VIB injection disk space requirement

[Tnjus]

We are using forever forward incremental for our backup copy jobs. Does the vib/vbk merge process require us to reserve repository space (working space) or is the injection "dynamic", and does not require any working space? I would like to increase the number of restore points, but want to make sure we have enough space available. Also, is there a rule of thumb on how often to do compaction? Our vib's are approximately 10%-20% of the vbk.

Thanks in advance. Tom

[foggy]

Tom, you will need space just for the regular increment. Injection itself does not require any additional space on repository. As for the second question, regular backup job does not currently have compact operation available. You can, however, run active full manually (once a month or so) to avoid fragmentation of the full backup file.

[alanbolte]

One thing to watch out for in backup copy jobs is when failures or stopped jobs lead to VM disk data spread across multiple VIB files. In this situation, data from the oldest VIB file will be copied into the second-oldest VIB file before the oldest is removed (this is called overbuild internally); after that the normal merge procedure (patch) occurs. The data usually doesn't deduplicate very well, so this process can use up more disk space than expected.

[Tnjus]

Thanks for the replies. I was aware that BACKUP jobs do not support compaction, but I was referring to BACK COPY jobs. Is compaction still an option with forever forward?

Thanks again.
Tom

[foggy]

Actually, backup copy can be forever forward only, you cannot change the backup method for them.