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".session" files stored alongside ".rdb" files new to Retrospect v13?


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Since I have done the v13 upgrade, I have been seeing ".session" files stored along with the ".rdb" files in my Disk Media Set.

 

I searched the documentation and the other forum postings for an explanation, but have come up short.

 

My apologies if I'm missing something here.

 

What are these ".session" files?

 

Regards,

 

-- madison

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These files are also present for backup sessions since the upgrade to v11 for Windows. I think these are connected with the changes made to the catalogue rebuild process in v11 for Windows and v13 for OSX which allow for faster rebuilds.
 
 

Faster Catalog Rebuild
 
Retrospect v11 for Windows and Retrospect v13 for Mac both have under-the-hood performance improvements to catalog rebuild. Rebuild's performance has been a problem for customers. With this latest version, the rebuild process is now significantly faster, up to 3x in some cases. It supersedes the existing performance optimization, "Fast Catalog Rebuild", which has been removed.
 
The new process does require a backup operation to an existing set beforehand; this caches more information about the catalog in the set, so that if a rebuild is necessary, the operation can quickly reconstitute the original catalog.

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The .session files help Retrospect perform faster catalog rebuilds. We made the changes to help cloud backup users with catalog rebuilds.

 

Retrospect will read these files during a rebuild process. If you want to perform a through rebuild, you can delete all .session files before catalog rebuild and Retrospect will create new .session files from the original backup set data.

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Thanks, Scillonian and Mayoff.

A few more questions:

1) It seems that the first run in v13 produced a lot of .session files -- I assume this represents the substrates for a catalog rebuild for the previously backed-up material (more or less what you are saying if one had deleted the .session files).

2) It seems to create a new ".session" file for each new backup run, right?

3) For Cloud backup then, or even just a normal offsite backup of a standard Disk media set -- are the .session files sufficient in and of themselves such that one would not need to archive the catalog offsite as well?  There's nothing else Retrospect would need for a restore, correct?

4) Is there an advantage ('cept for speed) of having the original Catalog file handy?

It would be great if this stuff made it's way into the official documentation, but again, perhaps I missed it.  ;)

Regards,

-- madison
 

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Thanks, Scillonian and Mayoff.

 

A few more questions:

 

1) It seems that the first run in v13 produced a lot of .session files -- I assume this represents the substrates for a catalog rebuild for the previously backed-up material (more or less what you are saying if one had deleted the .session files).

 

2) It seems to create a new ".session" file for each new backup run, right?

 

3) For Cloud backup then, or even just a normal offsite backup of a standard Disk media set -- are the .session files sufficient in and of themselves such that one would not need to archive the catalog offsite as well?  There's nothing else Retrospect would need for a restore, correct?

 

4) Is there an advantage ('cept for speed) of having the original Catalog file handy?

 

It would be great if this stuff made it's way into the official documentation, but again, perhaps I missed it.  ;)

 

Regards,

 

-- madison

 

 

 

1) The more backup sessions you have inside your media set, the more .session files you will have

 

2) Yes, you will get new .session files for each backup operation

 

3) The .session files will help make a catalog rebuild faster in the future. I don't typically keep back up copies of my catalog files, since those backups can become outdated very quickly. If something goes wrong, I prefer to perform a catalog rebuild instead of using an old outdated catalog.

 

4) You would need your catalog file to perform future backups or restores. A rebuilt catalog file is going to contain the same information as your original catalog file.

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