Scheduling Advice

[moggyman]

I have two remote servers which undergo quite intensive bursts of activity at known times during the day. These are usually complete by 2pm and 10pm. These servers were in a replication job with other servers but the amount of changes made to them meant that processing them and sending the data over the WAN was holding all the other servers up, so I put them in their own replication job.

Ideally, I'd like to keep 3 restore points and execute this new job with greater frequency so that the changes don't try to go over the WAN in one big lump. For example, if I could run the job at 2pm, 10pm & 6am then this would give me 3 restore points for the last 24 hours. However, how can I get the replication job to execute at those specific times? In the scheduling settings I can specify an 8 hour interval but I can't see a way of configuring the time window it provides so that the job executes at those three times during each day. Maybe I'm having a senior moment.

Can anyone suggest a solution?

Thanks

[foggy]

Periodic schedule intervals are counted from midnight. Would it be acceptable to start the job at 8am, 4pm, and midnight? In this case, you can go with the 8-hour interval. Otherwise, run the job via PowerShell script at the exact time needed (set as a task in Windows Task Scheduler). Thanks!

[moggyman]

Interesting. I presume that this would be the case if I left the Time Periods section completely 'permitted'? In the Time Periods dialog does 'Permitted' mean that a job is only allowed to start during that time or does it mean that the job is only allowed to start and run/complete during that time? As an initial test, I have enabled the periods 6-7am, 2-3pm and 10-11pm for all days and the option to terminate a job if it exceeds its backup window is deselected. Should this work?

If it doesn't work, is there a guide somewhere for a novice on how to run the job via PowerShell at specified times using the Windows task Scheduler?

[foggy]

Yes, a backup window setting is also an option and will work as you expect. Don't forget to enable the 8-hour interval as well.

As for the PS hints, you can find the examples on the forum - there are plenty of those.

[moggyman]

Many thanks - I'll see what happens over the next few job runs.......