Jobs priority in Activity monitor

[SnirA]

Hi,

We are runing netbackup 7.5.0.6 environment on Windows server 2008.

We have a lot of SLP runing all day, They always takes all the Physical  Tape library slots.

when we want to do a restore we find ourself canceling a lot of slp in a desperate way to find an empty driver for the restore to work.

We try to work with the Priority of jobs but it dosent seem to work that good.

On the master server properties i try to config SLP Prio but i dont see any SLP defenition there.

There is a Duplication defenition that is on 5000. When I open the SLP job details i see the priority is on 0.

Why is that ?

also - backup priority is 4000, when you open job detail on the backup you also see priority is 0.

basicly we want to find a way to make the restore jobs work straight away with canceling slps and hopeing for one empty driver slot.

Can you help?

Thanks in advance.

[Nicolai · Accepted solution]

Configure a "on demand" store unit for duplication jobs. Lets say you have 5 tape drives configured in one storage unit. To solve the issue create a new storage unit e.g "tape-duplicate" with a max drive set to two and point all SLP to use this storage unit. Then all SLP will only use two tape drive at any point in time. There is no 1:1 relation between storage unit and physical devices.

[SnirA]

Hi Nicolai, Your solution seems elegant.

I gueess In the mediaserver I should put "Any Avialable" -> Will netbackup recognize if a media server sees a tapes or not ?

Say if i have 7 mediaservers and only 6 of them sees those Tape Drives. And I put "Any Avialable" mediaserver at the storage unit, Will it choose this one mediaserver that dosent see those drives?

[Nicolai]

I am not sure i understand correctly - I will try to answer the best I can

If you configure a media server to use a storage unit it does not have access to it will fail. Lets say to share 5 drives between 3 media servers but only 2 have SCSI access all Netbackup jobs to media server 3 will fail.

Hope it got it right 

[SnirA]

I dont want to configure spesific media server, I want to configure any avaible media server.

is it possible?

[Nicolai]

So you want all media server to process SLP - even those without access to tape drives ?

It is possible to do over the network replication but from a performance perspective this is not a recommended setup.

[SnirA]

Hi,

No i am asking if media server wihtout access to the drives will be choosen when i do "any available server"

what netbackup is checking in a media server when you chhoce this options?

[Nicolai]

Retore will always take place on the media that did the backup. So a tape less media server will never get the restore request for a tape based backup.

[SnirA]

Nicolai, Thanks for your help so far.

I will make a summary of what we discussed.

I have an issue that all my SLP jobs are always taking all my Tape Drivers.

there are 2 issues on the line:

1. The priority jobs dosent seem to work. SLP having a priority 0 and see this priority in other jobs.

even when I see in the host of master server priority is define 4000. the jobs still present at 0. <- this is for backup jobs.

2. When i have a restore runing and it need a Tape drive, I always need to cancel SLP jobs so it will be able to get a drive.

you said I need to creat a SU for this SLP that runing, I am all for it.

there is a method to create an SLP and telling netbackup to use "Any available server" !

we are taking about SLP here, nothing to do with restore.

my Quesiton is : what netbackup refers to as "any available serer", will it tries to use a media server that dosent see the tapes ? ( again nothing to do with restore)

[Marianne]

1. Priority only applies when a number of jobs are going active at the same time. It has no value when jobs (backups, duplication, etc) are already active. This means that no matter what priority restore jobs have, it will not stop/suspend/cancel jobs that are already active. 

2. Take a look at SLP enhancements in NBU 7.6. It may be possible to suspend SLP duplications. (I have not tested 7.6 yet....)

Any Available is linked to Storage Unit Property 'On demand only'. This means that STU must be specified explicitly for backup or duplication to use it.
The default for Disk STU is to have  'On demand only' selected and for tape STU not to have attribute selected.
Any Available will only select STUs that do not have  'On demand only' selected.
You may want to create Storage Unit Groups and select that for SLP, rather than Any Available.

Hope this helps.

[SnirA]

Hello Marianne thank you for the answer.

1. Thank you for explaning me this.

2. This is our main problem, I can create a script to cancel all SLP job and the Restore job will get a tape and run fine.

we dont want to do it, Sometimes other people run restore and they dont have any access to the activity monitor. We wont them to run restore without any holdups( for this case the SLP taking all the available tape drives)

Regarding the "Any available" This is a screenshot of a STU that i would like to test with the SLP:

the "Any available" is in a place where you need to choose a media server to do your task.\

I dont understand what "Any Available" stands for.. ( will it choose a media server that dont see those tapes?, how it decide what media server is available)

[Marianne]

I dont understand what "Any Available" stands for.. 

Have you seen my attempt to explain? 

Any Available is linked to Storage Unit Property 'On demand only'. 
The default for Disk STU is to have  'On demand only' selected and for tape STU not to have attribute selected. This means that STU must be specified explicitly for backup or duplication (i.e. SLP) to use it.
Any Available will only select STUs that do not have  'On demand only' selected.
You may want to create Storage Unit Groups and select that for SLP, rather than Any Available.

I really don't know how else to explain it...

You may want to read through this topic in Chapter 11 of NBU Admin Guide I  http://www.symantec.com/docs/DOC5159: 
On demand only storage unit setting

[SnirA]

I think you misunderstood me.

I was reffering to the defenition inside the stu. "any availeable" there - stands for any available media server that is able to use this "stu".

-i found my answer; thank you for all your help guys!