershell or something like that?
foggy
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by foggy »

You can achieve that with two separate copy jobs, one with simple daily retention and another copying on a weekly basis. Do you need to have weeklies as separate full backups or weekly incremental chain is ok?
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Re: GFS Retention Policy

Post by mjah »

It needs to be a full backup. The idea was to offload after one year 52x a weekly full backup. The customer wants to be able to restore on weekly basis for 7 years and the last 60 days on daily basis. Veeam only support 99 weekly backups so we need to manual offload 52x weekly backup after one year to some offline storage so veeam can start over again for the new year.
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