On our NetApp system running Ontap 9.13.1 we’ve enabled the new tamperproof snapshot copies feature. We’ve set a snapshot schedule to automatically create snapshots every hour. As a test we’ve set the Snaplock retention to 1 day.
For backups using Veeam we use storage integration.
The problem we are facing now is that Veeam sometimes is unable to delete its storage snapshot because it’s locked by the Snaplock retention. This happens when Veeam creates its snapshot around the time the automatic snapshot schedule on the NetApp runs and creates a tamperproof snapshot. By default a volume clone inherits its parents snapshot settings. This results in automatic tamperproof snapshots being taken of the temporary clone also.
In NetApp system manager we now have multiple veeam_aux volumes which can’t be deleted yet since the Snaplock retention has not expired.
The affected Veeam jobs return the following warning:
Failed to delete snapshot VeeamAUX<volme name> of volume VeeamAUX<volume name>. Details: Failed to delete volume. The volume has one or more unexpired locked Snapshot copies.
The solution would be that Veeam removes the snapshot schedules from the cloned volume so that no automatic snapshots will be created and Veeam can delete the volume after the backup completes.
The situation currently is that you end up with many veeam_aux volumes on the storage system which can only be deleted when the retention expires. Depending on the Snaplock configuration this can take weeks or months. Also these volumes need to be manually deleted. Not a pleasant situation to say the least
