Retention/pruning of restore points on unused datastore

[gregsmid]

Hi all,

We have a Backup Copy Job that used to point to a particular repository, but we got some new storage and re-pointed the job. The BCJ is running correctly with the new repo, managing the restore points to keep and the Weekly/Monthly/Quarterly/Yearly archival points the way we want it to. No issues there.

The old repo is a Dell Data Domain 4500, and it had to be re-IP'd when we moved it to a new site. We couldn't find a straightforward way to re-IP a Data Domain repo in Veeam, so we ended up just removing the repo from Veeam's config and adding it back in with the new IP. All the existing retention points got imported from this 'new' repo, but now I'm unsure if there's a way that we can have Veeam continue to prune the legacy restore points that fall outside our WMQY archival needs.

I thought maybe I could create a new BCJ with no source objects specified, but with our required retention/archive settings. I was hoping maybe it would pick up on the existing restore points, but of course it just says there's nothing to process. Hey, it was worth a shot.

I don't want to have any new restore points copied to this repo, but I do want the ones that are already there to be merged and pruned as their retention/archive periods expire. Anybody have a way to do that?

Thanks!

[Mildur]

Veeam needs a Job to enforce the retention until Veeam V10.

With Veeam V11, there is a new feature:

If the backups are visible under „Home > Backups > Disk (Imported) node“, you have to manually delete them.

If there are under „Home > Backups > Disk (Orphaned) node“, veeam will use the „background gfs retention“ process to remove them as configured in the gfs setting from the former job which created the gfs.

I think, you have the „Home > Backups > Disk (Imported) node“ Situation. You will have to manually remove them.


https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=110

Background GFS Retention

Background GFS retention applies to standard and orphaned backup files that are no longer processed by any jobs. The orphaned backup files are shown under the Home > Backups > Disk (Orphaned) node.

Background GFS retention process detects backup files that are no longer processed by any jobs and analyzes their retention period. If the retention period for GFS flags of such backup files has expired, Veeam Backup & Replication removes GFS flags. Then Veeam Backup & Replication deletes these backup files according to the short-term retention policy, if the following conditions are met:

- The backup file does not have any other GFS flags assigned.
- The backup file does not have any dependent files.

Background retention job applies both to standard and orphaned backup files. It does not apply to imported backup files.