David Longo wrote:
> 
> 2.  With the new Linux servers, they will also implement Novell's
> Dynamic Storage Technology.  This will enable the infrequent accessed
> files to be dumped off to a "shadow" space on SATA drives.
> 
> Does anybody know if this speeds up  the TSM backup?  In other
> words, does the "file scan" done when backups run also have to scan
> this also each day?  Any experienced do's/don'ts about this from
> TSM point of view?

I've no personal, first-hand experience with this, but I investigated
DST a while ago and decided that it is unlikely to be helpful for TSM-based
backups.

Basically, DST means that you've got two physical volumes that are
presented to your client PCs as a single logical volume. In the
background, a rule set moves files from one physical volume to the
other (usually one volume is expensive/fast, the other cheap/slow).
It also allows conventional backup software (the kind that needs to
do full backups periodically) to backup the cheap/slow volume less
frequently, saving both time and tapes.

As far as I know, the unified view is strictly limited to NCP clients,
which means that for TSM, there really are two separate volumes to
backup (can anyone confirm this?). Since TSM uses the "incremental
forever" approach, it's actually counter-productive to move a file from
one volume to the other, because TSM will see it as a new file and
will have to back it up for a second time.

-- 
Jürgen Weinelt
Rechenzentrum der Universität Würzburg