No Proactive scripts running

[j.a.duke]

System Details: 

Retrospect 17.0.2.101

Mac Mini 2018 32/256 connected to an Areca Thunderbolt 3 array (140TB)

macOS 10.14.6 on server and 10.12 - 10.15 on clients (mix of local desktops & remote outside of network laptops)

Destination is a Storage Group (to allow multiple backups to write to it simultaneously)

 

I set up a Proactive script per the instructions in the KB (https://www.retrospect.com/en/support/kb/how_to_set_up_remote_backup), pushed out a client to all of my systems via Munki (https://www.retrospect.com/en/support/kb/deployment_with_munki) and everything was working. And it's worked well for over a month until last Thursday when all proactive stopped working.  All scheduled backups are running.

I rebooted the server Mac multiple times.

I tried stopping, then starting the Retrospect Engine on the server mac.

When I rebooted today, some of the proactives ran, but nowhere near the number that are listed as ASAP under Activities-ProactiveAI.

I'm currently running a regular backup script manually, but no proactives are running.

I've tested several of the clients that are in the primary proactive script and they are responding.

I don't see a whole lot of troubleshooting info for proactives in the knowledge base.  

Any suggestions on what I should look at or how to get this all working again?

Thanks.

Cheers,
Jon

[DavidHertzberg]

j.a.duke,

[Denunciation—which I erroneously deleted—for posting in the above OP and in the OP of this earlier thread as if you've got two separate installations; one installation in which you use Remote Backup and Storage Groups, while in the other installation you make no mention of using those features.]   [ Denunciation—which I erroneously deleted—for not including in the above OP any description or screenshots of the Schedule tabs of your Proactive scripts, which is where I suspect(ed) the problem lies.]     [Denunciation—which I erroneously deleted—for this OP not describing testing including:]  (what changed on 5 June 2020?).....  [Threat—which I erroneously deleted—that I'm not going to respond to your future posts unless you start giving complete descriptions of your problems.]  [Warning—which I erroneously deleted—that if you instead seek help from Retrospect Tech Support they will insist on complete descriptions of your problems.]   No one can help  you trouble-shoot without a complete description of your installation's backup.

But in the remainder of this post I'm going to give you some advice.  The first part of the advice is to not use Remote Backup unless you absolutely have to.  This April 2020 post explains that advice.  If your "remote outside of network laptops"—which may include COVID-19 true Workers From Home—are for the equivalent of Sally in Shanghai and Albert in Adelaide, as mentioned in the first paragraph of that post, then and only then do you need Remote Backup—with the kludge discussed in the fourth paragraph.  Otherwise what you really need is to define the known existing Subnets in your multi-network installation for those laptops per pg. 88 step 2-3 of the Retrospect Mac 17 User's Guide, and to Add those "clients" with Subnet Broadcast per pgs. 86-87.

[Recreation from memory of erroneously-deleted paragraph:]   The second part of the advice is to not use Storage Groups unless you absolutely have to.  The second and third paragraphs of this May 2020 post explain that advice.  It will be somewhat more work to manually create a separate Media Set and Proactive script for each "client" you are attempting to back up with a single Proactive script.  However you can make those separate Proactive scripts run in parallel by specifying Any Activity Thread in each Summary, and you'll avoid problems caused by the currently-half-baked GUI for Storage Groups.

Edited June 29, 2020 by DavidHertzberg
Recreate a summary of the erroneously-deleted first paragraph; I intended to _copy_ part of it into an additional post. Reword first half of last sentence of second paragraph for clarity. Recreate the erroneously-deleted third paragraph.

[Nigel Smith]

On 6/17/2020 at 7:30 PM, j.a.duke said:

Any suggestions on what I should look at or how to get this all working again?

Start with the clients on your internal network -- are they getting backed up Proactively?

Are the remote clients connecting to your network over a VPN, and you're then catching them with the Proactive script? Or are they truly outside -- check your server is still available on ports 497 and 22024 to the outside world.

[DavidHertzberg]

On 6/17/2020 at 8:25 PM, DavidHertzberg said:

j.a.duke,

...(what changed on 5 June 2020?).....

....

....

IMHO Nigel Smith has spotted the likely cause: ports, not schedules.  On 5 June either j.a.duke's "backup server" machine had its ability to communicate to the outside world over ports 497 and 22024 cut off, or the "remote clients" had that ability cut off—which implies that they're really on a VPN or on a known subnet in a multi-network existing installation that had its ability to communicate to the outside world over ports 497 and 22024 cut off.  The fact that the cutoff happened on one particular day implies that something was done by a network administrator—who surely works for some organization.

Maybe j.a.duke can clarify what he meant in his OP by "I've tested several of the clients that are in the primary proactive script and they are responding."  Did he trouble-shoot via a Locate of individual Clients in Retrospect, or via some other method?  If he can do that in Retrospect for "several of the clients", it implies that they are not Remote Clients but are on a VPN or subnet—you can't Locate a true Remote Client because AFAIK Retrospect can't address it.

[Nigel Smith]

On 6/17/2020 at 7:30 PM, j.a.duke said:

And it's worked well for over a month until last Thursday when all proactive stopped working

Jon, did you ever get anywhere with this?

Just had a silly thought -- if the problem was that your Proactive scripts were running but none of your remote clients were getting backed up, make sure you didn't install Retrospect client on your server (see the very last point in the Remote Backup KB article).