Windows 2010 Progress Backup

[techjohnny]

Our Server 2008 Server is running a full backup of all files and directories on our OpenEdge 10.1B server. Will this suffice for backing up the database if it's online? I'm use to running probkup online instead, but curious if that is now just redundant?

Guess trying running the database from a backup would help answer.

The server is running VSS for backing up

Okay, subject should say Windows 2008

 

[jurriaan]

The first question with respect to backups:

Have you tested it?

As far as I know, there is no alternative to probkup online since only probkup online looks at what Openedge does in memory as well as what is on the disk. If you only backup the disk, you miss out on anything in memory. You could try working around that with quiet points, but I think testing that extensively is more trouble than just using probkup online.

 

[Cringer]

Completely agree - you should rely on probkup, not on server backup. In fact, your server backup should NOT be backing up database files IMO. It's likely you haven't had any issues as this is likely to be running when the system is not being used much, but having a backup client running over the db files is lining you up for contention issues. We had a situation a few months ago where our production database crashed every Tuesday night. We never tracked down the culprit as we moved from corporate IT to being autonomous and that solved the issue. But I am pretty sure it was either anti-virus or backups causing it.

 

[Chris Hughes]

If you really don't want to use probkup online then make sure you stop all databases / systems first on that server. Then at least you are backing up a static disk.

Progress will not support you restoring from what you are currently doing should it not work for any reason when you need it to,

+1 On the AV comment as well, I ignore the entire db folder structure if any sys admin insists on putting AV on the db server.

 

[RealHeavyDude]

File system backups or snapshots on SANs or the like will never be able to generate a good backup of a running Progress database. There might be SAN vendors claiming that they can but they don't understand how a database is different than flat files.

The recommended way to backup a Progress database is always to use probkup regardless whether you are doing an online or offline backup. That way it is ensured that the backup containes every relevant database block of every extent which might be spread across different file systems and folder structures.

Nevertheless, Progress allows you to set quiet points on a running database which effectively block any update to the database until they are released. When the quiet pont is set you are able to backup a running database by gathering all necessary files and copy them somewhere else or make snapshots of the relevant file systems. Still, I don't think you will find anybody on this forum that would recommend you to do so.

You should always trust the backup utility of the database vendor - at least when it is a Progress database - more than any other magical thing. probkup has a proven track record and has never failed on me in 25 years. I can not say that about other backup strategies like file system snap shots.

In the end, whatever disaster recovery strategy you implement: Make sure it really holds water by thoroughly testing it and that it fullfills your needs. It ain't fun telling the boss that, by the way, unfortunately, your production system was not covered the way it should have been ...

Heavy Regards, RealHeavyDude.

 

[TomBascom]

probkup is the best way to backup a Progress database. Period.

Do not forget that the point of a backup is to be able to restore it -- "prorest" is the best way to restore a Progress database. When restoring you often want to have certain flexibility about where you restore. Prorest helps you to do that in ways that non-Progress backups simply cannot.

Second best ways to backup require that you get a synchronized copy of each and every piece of the database, no matter where it is hidden.

It is not always obvious where all the parts of the database are -- especially if the system has been installed for some time and has grown and extents have been added in non-standard locations perhaps due to temporary disk space shortages.

prostrct list knows where all of the pieces are. Running it should be step #1 when making a non-standard backup.

Assuming that you get past that and actually do have all of the parts of the db, snapshots can be very handy. Not so much as a formal backup but as a way to manage the process or to provide rapid recovery during maintenance operations.

 

[techjohnny]

Thanks for all the great feedback.

Yeah, the snapshots or/and backup do require running prostrct since the directory have changed.