Backup job taking from different media set?

[PCAU]

Hi All

I have an issue where my daily tape backup job is 'stealing' media from my monthly media set once the monthly media passes it's overwrite protection period and no media with free space is available within it the daily set.

my setup is as follows:

-BE 2010 R2

-24x Tape Library which is not partitioned

-2 media sets: daily and monthly.

obviously my daily backup job is set to use the daily media set and the montly job is setup to use the monthly media set.

The jobs are set to Append to media, then overwrite if no appendable media is available and the media management setting are full overwrite protection level and Overwrite recyclable media before overwriting scratch media.

is there anyway to restrict the job to using media within the set media set only? in my case when there is no space on a tape within the daily media set, i'd prefer the daily backup job to fail or wait for media to be inserted rather than taking media from the monthly media set.

any info or tips greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance

[Hywel_Mallett · Accepted solution]

Backup Exec is working as designed here. With your media protection settings, it's going to use recyclable media in the target media set first, then scratch media, then recyclable media in any other media set.

The only way around this is to partition the tape library (one partition for daily media and one for monthly media) and target your jobs to each partition.

However, is it that big a deal if your media moves between media sets? This allows Backup Exec to have the most flexibility with media.

[PCAU]

Thanks for your reply.

It is a problem for me because even though I have a tape library, we still cycle the tapes for offsite storage and have dedicated daily and monthly tapes.

Partitioning the drive is probably what i'll do but it would be nice if there was a setting to stop it using recyclable media in any other media set  as a last resort.

[pkh]

the media management setting are full overwrite protection level

I don't know what  you mean by this, but if you have set the OPP (overwrite protection period) to Infinite - Do not Overwrite, then you are in trouble because your media as the setting implies cannot be overwritten and hence cannot be recycled.

Even though you specify append, BE will only append to the first tape, for the second and sequent tapes, it needs to have overwriteable tapes.

Before you partition your library you should check your the OPP of your daily media set to make sure that the tapes can be recycled, i.e., they can be overwritten after a reasonable period of time.

[PCAU]

No the media set OPP is not Infinite and they can be overwritten after a set period of time which is suitable. However there is some overlap between the OPP of the Monthly media set which I cannot avoid.

Sorry what I meant by "the media management setting are full overwrite protection level"

Is in the tools, options, media management section.

Full - protect allocated and imported media

Prevents media in media sets and imported media from being overwritten. See Media overwrite protection levels. This is the safest option to choose because the media being protected cannot be overwritten until the following occurs: The overwrite protection period for the media expires. You move media that belongs to an active media set to Scratch Media. You erase, format, or label the media.  You move media from Imported Media to Scratch Media.

[pkh]

The fact that your job is grabbing media from another media set means that the OPP is not set correctly and there is no suitable media in the targeted media set.  Maybe my blog will help.

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/faq-wrong-tape-used

[PCAU]

Exactly right :)

Whats happened in my case here is there is/was an overlap in the OPP for the daily and monthly tapes - our backup size changes very dramtically very frequently so I havent been able to tightly lock down the OPP.

Secondly, in this instance we reached the capacity of the tapes used for our daily backup which is why it grabbed media from a different set, I'll be including an additional tape from now on to cater from this.

Hywel Mallett answered my question though as to whether there was a way to stop this behaviour or not.

thanks also pkh.

[pkh]

Whats happened in my case here is there is/was an overlap in the OPP for the daily and monthly tapes

I don't know what you mean by overlap.  OPP for different media sets does not affect each other. 

The exact cause of your problem is definitely the lack of tapes in your daily media set.  It has nothing to do with how the OPP is set for the monthly media set.

[PCAU]

What happened was the Friday nights backup ran out of free media. It sat waiting for user intervention to insert media. On Saturday the OPP for the Monthly media expired so all of a sudden free media was now available for the daily backup job.

So whilst this is "by design" of Symantec It's still undesirable for my situation and the only way I can avoid it is to ensure there is free media available within the backup set.

It would still be nice for an option to stop this behaviour where it does not suit.

[pkh]

This is by design.  BE will use any overwriteable media in the library to prevent a job failure.  You may prefer to have your job failed rather than having the inconvenience of it using the "wrong" tape, but for me and other organisations, backup failure is not an option.  I will be publishing an article in the next few days to explain this subject better, watch out for it.

[Hywel_Mallett]

It is a problem for me because even though I have a tape library, we still cycle the tapes for offsite storage and have dedicated daily and monthly tapes.

That's not a problem! Backup Exec has reports that thell you what media needs to be moved off-site (and what needs to be moved back). Make sure that the vault rules for your media sets are sensible, then schedule a "Move media to vault report" and a "Retrieve media from vault report". The only thing is that if you have labelled your tapes as Monday, Tuesday etc, then soe of those labels don't make sense, but at the end of the day they're just labels.

I found it easier to let Backup Exec label the tapes (LTO000001, LTO000002 etc), and manage the media itself.