Schedule backup types for SQL Server Intelligent Policies
The attribute specifies the type of backup that the schedule controls.
Refer to the following guidelines when you configure schedules:
If you require a 24-hour schedule for transaction log backups, create a separate policy for the transaction log backup schedule.
The backup operation is skipped for a specific database if the database recovery model is not supported for the selected backup type. See Schedules and unsupported recovery models.
If a differential backup runs and a full backup does not already exist for the database or filegroup, NetBackup can convert the backup to a full backup. Similarly, NetBackup can convert transaction log backups if a full backup does not already exist for the database. Enable this behavior with the options or .
For snapshot backup policies, you must create a schedule for NetBackup to successfully convert differential backups to full backups.
If you have read-only filegroups, follow the instructions for backing up read-only and read-write filegroups separately.
See Reducing backup size and time by using read-only filegroups.
Table: Schedule backup types for SQL Server Intelligent Policies shows the backup types you can specify.
Table: Schedule backup types for SQL Server Intelligent Policies
Backup type | Description |
|---|---|
Full Backup | A complete backup of the database that contains all of the data files and the log file. (Note that a full backup does not truncate the transaction log.) |
Differential Incremental Backup | A backup of the changed blocks since the last full backup. If you configure a differential incremental backup, you must also configure a full backup. |
Transaction Log backup | A backup of the active and the inactive portion of the transaction log. By default, the inactive portion is truncated after a successful backup. A transaction log backup can only be performed against a database that is configured to run in the full recovery model. You can choose to turn off truncation in the Microsoft SQL Server tab. See Configuring high-frequency transaction log backups. If you want to configure transaction log backups to run at a high-frequency, review the recommendations. See Configuring the number of jobs allowed for backup operations. |
Consider the following when you configure transaction log backups:
Create a dedicated storage unit for transaction log backup images.
Create a separate policy for transaction log backups and for full (and differential) backups.
Configure the number of jobs that are allowed for backup operations. See Configuring the number of jobs allowed for backup operations.
NetBackup skips database backups in certain situations. The first case is if the database recovery model for a database does not support the selected backup type. For example, the simple recovery model does not allow transaction log backups. The second case is for the master database, which is skipped for any backups other than full database backups. To back up the master database, you must have a full backup schedule and select in the backup selections. Specifically, the master database is skipped for the following types of backups: differential, filegroup, filegroup differential, file, and transaction log.
In these cases, NetBackup skips the backup of the database, but continues with the backup of the other databases that are protected by the policy. The backup completes with a status 0 and the job details indicate that the database was skipped.
Table: Examples of backup schedules shows an example of the schedules you can create for a single SQL Server Intelligent Policy.
Table: Examples of backup schedules
Schedule | Frequency | Backup window |
|---|---|---|
Weekly | Sunday 12 hours | |
Daily | Monday - Saturday 2 hours in the evening | |
Per your RTO and RPO | Sunday - Saturday 24 hours Note: When the full or the differential schedule for the policy runs, the transaction log backup does not run until that schedule completes. |