That is not what I have been told by the vendors.  On some VTL, the
appliance is connected to the physical tape library and controls the
tape library.  When you create the virtual tape, the appliance will
inventory the physical tape first before creating the virtual tape (same
bar code).  NetBackup uses the virtual tape but the appliance will write
to a physical tape when you eject the tape from NetBackup.  Therefore,
NetBackup will see only one tape, which is now on the physical tape with
the same bar code.  The virtual tape is deleted.  This also removes the
duplication process overhead of running from the media server.  My
problem with this is how the tapes will be restored.  Do I have to move
it back to a VTL tape before restoring, or can I just use the physical
tape as NetBackup is only aware of one tape.  The vendors also said this
is being done in a real environment.  Is anyone really doing this?

Ken

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Peppas [mailto:perf AT peppas DOT gr] 
Sent: Saturday, November 19, 2005 1:52 AM
To: Lee, Kenneth (SBS US); veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
Subject: RE: [Veritas-bu] VTL questions

Hi,

I don't understand why you say that the "tapes" in the VTL will be the
same
as in the physical. They wont.

Don't forget that NBU will treat the VTL as  a physical lirary, so you
cannot have the same tapes in the VTL and in the STK.
After you do the backups to the VTL, duplicate the tapes (by script or
by
Vault) to physical ones and then expire  the VTL tapes. This will make
the
physical tapes primary copies. All restores will now ask for the
physical
tapes.

Regards,

Jim Peppas 

-----Original Message-----
From: veritas-bu-admin AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
[mailto:veritas-bu-admin AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu] On Behalf Of Lee,
Kenneth
(SBS US)
Sent: Saturday, November 19, 2005 3:32 AM
To: veritas-bu AT mailman.eng.auburn DOT edu
Subject: [Veritas-bu] VTL questions

We are looking into VTL and I am getting conflicting stories.  Here is
what
I want to do and I would like to know if it is possible.

I have a STK SL8500 physical tape library.  NetBackup 5.1 Solaris Master
server & media servers.


I would like the following:

1.      Backup some clients to VTL.
2.      At the same time, backup some clients to STK SL8500.
3.      In the day time, I would like the VTL to migrate the virtual
tapes to the STK SL8500 physical tape.  I don't want to do duplication
through NetBackup.  Since the VTL tapes have the same bar code as a
physical
tapes, NetBackup will think that the tapes are ejected.

Questions:

If I attached the physical tape library to a VTL, can I still use the
same
tape library for NetBackup?  One vendor said yes, another said no.
They both use FalconStor solution.

If I used the VTL to move the virtual tape to a physical type, during a
restore, will I need to bring the virtual tape back to the VTL before I
can
restore?  My question is why can I not just put it into the physical
tape
library as they have the same bar code?  I don't want to do any
importing
either.  Am I missing something?

Thanks,
Ken


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