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Netbackup 7.7.3 manually expired tapes not being pulled

cajunspirit
Level 3

 

Good day all,

We recently had expired tapes in the magazine and wanted to manually expire them so that they will be pulled for duplications. I used the bpexpdate command and successfully expired the tapes, however they were never pulled for duplication.

"bpexpdate -m “IXXXXXXL5” -d 0"

 I also tried adding the " infinity " switchI

Now when reviewing the tapes I see they have no retention level = 0 and I suspect this is the cause. Can anyone lend some guidance?

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions

Marianne
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bpexpdate -d 0 -m <media-id> 
is the correct command.

If the Policy schedule retention levels are configured according to business needs, you should never need to manually expire tapes.
Unexpired tapes/images need to be kept to restore from until they naturally expire.

Insufficient media in the environment should never be a reason for manually expiring tapes.

View solution in original post

11 REPLIES 11

Nicolai
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the infinity switch will cause the tapes never to expire. the -d 0 is the right switch to expire the data on tape.

Marianne
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Please show us output of :

nbemmcmd -listmedia -mediaid XXXXXXL5

Good day,

Please see command results below

Tape 1

NBEMMCMD, Version: 7.7.3
====================================================================
Media GUID: 617445b1-7022-429c-87c1-305da55224f5
Media ID: I20316
Partner: -
Media Type: HCART2
Volume Group: ---
Application: Netbackup
Media Flags: 1
Description: FCIS barcode rule
Barcode: I20316L5
Partner Barcode: --------
Last Write Host: NONE
Created: 05/22/2017 16:38
Time Assigned: -
First Mount: 05/22/2017 18:29
Last Mount: 10/05/2017 00:20
Volume Expiration: 10/10/2017 15:51
Data Expiration: -
Last Written: 10/05/2017 00:22
Last Read: -
Robot Type: NONE
Robot Control Host: -
Robot Number: -
Slot: -
Side/Face: -
Cleanings Remaining: -
Number of Mounts: 35
Maximum Mounts Allowed: 0
Media Status: ACTIVE
Kilobytes: 0
Images: 0
Valid Images: 0
Retention Period: -
Number of Restores: 0
Optical Header Size Bytes: 0
Optical Sector Size Bytes: 0
Optical Partition Size Bytes: 0
Last Header Offset: 0
Adamm Guid: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Rsm Guid: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Origin Host: NONE
Master Host: is00nbr001
Server Group: -
Upgrade Conflicts Flag:
Pool Number: 4
Volume Pool: FCIS-Full
Previous Pool Name: -
Vault Flags: -
Vault Container: -
Vault Name: -
Vault Slot: -
Session ID: -
Date Vaulted: -
Return Date: -
Media on Hold: 0
====================================================================
Command completed successfully.

 

Tape 2

NBEMMCMD, Version: 7.7.3
====================================================================
Media GUID: 9d7c3bd2-cb7d-49e4-b671-d1a20137e15e
Media ID: 0123L5
Partner: -
Media Type: HCART2
Volume Group: ---
Application: Netbackup
Media Flags: 1
Description: FCIS barcode rule
Barcode: I20123L5
Partner Barcode: --------
Last Write Host: NONE
Created: 12/27/2013 23:58
Time Assigned: -
First Mount: 12/28/2013 23:33
Last Mount: 04/28/2017 03:22
Volume Expiration: 05/04/2017 17:45
Data Expiration: -
Last Written: 04/28/2017 03:21
Last Read: -
Robot Type: NONE
Robot Control Host: -
Robot Number: -
Slot: -
Side/Face: -
Cleanings Remaining: -
Number of Mounts: 29
Maximum Mounts Allowed: 0
Media Status: ACTIVE
Kilobytes: 0
Images: 0
Valid Images: 0
Retention Period: -
Number of Restores: 0
Optical Header Size Bytes: 0
Optical Sector Size Bytes: 0
Optical Partition Size Bytes: 0
Last Header Offset: 0
Adamm Guid: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Rsm Guid: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Origin Host: NONE
Master Host: is00nbr001
Server Group: -
Upgrade Conflicts Flag:
Pool Number: 4
Volume Pool: FCIS-Full
Previous Pool Name: -
Vault Flags: -
Vault Container: -
Vault Name: -
Vault Slot: -
Session ID: -
Date Vaulted: -
Return Date: -
Media on Hold: 0
====================================================================
Command completed successfully.

Marianne
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You did not only expire the data (using bpexpdate), you only expired the hardware (probably using the Media section of the GUI.

Hardware expiration means that the tape is either too old to be trusted for backups or faulty.
NBU does not do that - a backup admin does that manually.
NBU default is 'never'.

See your output:

Tape 1:
Volume Expiration: 10/10/2017 15:51
Data Expiration: -

Tape 2: 
Volume Expiration: 05/04/2017 17:45
Data Expiration: -

Ok thank you for this information.

Can you kindly guide me on how to correctly execute a manual tape expiry?

Marianne
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bpexpdate -d 0 -m <media-id> 
is the correct command.

If the Policy schedule retention levels are configured according to business needs, you should never need to manually expire tapes.
Unexpired tapes/images need to be kept to restore from until they naturally expire.

Insufficient media in the environment should never be a reason for manually expiring tapes.

The command you put is the same as mine, only with the order of switches changed.

Does putting the -d 0 before -m XXXXL5 really make such a difference?

I appreciate the recommendation, which is already known, but we are at the mercy of the customer and their tape managers oft send tapes that have not yet expired.

Marianne
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The order of the switches does not matter at all.

As you can see from nbemmcd output, the data expiration was successful.

Volume Expiration: 05/04/2017 17:45
Data Expiration: -    
Kilobytes: 0
Images: 0
Valid Images: 0
Retention Period: -

In addition to bpexpdate command, someone has selected the media id in Media section of the GUI and entered an expiration date there. As explained - this is a hardware expiration.
Netbackup will not consider these tapes for backups.

 

How does one correct a hardware expiration then?

Of these 2 tapes I only expired one using the gui, (20316) the other (0123L5) I did not expire using the GUI as a test to see which will be pulled. Neither was pulled over the course of 3 duplication instances.

How do I get them to be pulled again?

Marianne
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You need to do the same to reverse/cancel the expiration date - open the tape in the GUI and select 'never' as expiration date.
Tape 2's hardware expiration seems to have been done manually back in May:
Volume Expiration: 05/04/2017 17:45.
If not you, then someone else.

Tapes will be available immediately after changing hardware expiration to 'never'.

Thank you ever so much, what a blessing you are.

Clear and concise answers, no wonder you are the top rated contributor.