Disk backups - automatic removal of expired files
I have a large disk storage that I do my backup to disk on then from there, backup to tape. I have an expiration date of 5 days. Question, what program does this cleanup and why does it work sometime and not other times?? Also, is there a place that you can set this program to run (specific date)?
Thanks much
Cathy
- Disk storage is managed by DLM and it grooms the disk storage every 4 hours. See this blog and my article https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/data-lifecycle-management-be-2012 https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/articles/when-backup-sets-are-deleted-under-dlm
thanks pkh. Where is the blog and article and can you change the date and time this occurs??
Cathy
- No. DLM will groom very 4 hours. You have no control over this
Make sure you are on SP4 and the latest hotfixes.
If your disks are removable USB disks, then plug them in and leave them for a couple of hours so that DLM can groom them.
Bear in mind that even though full backups might be listed as expired, they will not be removed from the system until all their dependent Incremental backups can also be removed from the system
As such if you are using 5 day retention on your fulls and incrementals (and assuming you run a full once week and daily incremantals that run for 6 days before the next full) then the full will not be removed for 10 days (+ up to 4 hours more)
Also note that without changing the defaults we do not allow the last full sequence of a backup set to be removed autopmatically. As such if you run a one-off backup of a resource that backup will not be removed after the expiry time. The default setting that controls this is available in the BE console in 2014 but is a registry change in 2012. I would also suggest an upgrade anyway as 2014 does have some data lifecycle management (DLM) updates.