Backup Media Markup

[sunnyc_up]

hi,

We are going to mark our backpu medias according to their volume pools, could anyone suggest me the best area of media where can i put the sticker ?

[mph999 · Accepted solution]

I do NOT recommend doing this.

There is no need, the information is in NetBackup.

If you do not use scratch pool (which IS recommended) then the tapes will not 'move' pools on their own.

If they do move (beaucse they are moved manually) then the sticker would be out-of-date and things will get very confusing.

Take note of this point ...

ONLY proper barcode labels should ever be attached to a tape - other laels will probably come off and could damage the drive.

Martin

[Andy_Welburn]

& was in process of writing the same arguments.

I presume there's a proper business requirement for this? Different paying clients wanting their data held separately maybe?

other labels will probably come off and could damage the drive.

I can vouch for that - back in the days of individual saves via integral DDS tape drives even the so called 'proper' tape labels had a habit of peeling off (usually when in the nice warm environment of a servers tape drive) which resulted in media being physically stuck within the drive.

[Marianne]

Maybe order different labels for the different pools?

But again, all of the above arguments are applicable:

What if one pool runs out of tapes and you need to 'borrow' from another pool? Once written (and internal media-id written to tape header) you cannot just pull off a label and put on a new one. NBU will freeze the media if internal and external media id's are different.

Maybe explain the need for this request?
We might be able to give better advice if we understand the requirement.

[J_H_Is_gone]

when we first got NB we had different pools for window, Unix, exchange...

we got special barcodes   started with W for tapes that went into the windows pool, with X for exchange tape pools  ..... and so on

then I had to have "scratch tapes" that had just numbers to put in the scratch pool in case any of them ran out.  I had to check each pool that they had enough tapes each,  If I had to add tapes, I need to make sure they got the right barcode.  and because they were separate pools, a lot of the tapes never got FULL.  So I was wasting a lot of tape..... so much work , so sad.....

When I got my new robot and new master server for upgrade.

Went to as few pools as I could.  Only special tapes I have are the 7 year retention in its own pool.  Then just 1 encrypted pool for everything else!  so now I just have to make sure my one special pool has a tape or two, and the big pool or the scratch pool has enough tapes for the night.  No more --- I need 20 for windows - I need 10 for Unix - I need 5 for exchange.  Now --- I need 30 for all - less trouble and use fewer tapes.

Now I am happy, I have time to take my lunch, and do the rest of my job.