Initially I set the Volume Retention to 14 days, but I reduced it to 12 days, just to be safe that the tape will definitely get recycled. Thing is, sometimes there are issues that cause the backup not running on time. Backup jobs got pending, and they ran at a later date. Sometimes the jobs got pending for a bit too long and this causes the number of days between the last written date and the incoming backup date to be less than 12 days. When this happens, the incoming backup job will not be able to run because the volume status is 'Used', and it is waiting for me to create a new label.
Just redeuce the volume retention in one day? E. g.: 11 days?
I have set Volume Use Duration to 2 days, hoping that after 2 days, it will be marked as Used, and if in any way that the backup needs to be performed in less than 12 days, it will be automatically purged.
If the first backup runs on time, Recycle and AutoPrune = yes, this is the expected behavior.
Observe that Bacula doesn't update its Catalog each second. The volume may appear used after the retention period is over, but if you submit a job that needs writing space if may recycle the volumes.
Unfortunately, this is not happening. The volume status is used, and I will have to create a new label in order to get the backup job to run (I prefer just to manually purge it). So what should I do to tell bacula to run the backup job, even when it hasn't exceed the retention period?
If you want to just ignore the retention you can use the Purge Oldest Volume = yes option on pool. I don't like it, since It may lead you to a volume usages loop.
