Dirk Kastens had asked whether ADSM is able not only to restore files but
also to delete spurious files that are on disk at the time of the restore
but have no active backup version in ADSM.

On Thu, 13 Feb 1997, Jerry Lawson answered:

> I agree - it does sound like your boss is paranoid - ADSM will handle what you
> would expect it to do - that is restore all of your files to the last good
> backup.  It does not delete files that weren't there, nor would I want it to.

I agree that the delete on restore is not always wanted but it surely
should be an option. People have many ways to back up their data, eg. on a
raw device basis or on an AFS/DFS volume basis. In the latter case, there
is no choice other than to backup the data both on a volume and a
single-file basis. Typically, volume dumps are not taken every day. The
restoration of an entire volume will thus restore all files that were
present when the volume dump was made. The ADSM restore will then fill in
the missing files (those that were created or modified after the volume
dump) but fails to delete the spurious files.  The only way to delete
these is to do a specialised query that searches for inactive backup
copies for which no active copies exist. I have written such a script (see
http://www.lrz.de/ALES/tools/) but it is incredibly slow like everything
based on query - and it does not work on AIX due to the well-known
dateformat bug.

Not every volume contains the data of an individual user who certainly
remembers which files he deleted during the last week or who is able to
re-identify files he uses no longer. Some directories contain data that is
automatically produced and deleted. Cleaning up a mess in such areas is a
lot easier if the backup product does not unnecessarily produce spurious
files.

It would such a simple and useful thing if you had the *option* of a
delete on restore. Together with the -fromdate and -todate options it
would provide nearly everything that is needed for a point-in-time
restore.

Best wishes,

Helmut Richter

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Dr. Helmut Richter                       Leibniz-Rechenzentrum
Tel:   +49-89-289-28785                  Barer Str. 21
Fax:   +49-89-2809460                    D-80333 Muenchen
Email: Helmut.Richter AT lrz-muenchen DOT de    Germany
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