Using Veritas Backup Exec for Netware Guidelines
Revised: 8/1/2001
This
guide covers basic operation of the network tape drive and software. Keep a copy of this document near the file
server & tape drive. These
instructions assume you are performing these operations from the File Server Console (keyboard attached
to the file server). Most of these tasks can also be
performed remotely using the Rconsole utility. When using Rconsole, you must press Alt-F1 instead of Ctrl-Esc when accessing the menu.
Clearing an Active Job
Inserting & Ejecting
tapes
Labeling & Handling
tapes
General Guidelines
Maintenance (format,
erase, retention, cleaning)
Scheduling Automatic
Backups at night
Performing a Full
Restore
Tape Cartridges
New
DAT drives take DDS tapes. Below is a
chart with the tape specifications. Make a note of which tapes you need.
Uncompressed Compressed
Tape Name Length Capacity Capacity
DDS 90
meter 2GB 4GB
DDS-2 120
meter 4GB 8GB
DDS-3 125
meter 12GB 24GB
Login Name & Password
To
administer the Backup Exec software, you must enter the proper login name and
password.
File
Server Name: _____________________
Login
Name: _____________________
Password: _____________________
Checking Job History &
Job Schedule
To
check to see if your job is scheduled, go to the NetWare Client screen. At the file server keyboard, press Ctrl-Esc and choose the screen named Backup Exec - Netware Client.
You should see a menu with Administration, Commands, Options and
Help. You may need to press Esc to move
back to the main menu. Be careful not
to unload this program by pressing Esc to many times. Choose the pull down menu Administration,
using the arrow keys. Choose Job Schedule. You can choose either “View your jobs” or “View all jobs.” Typically only one person administers the
backup software, so “your jobs” and “all jobs” shows the same list. You should see a backup job named Nightly
scheduled with today’s date.
To
check to see if job was successful, you need to look at the Job History
screen. At the file server keyboard,
press Ctrl-Esc and choose the screen named Backup Exec - NetWare Client. Choose
the pull down menu Administration,
and select Job History. There should be an entry for each job that
was run. Note: The list is sorted by
completion date, not the date your started the backup. You may need to refresh the list by pressing
Esc and then choosing Job History again. A successful backup
is listed as Normal. An unsuccessful
backup is listed as Error or Aborted. Remember to check the Job History log each
day!
Clearing an Active Job
If
a backup is in progress, you can get detailed information about the job by
switching to the Job Manager screen.
Press Ctrl-Esc and select the
screen titled Backup Exec - Job Manager. The Job Manager screen has a status window
that will read Ready if the tape
drive is idle or Active if a job is
in progress. Below the status window is
a message window. If there is a
problem, you will see a message “Session
1 in need of attention.” If this is
the case, press Enter to see the
session details.
The
most common error message is “A tape was not found . . .” This usually happens when a scheduled
backup starts and there when there is not tape in the drive. When this happens, you have two choices: You can insert a tape and choose continue
(see below), or you can choose not to continue and abort the job. Typically, you don’t want the backup to run
in the middle of the day. This slows
down the system and open files are skipped, resulting in an incomplete backup.
I usually recommend aborting the job.
After aborting, wait a few seconds and the software will display a
message “Job completion statistics – Status aborted.” Press Esc to return to
the Job Manager main screen. At this
point, insert a tape for the next scheduled backup.
You
may see an error message “Sense data error, check SCSI cabling . . .” If this happens, there was a problem
communicating with the drive. Do the
following. Unload the backup software
(see section Starting & Stopping the Backup Software). Power off the tape drive and check the cable
connections. Turn back on the tape
drive and then restart the Backup Exec software.
Stopping and Starting the
Backup Software
To
stop the Backup Exec software, do the following. At the file server console, go to the menu by pressing Ctrl-Esc. Under normal operation, there should see two screens listed for
the tape software: Backup Exec - Job
Manager and Backup Exec - Netware
Client. These two screens should always be present unless you
accidentally unload them or purposely shut them down. Before unloading the Job Manager, make sure
no backups are in progress. See the
section titled Checking & Clearing an Active Job for more
information.
To
manually shutdown Backup Exec, switch to the menu (Ctrl-Esc) and choose the
screen titled Backup Exec - Netware Client. Using the arrow keys, select Exit. Next, switch to the menu (Ctrl-Esc) and choose the screen titled
Backup Exec- Job Manager. Close this
screen by pressing Control-X. At the
System Console screen, type BESTOP
and press Enter to shutdown and
unload the rest of the Backup Exec software.
