Sorry, that's enhanced AUTHENTICATION.  My bad.  It's vopie, which can
be used as a added level of making sure that the machine you're
talking to is really the one you think (in addition to the default
IP/DNS method).  If you don't know, you're probably not using it.

The volDB contains info about the cartridge: where is it, how many
times has it been used, etc.

The mediaDB contains info about the actual tape portion: what's on it,
when does it expire, etc.

The same (most at least) data is on the master, but is in a different
format.  I don't know of a tool to recreate a mediaDB from it.

W/o the mediaDB, I don't believe your active tapes will ever expire
(or more accurately become reusable after expiring).  I don't know of
any chance of data loss (by overwrite), I don't think it's possible,
but I'm not going to take the chance.

Which leads to my argument as to why you must back them up.  I don't
know everything that's in them now, and I don't know that even though
LET'S ASSUME it's okay to skip them today, something new won't be
introduced in a patch, new release, etc.

> What is enhanced authorization data?  Also the mediaDB, what does
> this contain?  I know that there is a volDB and a mediaDB.  What is
> the difference between these two.  Also, I checked one of our media
> servers and it contained a size of 0 for the mediaDB.  Isn't this
> stored on the master server?  Is there some additional information
> that would help provide compelling reasons for media servers being
> included in the NetBackup database backups.  I know the
> documentation states that all media servers should have their
> database and db directories backed up, but I am trying to prove
> "why" to some disbelievers by showing what the media server contains
> that is not on the master server.  ;-)
> 
> Thanks
> Dan
-- 
Larry Kingery 
           Linux: Because rebooting is for adding hardware