Evaluating - lots of questions

[SteveYates]

I work for a VAR in Illinois (ASCII member), and we are evaluating Retrospect for use both at our location and to recommend to clients, as it supports the OnStream drives we have grown to like. Target usage is for desktops, workgroups, and servers. I have installed 5.6 Server on my Windows XP Pro PC to test and after reading through the manual I have compiled a few questions. I should note so far I have only done one test backup, a partial backup.

 

 

 

1) Selectors - there is no Edit button to view built in selectors, as is described in the manual p. 179? Although the built in selectors seem neat, I would really like to know *specifically* what I am selecting to exclude. [Whoops just figured this one out. It's only visible under the Special tab, not when editing a script. Good thing, since Dantz's definition of "cache" also includes Windows' TEMP folders too! I was referred to p.179 from the scripts section of the manual, and missed that they were different; you have to exit that to jump to the Special tab]

 

 

 

2) backup set properties - no Media Action button as described in the manual p. 155? Or, there is a Media section and Action button but it is disabled on this my first configuration of this backup set. Why is that? Do I need to run an entire backup set to change this option?

 

 

 

3) Is there a way to automatically erase/recycle on a backup set?

 

 

 

4) Is there a way to automatically print the operations log for a backup after each backup? This is an important feature to many of our clients who honestly don't have the skills and/or inclination to jump on the server to print selections of the operations log. I found some clever ways to export logs and convert to HTML, but I couldn't see a way to simply print the log file on each job and if it's not there this seems like a big hole in an otherwise nifty program.

 

 

 

5) File "C:\Documents and Settings\User2\My Documents\private\test.txt": can't write, error -2351 (File is encrypted). I was experimenting with encrypting folders on this PC and stumbled on this error during the restore of this file to a different (FAT32) drive. Is this because it wasn't restored to an NTFS drive? Or does this mean Retrospect really can't restore encrypted files?

 

 

 

Thanks,

 

 

 

- Steve Yates

 

- A truly wise man never plays leapfrog with a unicorn.

 

 

 

/ Taglines by Taglinator 2.5 - www.srtware.com /

 

 

[lv2ski]

1) If you go to Special/Selectors you can then open a selector and edit it. Glad you figured it out!

 

Thanks for letting us know!

 

2) You must run a backup before the Action button becomes enabled. Why? Because Otherwise the 1st time it backs up its going to do a full backup of your source no matter what. It won't make a difference about Recycle, or Normal. (which are options found under the Action button to toggle)

 

3) When creating a script, when you go to create your schedule for your script you can toggle it to do a recycle backup. You can also toggle it to do a recycle backup under the Immediate Screen of a backup, under Options. Or you can go to Configure/Backupsets/Get properties on your backupset and go to Options/Action. (as mentioned in your post before).

 

4) There is not a built in function to automatically print the log. Although, you could probably create a VBS script that triggers the log to be printed after each backup. See page 192 of our user manual for more info on this.

 

5) Its because it wasn't being restored to an NTFS volume. Retrospect can restore encrypted files.

 

 

 

Hope this helps!

 

Melissa

[SteveYates]

>You must run a backup before the Action button becomes enabled.

 

 

 

Thanks for the reply. Do you mean that if I install Retrospect at a client's, and want to create several backup sets, I must sit through a full backup on each set first before I can set this Action?

 

 

 

- Steve Yates

 

- "Bother!," said Pooh, as he erased his hard disk.

 

 

 

/ Taglines by Taglinator 2.5 - www.srtware.com /

 

 

[lv2ski]

> Do you mean that if I install Retrospect at a client's, and want to create several backup sets, I must sit through a full backup on each set first before I can set this Action?

 

 

 

Yes if you want to use the Action button. But why are you using the Action tab? When you toggle something under the Action button it is a One time only operation. So if you switch it to do a recycle it will only do ONE recycle and then default back to normal.

 

 

 

If you want to continue doing one type of operation(recycle, new media, normal), it is better to toggle this in your schedule of your script. I guess I'm sort of wondering why you want to use this action button.