Newbie onbar vs ontape question..I hope that's ok

Hello everyone. I have a newbie question - I hope you don't mind. I have an IDS 9.4 database, although that should not really be relevant to my question - I think. Question is using both onbar and ontape. I understand of course that one cannot use an ontape archive tape and use onbar to restore the tape(s) created by ontape, and visa-versa...one cannot use an ontape created archive and use onbar to restore from the tape(s) created by ontape. But there is no reason why an informix database cannot use both ontape and onbar as long as the backups used by ontape are used by ontape for restore and the backups used by onbar are used by onbar for restores...are my assumptions here correct? Thank you, Will

There are two backups - Level 0/1/2 and Logical logs. One should use either ontape or onbar for both backups. Mix and match could be a disaster while restoring. using ontape or onbar will depend upon your business continuity planning requirement. There are pros & cons for both. WILL LANDSTROM <willlandstrom@yahoo.com> wrote: Hello everyone. I have a newbie question - I hope you don't mind. I have an IDS 9.4 database, although that should not really be relevant to my question - I think. Question is using both onbar and ontape. I understand of course that one cannot use an ontape archive tape and use onbar to restore the tape(s) created by ontape, and visa-versa...one cannot use an ontape created archive and use onbar to restore from the tape(s) created by ontape. But there is no reason why an informix database cannot use both ontape and onbar as long as the backups used by ontape are used by ontape for restore and the backups used by onbar are used by onbar for restores...are my assumptions here correct? Thank you, Will ******************************************************************************* Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum. --------------------------------- Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage.

WILL LANDSTROM wrote: > Hello everyone. I have a newbie question - I hope you don't mind. I have an > Hello and welcome to the family. We love newbies on this list. > IDS 9.4 database, although that should not really be relevant to my question - > I think. Question is using both onbar and ontape. I understand of course that > one cannot use an ontape archive tape and use onbar to restore the tape(s) > created by ontape, and visa-versa...one cannot use an ontape created archive > and use onbar to restore from the tape(s) created by ontape. But there is no > reason why an informix database cannot use both ontape and onbar as long as > the backups used by ontape are used by ontape for restore and the backups used > by onbar are used by onbar for restores...are my assumptions here correct? > There is no reason why you cannot use both ontape and onbar, however, there are two problems, one minor the other major, that will make it impractical. First, you will always have to take level zero (full) archives and cannot take advantage of level 1 and level 2 incremental archives with either tool while you are using both. Any level 1 will be taken as of the last level zero regardless of what tool was used to perform that level zero. If it was performed using the other tool you will not be able to restore the level 1 and will have to restore the level zero and roll all logs forward from there. The second and more major problem is that you will only be able to archive the logical logs using one of the tools, not both! IDS only exports logical logs to the archive tool (whichever) that have not yet been archived, so once you back up the logs with one tool they will be unavailable to the other tool. That one's pretty much a show stopper. If you want to use onbar to be able to catalog archive and restore using your existing XBSA compliant archiving software but also want the simplicity of an ontape restore in a tight emergency, consider doing it this way: - Use ontape to archive the database and logical logs to disk files. - Immediately copy the disk file(s) to another server (preferably offsite) for safety. - Configure your filesystem archives to also pick up the IDS ontape archive files every time. - Keep at least two archives' files on disk including all of the logical logs beginning with the older archive so that you can restore the server directly from disk without waiting for the storage manager to retrieve the tapes and restore the files first. This way even if the latest archive fails to restore you can use the prior one and roll forward all of the logs. You can use ontape -c to continuously back up the logs or use the ALARMPROGRAM to archive them as they fill (my package utils4_ak contains an ALARMPROGRAM executable and skeleton script to do that). You can download utils4_ak from the IIUG Software Repository. Art S. Kagel > Thank you, Will > > > ******************************************************************************* > Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum. > >

Most of your assumptions are correct. But you may have missed a big caveat. A restore of an archive taken by either onbar or ontape will probably be followed up by a lower level archive or logical log restore. An example would be to have a LEVEL 0 archive then a LEVEL 1 from a couple days later and then Logical log backups after the LEVEL 1 (and/or LEVEL 2). A server restore cannot be a mix of ontape and onbar Archives and Logical Logs. Remember the Server records in the reserve pages when Level 0 Level 1 and Level backups are started/completed, it must do so to figure out what needs to be backed up in the next level backup. Any level 0 archive will reset the pointers, any level 1 will reset the pointers for that level, and level 2 will reset the pointers for that level, and any logical log backup will mark the logical log as backed up. The restore utilities do not (at least up to version 10) allow for the administrator to used alternate methods of backup (notable exception is external Archive/restore) I have seen in the past where a system that takes only Level 0 Archives and Logical logs backups using onbar can have an ontape backup performed with out incident. I believe that after 10 the inclusion of a Logical Log backup that is kicked off as part of the onbar archive makes this not work if you normally take ontape and decide to get an onbar Archive. Why would you want to have both backup utilities for a single instance? George -----Original Message----- From: ids-bounces@iiug.org [mailto:ids-bounces@iiug.org] On Behalf Of WILL LANDSTROM Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2007 12:43 PM To: ids@iiug.org Subject: Newbie onbar vs ontape question..I hope that's ok [10492] Hello everyone. I have a newbie question - I hope you don't mind. I have an IDS 9.4 database, although that should not really be relevant to my question - I think. Question is using both onbar and ontape. I understand of course that one cannot use an ontape archive tape and use onbar to restore the tape(s) created by ontape, and visa-versa...one cannot use an ontape created archive and use onbar to restore from the tape(s) created by ontape. But there is no reason why an informix database cannot use both ontape and onbar as long as the backups used by ontape are used by ontape for restore and the backups used by onbar are used by onbar for restores...are my assumptions here correct? Thank you, Will ************************************************************************ ******* Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum.

Thanks to everyone for the responses. They were all helpful. I am not mixing ontape and onbar in practice-I was just asking for clarity. I appreciate the answers. Will