[Veritas-bu] Top 10 Things I Hate About NetBackup

Can you say more about the read/write errors on WinNT media servers with
patch NB_34_1.  That's where we are and we've definitely seen some of
those errors, but have been troubleshooting hardware.  What are the
known issues and workarounds?

Patrick Wilhelm
Davidson College - ITS
704-894-2569
pawilhelm AT davidson DOT edu


-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Shinkarev [mailto:shinkara AT pprd.abbott DOT com]
Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2002 9:43 AM
To: Metcalf, Bob
Cc: Veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
Subject: Re: [Veritas-bu] Top 10 Things I Hate About NetBackup


On Thu, Jan 24, 2002 at 08:44:23AM -0500, Metcalf, Bob wrote:

I would say know problems with NBpatchXXX

NB_34_2         too new to say something. 
NB_34_1         Windows NT media server problem. Numerous read/write
errors
                sg driver problem on Solaris Media Server. 
J850645         Introduced RESOURCES_BUSY error. 
                new 3.4 sg driver replaced later with old 3.2 driver. 
......


> 
> Here's my gripe....
> 
> How about a pathc-level Matrix on the bloody
> web site?  How hard is this:
> 
> Solaris7 server,  NBpatchXXX, NBpatchYYY
> NT4SP6 server,  NBpatchHHH, NBpatchTTT
> 
> Is there anybody out there that can claim
> to actually make sense of the current page?
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Miriam Ben-Haim [mailto:miriam AT techunix.technion.ac DOT il]
> Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2002 2:55 AM
> To: Fabbro, Andrew P
> Cc: veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
> Subject: Re: [Veritas-bu] Top 10 Things I Hate About NetBackup
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I would add:
> 
>  full backup should not expire as long as other backups depending on
>  it are not expired, even if its original expiration date arrived.
> 
> and
> 
>  update and install clients' software with ssh rather than rsh.
> 
> 
> 
>       Miriam
> 
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>  Miriam Ben-Haim                 E-mail: miriam AT technion.ac DOT il
>  Unix Systems                    Phone : +972-4-8292177
>  Taub Computer Center            Fax   : +972-4-8236212
>  Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, ISRAEL
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> 
> On Wed, 23 Jan 2002, Fabbro, Andrew P wrote:
> 
> >Entertaining myself here at lunch, I present, in no particular
order...
> >
> >10. Can't set exclude lists at the master, only at the client.  Very
silly.
> >I would like to exclude, say, /tmp or WIN386.SWP on all clients in a
class
> >but I can't...instead, I have to make sure the exclude file is
correct on
> >each client.  What a nightmare for large environments.  Some admin
adds a
> >client (that I may not have access to check his setup) and doesn't
set his
> >exclude list properly.  Now I'm chewing tapes for nothing, or worse,
not
> >backing up something he needs.  What was the thinking here?
Particularly
> >since the raw Class database shows an Exclude field ;)
> >
> >9. "Use any available media server" doesn't round-robin.  Strange but
true
> -
> >it works the list of media servers *alphabetically*.  If you have
multiple
> >media servers, then NetBackup will attempt to use all of the drives
on #1,
> >then go on to #2, etc.  If one of the drives in #1 becomes free, then
it'll
> >use it before going back to #2.  So if you have multiple media
servers and
> >want to distribute the load, it's difficult to do so because your
full
> tapes
> >will naturally accumulate in the first (alphabetically speaking)
storage
> >unit.
> >
> >8. Can't restart just one stream.  If a single stream fails, you have
to
> >rerun the whole backup job.  Blech.  Why can't I restart just that
one
> >stream?
> >
> >7. The X-windows backup/restore GUI doesn't have a "preview media
required"
> >feature for a restore.  The Java backup/restore GUI doesn't show you
a list
> >of the backup images.  I wish there was one that did both ;)
> >
> >6. bpinject sucks.  I think bpinject is only packaged with bpvault.
The
> >design is really amazingly bad.  The idea is that you can type
"bpinject 2"
> >and it'll dump the cap from robot 2 into the robot.  However, if that
robot
> >is on another machine, then you need to have root-level .rhosts
access to
> >it.  Oh sure, let me rewrite our site security policy so I can insert
tapes
> >- har!  This is a particularly bad design because you can use
Netbackup's
> >vmchange to insert the tapes through NetBackup.  The only reason you
need
> >.rhost access is to query the robot - I'm opening my whole system up
just
> so
> >you can query the robot!?!?
> >
> >A better solution is simple:
> >
> >     - write a service on the media server that runs out of inetd
that
> >reports the status of the robot.  Takes
> >     about 100 lines of perl.
> >     - when the bpinject script needs to know what the status of the
> >robot is, it can connect to this service
> >     and query the status of the robot, then use vmchange (vmadd,
etc.)
> >to insert tapes.
> >
> >5. jnbSA sends the root password in the clear.  Come on people, this
is
> 2002
> >- how hard would it be to encrypt this?
> >
> >4. Frequency for hours, days, and weeks...but not months!  How can I
do
> once
> >a month?  I can do every 4 weeks, but that doesn't really work
because
> >there's an extra week every quarter.
> >
> >3. Stupid bug - put in a path like "/somewhere/someplace/blah   ".
Note
> the
> >blanks.  Now run a coverage report.  Note that this is reported as
> >"UNCOVERED".  Sheesh.  Also, if you put "C:" in a file list, you'll
get
> only
> >the "Veritas" folder on C:.  If you put "C:\", though, you get
everything.
> >
> >2.  Archive doesn't make two copies, only one.  Considering that
you're
> >blowing the data away from disk, I'd feel better if it was written to
two
> >tapes, but NetBackup only does one.  I wish this was configurable.
> >
> >1. It's still better than any other product on the market.
> >
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >Veritas-bu maillist  -  Veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
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> >
> 
> 
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-- 
----
Andrew Shinkarev
Network Systems Specialist
Abbott Laboratories
(847) 9387559
shinkara AT pprd.abbott DOT com
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