Transfer Of Backup Scheme Inquiry

[ignprint]

Good morning (afternoon)!

 

One of our Magnum 1x7 LTO3 autoloaders is on the fritz and is going to be sent out for repair.

 

We've two setups that are exactly the same (see my signature for tech details).

 

Can I take the scripts / catalogs on one station and transfer them to the other station to resume backups...? How would I accomplish that?

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

 

Thank you very much for your time and assistance.

 

Cheers!

 

Anthony

[twickland]

Can I take the scripts / catalogs on one station and transfer them to the other station to resume backups...? How would I accomplish that?

You don't say whether you have two copies of Retrospect and were using both computers as backup servers. If you were, there is no convenient way to combine the scripts from both machines; you would have to enter all that information by hand. If you weren't, then the moving process is pretty straightforward.

 

All the information about scripts, selectors, clients, etc., is contained in a file called Retro.Config (6.0), located at /Library/Preferences/Retrospect. This folder also contains other useful files, including the Operations Log, so copying that entire folder to the second computer makes sense. The catalogs can be copied to any convenient location. To tell Retrospect about the new location of the catalogs, it's easiest to highlight the entire group and double click (you can also go to Configure> Backup Sets, click on "More" and navigate to each backup set's catalog).

 

If you were backing up specific local volumes or subvolumes on the first computer, you will need to install Retrospect client on that machine to be able to continue to back up those items.

 

 

 

 

 

[ignprint]

Apologies.

 

Yes, both stations are running Retrospect (same software build and same hardware being used).

 

Station 1 is backing up partitions in itself as well as sharepoint-accessed partitions on another station. Station 2 is doing the same.

 

Station 1's autoloader is being sent for repairs while Station 2's autoloader works fine.

 

I tried transferring the two catalogs to the working station. I recreated the script and pointed it to the catalogs. It started to run the backup...however, the autoloader did not see the member that Retrospect was asking for, even though I had placed it in the autoloader. I stopped the script, restarted Retrospect and ran an Inventory Update on the autoloader. All to no avail - the tape is still listed as erased. It still appears fine in the other autoloader.

 

...?

 

Thank you, twickland, for taking the time to answer my query.

[twickland]

All to no avail - the tape is still listed as erased. It still appears fine in the other autoloader.

That doesn't sound good. It suggests you may also have problems with the tape drive in station 2's autoloader. It would be the tape drive, not Retrospect, that determines whether a tape has no data on it.

[ignprint]

That doesn't sound good. It suggests you may also have problems with the tape drive in station 2's autoloader. It would be the tape drive, not Retrospect, that determines whether a tape has no data on it.

 

Thank you again for your time and advice.

 

The autoloader is now reading those transferred tapes correctly. Because of course.

 

When the autoloader comes back from repair, do I just copy back the catalog and point the script to the revised catalog...?

 

Cheers!

Edited August 16, 2011 by m.anthony

[twickland]

When the autoloader comes back from repair, do I just copy back the catalog and point the script to the revised catalog...?

I assume you're talking about station 1.

 

Presumably you still have a catalog on that machine with the same name. If you simply replace that copy with the updated catalog, Retrospect should carry on going forward.

 

One issue I expect you'll have is that station 1 will have a whole bunch of previous script scheduled events that Retrospect on that station was unable to execute because the tape drive was missing. If so, you should go to Automate> Preview and delete the latest scheduled events that you don't want to occur. Retrospect will then also delete all prior scheduled events for that particular script and scheduler. If you have multiple scripts or multiple schedulers within a given script, you'll have to repeat this operation for each script/scheduler.