A couple of things.  

1)  In my original write of email I had mentioned databases were an exception.  Apparently on editing I left it out.  However I did note that it was overkill only for things that don’t frequently change.  Having worked in several large IT shops I’ve yet to run across one that backed up every OS (/, /var, /usr, /opt) component every night and as I said it is overkill.  The things that change in these directories do so rarely and compared to things like databases restore times are negligible even if you had to restore a CumulativeIncremental after a Full.

 

2)  The discussion of data domain etc… doesn’t answer the OP’s question.   He was asking for a strategy on how to maximize success using his existing setup.    My response was based on that.  His main concern seemed to be how he could setup the backup strategy so that he wouldn’t need two tapes for a single drive on the weekend which presumably means there is no operator available to change the tape.

 

 

Same here.  I filter out the retries if the final attempt was successful.  I also filter out 150’s (I cancelled the job) and I filter out failures that were out of my control like a server being decommissioned and no one told me before the backups ran.

 

 

 

I second Data Domain as a disk target for backups!


Wayne T Smith wrote:

Sure!   Investigate backing up to a disk appliance.  There are a number 

of vendors ... Data Domain might be a good place to start, as they have 

much of the market.

Since you do nightly full backups, they'll love you and you'll be 

impressed at what you can squeeze onto their disk (will vary with your 

data and each vendor).  

This isn't a no-cost solution, but I expect you will love the resulting 

system. *No* tape handling on backups or restores ... what will you do 

with all your spare time? ;-)

If you are considering "differentials", consider "cumulative 

incrementals" first.  More data is backed up, but restores may be 

faster.  Also, with either type of incremental backup, how much you can 

fit on a tape depends on your data.  If a few small files change ... 

little tape; if a few huge files change ... maybe an incremental is 

close to a "full"!

cheers, wayne (who knows a bit about NetBackup, but doesn't even know 

how to spell BackupExec, let alone whether it can backup to disk).

Bockert, Patrick wrote, in part,  on 2008-01-03 2:22 PM:

Greetings,

I'm looking for assistance in creating a new backup strategy for a 

number of servers that are currently being backed up nightly with a 

full backup. Until now the backups were running fine, but the problem 

is that the backup's are now requiring a second tape to complete and 

over the weekend there is no one available to swap tapes.

Our current retention of the daily tape is 30 days and the monthly are 

kept for a year. My first inclination is to schedule a weekly full 

with differentials for the remainder of the week. Instead of 14 tapes 

per week, I could maybe get by with 3. The full backup would still 

require 2 tapes but if the differentials could be appended to the same 

tape I could maybe leave the tape in for the rest of the week. Then 

start the rotation with another set of 3 tapes with four sets in all.

Specifically I'm utilizing Veritas BackupExec to backup HP Proliant 

servers to super DLT Tape.

I'm looking for a simple solution that may result in less time and 

tapes to implement.

Does anyone have a suggestion?

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