At this point, you can also turn off the tape drive via the switch on
the back of the drive. This will
re-initialize the tape drive hardware and may help fix communication problems.
To
start the Backup Exec software, go to the file server keyboard. Switch to the System Console screen by
pressing Ctrl-Esc and choosing screen #1.
Type BESTART and press Enter.
You may be asked to log in to the backup server. Use the log in name listed above.
Note: To automatically start the Backup Exec software when the server is booted, put the BESTART command in the server’s AUTOEXEC.NCF file. To do this, type LOAD INSTALL and choose NCF File Options - Edit AUTOEXEC.NCF. Add the BESTART command near the end of the file. To prevent the Backup Exec software from automatically loading, remove this command or put a pound sign (#) in front of the command.
Inserting & Ejecting
tapes
It
takes between 30 and 45 seconds insert and load a tape. During the load process the drive removes
the magnetic tape from the cartridge and wraps it around the drive head. While ejecting the tape, the drive has to
wind the magnetic tape back into the cartridge. This process is slow and should not be interrupted.
Labeling & Handling
tapes
All
new tapes should be labeled as soon as they are opened. Place a label directly on the tape cartridge
and on the plastic container. I
recommend at least seven tapes, one for each business day, plus two off-site
backup tapes. Name the tapes Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
Off-Site1, Off-Site2, etc. For
additional safety, you should have two sets of tapes. Week One (Monday through
Friday) and Week Two (Monday through Friday).
Write
the date you first use the tape, so you know how old the tapes are. After each successful backup, write the date of the successful backup on
the tape label. This will allow you
to quickly locate the last good backup.
It is very important each morning to check the backup to see if it ran
correctly. If the backup ran
successfully, remove the backup tape from the drive, write the date on tape, and insert the next day’s tape.
General Guidelines
Always
alternate backup tapes, don’t use the same backup tape twice in a row. Never erase your last good backup tape. Always keep one full backup tape out of the
office or in a fireproof safe.
When
doing nightly backups, the tape is erased in order to make room for the new
data. If you have a data corruption or
backup drive problem that is not identified quickly, you may overwrite tapes
containing good data with bad information.
This is why you need to have several backup tapes so you don’t risk
overwriting you last good backup tape.
Tape
cartridges don’t last forever.
Typically a tape will last one to two years. When a tape gets old, it you may see error messages such as
“media failure” or “tape read/write error”
When this happens, clean the tape drive and try a new tape. If the problems persist, the tape drive may
need to be serviced.
Maintenance (format, erase, retention,
cleaning)
You
need to use the Job Manager screen on the File Server to run maintenance tasks.
Press
Ctrl-Esc and choose the screen named Backup Exec - Job Manager.
The
Job Manager screen has a status window that should Ready if the tape drive is idle.
Press
Enter to go to the Utilities Menu
where you can select the following options:
The
Quick erase feature is sufficient to
prepare a tape. This overwrites the
tape header information. The DAT tapes
do not need to be formatted, but must be quick-erased before they are used.
This process typically takes 2-3 minutes.
The
Full erase procedure erases the tape
header and all information on the tape.
This process can take from 1 to 3 hours to complete and can not be
interrupted.
The
Retention feature fast forwards and
then rewinds the tape and makes sure the tape cartridge is working. It is a good test of the operation of the
tape drive is to retention a tape. If
the tape drive sensors are dirty, this may cause the tape to de-spool (unwind
completely), which ruins the tape cartridge.
This takes about 20 minutes.
The
Clean Tape Drive option is done by
inserting a special cleaning cartridge.
Do this approximately once a month.
The tape drive will sense the presence of the cleaning cartridge,
automatically go through the cleaning process, and eject the tape when
finished. Do not spray the tape drive with
compressed air. Compressed air
contains a lubricating oil that will get on the read/write heads and damage the
tape head and tape cartridges.
Scheduling Automatic Backups
at night
Go
to the file server console. Press
Ctrl-Esc on the keyboard and choose the screen labeled Backup Exec - NetWare Client.
