Restore from available but not Primary image

[thesanman]

I have a set of backup schedules that write the primary onsite copy to a Disk Staged Storage Unit (DSSU) and a second copy immediately to the offsite tape pool for ejecting via offsite vaulting.  Later in the day the DSSU schedule creates the 3rd copy on tape.

What this means is that when the Primary on disk copy is expired as the DSSU gets near full, the primary copy becomes the offsite copy for a certain period of time until it too expires; then the 3rd copy becomes the Primary.

There is a window there where, if I initiate a restore, despite the fact that copy 3 is onsite and available in my tape library, because copy 2 is now the Primary copy it is the copy selected to be restored from.  Of course, the restore starts but sits there asking for the offsite tape to be located and made available.  Once I realise this has happened I can use the catalog function to promote the onsite copy to Primary but of course this always happens when you are least expecting it.

Can NetBackup be configured to select any AVAILABLE copy first for restores instead of always selecting the Primary copy?

Thanks,
Malcolm 
 

[Karthikeyan_Sun]

From Admin I Document:

 Each backup is assigned a primary copy. NetBackup uses the primary copy to satisfy restore requests. The first backup image that is created successfully by a NetBackup policy is the primary backup. If the primary copy is unavailable and a duplicate copy exists, select a copy of the backup and set it to be the primary copy.

NetBackup restores from the primary backup, and Vault duplicates from the primary backup. If your Vault profile performs duplication, you can designate

one of the duplicates as the primary. In most circumstances, the copy remaining in the robot is the primary backup.

When a primary backup expires, the next backup (if it exists) is promoted to primary automatically.

 

[Will_Restore · Accepted solution]

Karthikeyan described the process well.


NetBackup 6.0 MP5 or greater, you can set ALT_RESTORE_COPY_NUMBER
http://seer.entsupport.symantec.com/docs/287293.htm

"Previous NetBackup releases could only use the primary copy for restores.  In situations where multiple copies exist for an image, but the primary copy is not readily available, this option can restore from an alternate copy."

[David_McMullin]

The ALT_RESTORE_COPY_NUMBER is a GLOBAL setting, so if you set it to 3, you would not be able to restore from disk, also, from the docs, it does not show in the JAVA console, so it LOOKS like it will ask for the off site tape, but really not.

The trouble to set this variable for one restore is most likely equal to just promoting copy three to primary instead...

[thesanman]

It seems to me based on the above comments that there are a number of ways around this BUT none are that simple to use or activate and certainly it's not an automated function.

Should it be?

[David_McMullin]

When you make your off site copy, can you make it copy #3?
And make your on-ste copy #2?
You should be able to do this using Storage Lifecycle Policies.


OR 

If your on-site are short term, you can probably run a script that makes ALL copy #3 primary, and when they expire the copy #2 becomes primary.

BUT 

then you will not be able to restore from the DSSU, since that copy was no longer primary, lol


How about?

make a script or alias that set the touch file to copy number you want to restore from, then remove once you are done?

[David_McMullin]

I added this as an idea - maybe they will implement it - if it makes sense - vote for it!

Restore storage hierarchy or priority.
So you could tell it to restore from your DSSU then local and only if no copy there would it look for archived copy, regardless of primary...