On Mon, 2002-01-28 at 06:20, Farren Minns wrote:

    Hi TSMers

    I wonder if you can help with a few, hopefully simple, questions.

    I am running TSM 3.7.3.8 server on a Solaris 2.7 server (E250 400mhz with
    1GB Mem) . This is connected to an IBM 3494 library with two 3590 tape
    drives. Most of our clients are either Sun or NT boxes running client level
    3.7.2.0 (only about 28 client nodes in total).

    Question 1)

    We have a situation where an external user wants to be able to perform
    restores as and when necessary. At present, I prefer that all restore
    requests come through us so that we can keep track of who's doing what on
    our machines (particularly our backup server). However, let's just say that
    I wanted to allow a user access to backing up and restoring relevant files;
    how do I restrict that user to just certain files / file systems etc. i.e.
    how do I make sure that a user does not have free run of the box?


You can give him permission to restore his own files from his client by
giving him the password for that node only. That node will only be able
to retrieve it's own files.


    Question 2)

    During the day we tend to run tape reclamation of our Tapepool and
    Copypool. Also, Expiration kicks in at 24 hour intervals and takes about
    30-45mins to complete. Reclamation can take several hours. What I'm
    interested in is what happens when a restore is requested when either of
    these processes is running. Can TSM cope with this?

    If the restore needs to access a tape but both tape drives are in use with
    reclamation, will the restore take precedence, or will it sit and wait
    until a tape drive becomes available?

    If a restore is requested and expiration is running, does this have a
    negative / damaging effect on the server?


Typically, all processes have the same priority, but you can adjust
this, and give a restore higher priority. This is not generally a good
idea, but it can be done. What I do is schedule all activity on the
server, and shut down automated processes which run whenever they want.
You can force tape reclamation etc by running scripts that invoke the
reclamation (or other functions like forced disk to tape migrations etc)
at the time you want. That way, you control all server operations on a
24 hour schedule, and can schedule tape reclamation for 10 PM, when a
restore is less likely to occur. This is much preferred over priorities
that disrupt the normal flow of server operations.

Another idea, if this is happening too much is to buy a more tape
drives, and govern the number of processes for each activity...


    Question 3)

    Should expiration be run when no other processes are active, or does TSM
    cope either way?


The answer above schedules expiration to run alone, and at a time of day
when restores are not likely. You should let the expiration process run
to completion, but it should not disrupt normal operations. The only
considerations are the order you do things in as they pertain to when
you save data to the database and then backup the database. Typically,
you want to make sure you've finished all aspects of a server 'cycle'
before you backup the database so all transactions are preserved.


    Any help will be very much appreciated.

    Kind Regards

    Farren S Minns

    (Trainee Solaris System Admin - John Wiley & Sons)


Kevin Sawyer
Chief Technology Officer
Storagepipe Solutions Inc.
48 St. Clair Ave West Suite 1100
Toronto Ontario, Canada
M4V 2Z2
T: 416.802.2527
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kevin AT storagepipe DOT com