[Bacula-users] Recycling of volumes in Bacula

[John Drescher]

2010/9/29 Albin Vega <albinv4616 at gmail.com>:
> Hello
>
> I have now set up my first couple of backup jobs, both local and over
> internet and it seems to bee working fine!! Quite happy about this since its
> my first time using Bacula! However I have a couple of questions about
> version control an recycling of volumes.
> First a little info. I have 5 jobs running, each with its ovn fd/sd and pool
> so they can run at the same time. I use incremental backup. Here is the
> config of the pool and client for one of the jobs.
>
> }
> # File Pool definition
> Pool {
>   Name = buzzy-pool
>   Pool Type = Backup
> #  Accept Any Volume = yes                 # write on any volume in the pool
>   LabelFormat = "buzzy-"
>   Recycle = yes                                   # Bacula can automatically
> recycle Volumes
>   AutoPrune = yes                               # Prune expired volumes
>   Volume Retention = 1 year                 # 1 year
>   Maximum Volume Bytes = 50G          # Limit Volume size to something
> reasonable
>   Maximum Volumes = 10                    # Limit number of Volumes in Pool
> }
>
> Question: When a volume gets recycled, are all the files on that volume just
> deleted,

When a volume gets recycled the volume gets overwritten in the next
backup that uses it. I think now you can have it automatically
truncate if you want.

>or is it just files that has been deleted on the server being
> backed up that is deleted?
No definitely not that.




> client {
>   Name = buzzy-fd
>   Address = buzzy.client.net
>   FDPort = 9102
>   Catalog = MyCatalog
>   Password = "Password"               # password for FileDaemon 2
>   File Retention = 6 months           # 6 months
>   Job Retention = 6 months            # six months
>   AutoPrune = yes                        # Prune expired Jobs/Files
>
>
> What I would really like is this:
> 1. When a deleted file gets older than 6 months (a file that is deleted in
> the original server beeing backed up) I would like it to be deleted in the
> Bacula system. But I dont want files that in general is older than 6 months
> (and not deleted from the original server beeing backed up) to be deleted
> from the Bacula system.

Bacula does not have that feature. Also remember that recycling is an
entire volume at once not parts of the volume get deleted over time.
Bacula volumes are append only then  delete the entire volume to
recycle. The reason for this is bacula supports tape and other formats
not just disk and all formats work the same way.

> 2. When sombody changes a file, the file gets backed up again by Bacula, and
> every time its chaned it get backed up. Is there a way to configure that
> Bacula only keeps the 4 -5 last versions of this file, and delete the older
> ones?
>
Bacula does not work this way. And because of my answers above I am
not sure you could force it do do what you want.

John