About NetBackup for Oracle restores
Make sure that a backup has completed successfully before you attempt a restore. An error occurs if a backup history does not exist.
NetBackup for Oracle includes a recovery wizard that solicits information from the user about the desired RMAN restore and recovery operations. The wizard uses the information to create a template.
The recovery wizard saves a recovery template locally in a user-specified location on the NetBackup client. Recovery templates are not stored on the master server because recovery is always user directed, not scheduled. Typically, you run the recovery template immediately and then delete it.
The recovery process sometimes requires passwords for Oracle database access and system user accounts. Templates store the encrypted passwords that are decrypted at run-time.
Because recovery can be a complex process, it might be necessary to perform manual steps as part of the operation. For more information, see your Oracle documentation.
The restore browser is used to display database objects. A hierarchical display is provided where objects can be selected for recovery. The top database node expands to show all of the installed databases.
On Windows, Oracle services are searched for in the Registry to get the names and location of each database.
On UNIX, the oratab file is read to get the names and location of each database.
The objects (tablespaces, data files, PDBs, and users) that make up an Oracle database are displayed by expanding an individual database node. This information is gathered from various database tables and views. Since you must be connected to the database before you can access its tables or views, logon criteria must be provided. When a user selects or expands a database node the wizard first tries to logon to the database using OS authentication. If the authentication fails the user is solicited for a user name and password. Optionally, the user is prompted for the Net Service Name if the connection is through SQL-Net, which is then used to log on to the database. This user must have SYSDBA or SYSBACKUP privileges since the logon credentials are also used to perform the RMAN restore. The logon fails if the database is not in a mount state or an open state.
On Windows, NetBackup uses an API to browse the database. Logging is recorded in the nbwin folder.
On UNIX, the GUI uses the bpubsora utility to access and query the database. If a problem occurs when NetBackup attempts to connect or browse a database, run this utility from the command line to debug the issue.
The recovery wizard has several limitations:
The database is displayed only in its current state. If objects have been deleted from the database since the last backup, these objects do not appear among the objects you can select for restore. To restore the objects that have been deleted, you need to restore the entire database to a point in time before the objects were deleted.
Data is restored to the original location. The wizard does not provide a way for the user to specify alternate file names.
The wizard does not restore control files.