Note: Once in the Backup Exec screen, you can
navigate around by using the following keys:
arrow keys move left, right, up &
down,
Enter select an item,
agree to that selection
Esc backup to the
previous screen, cancel
Tab move to the next
section or topic
Shift-Tab go back to the previous
section or topic
Space
bar toggle an item On
or Off
F2 accept
selections and move to the next screen
Select
the pull-down menu named Commands.
Choose Backup
Make Selections
NetWare Directory
NetWare File System
Highlight
each one and press the space bar to change them to ALL
Press
F2 to Accept Selections
Choose Submit
Name the job
Nightly
X Verify after backup should be checked
Backup Type Normal
Tape Use -
change to Overwrite
New
tape name “Nightly”
Leave
password blank
Target
position - First Available
Job
Frequency - Press enter to Change to Execute
every one week
Press
tab to move to days
Press
space bar once for each day M, T, W, R,
F (5 times)
Press
F2 to accept selections
Press
F2 to accept the frequency settings
Execute
date: Choose today’s date, change time to 11:00
pm.
F2 to Save Changes
Next, you need to enter
a backup set name for each part of the backup set.
Enter Nightly for each backup set name.
You should see the
message
“Your backup
job was successfully submitted to the backup server”
Manual Backup & Restore
Notes: You should only perform a manual backup or
restore while the network is idle and everyone is logged off. You can run a backup for testing purposes
while people are logged in to the network, but it may slow down the
server. You can’t backup or restore an
application if it is being used by any
user, since these files will be in use, and therefore skipped. Restoring data should be done carefully, by
an experienced user only.
Select
the pull-down menu named Commands.
To
do a manual backup, choose Backup
Make Selections
Select the
items you want to backup. You don’t
have to select everything,
you can tag individual files or folders using the space bar.
Press F2
to Accept Selections
Choose Submit
Name the job Manual
X Verify after backup should be checked if you want to run a
compare pass
Backup Type Normal
Tape Use - choose Append or Overwrite
If you
choose Overwrite, you must enter a new tape name
Leave password blank
Target position - First Available
Job Frequency - Choose Execute only once
Press F2 to accept
Execute date: Choose
today’s date & time.
F2 to continue
Next, you need to enter
a backup set name for each part of the backup set.
You should see the
message
“Your backup job was
successfully submitted to the backup server”
To
do a manual restore, choose Restore
Make Selections - By Device.
Select the volume you will to restore, typically SYS
is drive F, APPS is drive G
Select the Backup Set
(by date) that contains the data you want to restore
Select the items you want to restore. Only select the files you need to
restore. Tag individual files or
folders using the enter key and space bar.
Press F2
to Accept Selections
Choose Submit
Performing a full data
restore
Note: This procedure should be followed in the
event of a NetWare drive failure.
1. Repair/ replace the network SCSI hard drive. Reload the NetWare operating system. Attach to the server via a DOS workstation
and login as supervisor.
2. Install the Seagate Backup Exec software on the file
server. If loading from a CDROM, mount
the Seagate Backup Exec CD. At the file
server console prompt type LOAD path\BEINSTAL where path is the name of the
CDROM (usually SEAGATE) or the name of the network install directory (usually
SYS:BKUPEXEC.INS or APPS:BKUPEXEC.INS).
3. Once the BackupExec software is installed, make sure it is
loaded correctly and finds the tape drive.
The load command is LOAD BESTART.
You may want to add this command to the AUTOEXEC.NCF file so it loads
automatically.
4. At the server console, switch to the Job Manager screen by
pressing Ctrl-Esc and choosing Backup Exec - Job Manager. You should see Status = Ready. Press Enter and login to the backup
server. This will bring up the
Utilities menu. Choose Retention Tape to
make sure the tape drive is functioning properly.
5. At the Utilities menu choose Catalog Tape. Take the defaults. At the question “Do you
wish to catalog any backup sets not yet cataloged on tape . .”, choose
Yes. This will update the Backup Exec software
with the backup set information and allow you to perform a data restore.
6. At the File Server , go to the Backup Exec - NetWare Client screen, Choose the pull down menu Commands - Restore. Make your
selections by Device (bindery, all files, all volumes) and press F2 to accept
selections. Choose Submit to start the
data restore.
7. Once finished, down and restart the file server and login as
supervisor. Check to see the data has
been restored. Check the trustee
directory assignments in SYSCON to verify the bindery information is replaced.