expire backup image

Loosk ok, if you delete all the images on a tape, then that tape becomes available for re-use.

For a tape to become available for re-use, you have to delete ALL the images (on that tape), only when the last images is deleted will the tape expire.  If a single image remains, then the tape will not expire, until that image does.

YOu could do this:

bpexpdate -d 0 -m <media id>

To target a particular tape to expire.

Martin

This method will expire images, but not necessarily make tape available.

The only way to make tape available to be overwritten is to expire ALL images on the tape.

We do not recommend manual expiration because retention period on images is a business requirement. Manual expiration may put business data at risk.

Please see this blog to understand how images are written to tape and why expired space cannot be overwritten:

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/understanding-how-netbackup-writes-tape

hi martin,

i used to use catalog and search date range and policy name to expire is that true  to do this in this way

hi marianne,

as you said " This method will expire images, but not necessarily make tape available"  so

1- i need the correct command to expire the image

2-how to make the  tape available for writing again

******  i can get the media id from the search on catalog after that go to use command line  to expire this media  *

If we have another look at your 'status 96' post, it is clear that you need to free up tapes for new backups.

Right now media server prodbar1 needs media right? According to bpmedialist output, the following media id's seems to be the oldest. The ONLY way to reuse any of them is to expire ALL images associated with them:

Server Host = prodbar1

 id     rl  images   allocated        last updated      density  kbytes restores
           vimages   expiration       last read         <------- STATUS ------->

FQS304   9      3   09/18/2009 22:45  09/18/2009 22:45   hcart  2835241983     0
                3   INFINITY              N/A         FULL

FQS319   9      3   09/18/2009 22:45  09/18/2009 22:45   hcart  2453239808     0
                3   INFINITY              N/A         FULL

If your ONLY search criteria is Policy name, you may end up expire recent, valid backups.

If you are 100% sure that none of the backups written on 18 Sept 2009 (from above bpmedialist output) wil EVER be needed for restore, you should expire ALL images associated with them

So, to reuse media-id FQS304, you need to run the following from cmd on the master server:

bpexpdate -m FQS304 -d 0 -host prodbar1

hi marianne,

ok and in this way after expiring the media the media will be available for other backup is that true??

That is true yes!

Please have a discussion with your management about retention/recovery needs.

You are going to have this problem on a daily basis if you keep on doing backups with retention of INFINITY. No tapes can be reused automatically and you will need to purchase LOTS more tapes or else run the risk of expiring critical data when you expire images/media manually.

You need to go through an exercise to determine media needs based on retention levels, number of media servers, number of pools, types (density) of media, etc.