Overwrite protection is erasing my tape

[alinawaz]

Hi All,

I defined the overwirte protection 1 week and appendable period 2 weeks but after two weeks this rule is erasing complete tape then taking new backup instead of overwiting 1st week of backup. can anyone please suggest.

i want to keep two weeks of backups and on third week it should overwite 1st week of backup.

Thanks

Agha

[Jaydeep_S]

Agha, not sure what BE version are you using and also if this is B2D or to Tape. However, you cant erase a partial backup set which is on the Tape. The overwrite Protection starts at the end of the last backup on that tape. With AP being set to 2 weeks are you backing up data to the same Tape everyday for 2 weeks?

With Overwrite Protection set to 1 week = The backupset will be overwritten after 1 week from the last backup written to that tape.

If you dont want this to happen, change the Overwrite Protection period. Refer to this documentation to more about Overwrite Protection and Append Periods

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH5459

[Colin_Weaver]

To be clearer:

-  an overwrite of any media is an overwrite of eveything in the media.

For a tape this means everything on the tape

For a Disk backup this means everything in a single bkf file.

The overwrite period just limits when everythign on the tape can be deleted (based on the timing og the last backup to the tape not the first.)

As such you cannot (in any version of BE) just overwrite the first backup set on at tape.

[alinawaz]

Thanks.

We are using BE-2010 R2 and we are doing backup to tap, this is one time weekly backup on every thursday in same tape.

i defined Overwrite protection 1 week and app period 2 weeks. is it not ok for my case.

I want to keep two weeks of backups after that on third week it should overwrite the first backup instead of erasing full tape.

Thanks

Agha

[alinawaz]

Thanks.

We are using BE 2010 R2 and backup to tape, it is weekly backup on every thursday in same tape.

I defined Overwrite protection = 1 week and app period = 2 week. is it not ok?

We want to keep two weeks backups after that on third week it should overwrite the first week of backup instead of erasing complete tape. is it possible and what i need to do.

Regards

Agha

[pkh · Accepted solution]

First of all, if you have done 2 backups to the tape, it is not possible to just overwrite the first backup.  Once you overwrite the tape, all the backup sets on the tape would be gone.

If you want to retain your backup sets for 2 weeks, then you need to set the OPP to 2 weeks.  If you set it to one week, then on the second week, the tape can be overwritten.  However, if you append to the tape, then the protection period gets extended accordingly.  You should study the following document properly so that you can set your OPP and AP correctly.

OPP and AP explanation

[alinawaz]

Thanks.

I defined the OPP = 2 weeks and append period = infinite Allow Append because we dont have any restriction for append. is it ok Or do i also need to define APP = 2 weeks? it will be same result.

After changing the OPP value from 1 to 2 weeks, should i need to erase the tape or it will take effect immediately?

Regards

Agha.

[pkh]

You can set the AP to infinite. There is no problem. When you change either the OPP or AP, they will take immediate effect. There is no need to erase your tapes.

[alinawaz]

Thanks a lot.