diff --git a/docs/tape-backup.rst b/docs/tape-backup.rst index ae597d3d..5d4ce444 100644 --- a/docs/tape-backup.rst +++ b/docs/tape-backup.rst @@ -979,3 +979,77 @@ This command does the following: - run drive cleaning operation - unload the cleaning tape (to slot 3) + +Example Setups +-------------- + +Here are a few example setups for how to manage media pools and schedules. +This is not an exhaustive list, and there are many more possible combinations +of useful settings. + +Simple Setup +~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +The most simple setup, always continue the media-set and never expire. +All backups are stored on a single media set and never deleted. + +Allocation policy: + continue + +Retention policy: + keep + +Such a simple setup has the advantage that it uses not much space, and +since there is only one media-set, it is easy to manage. On the other hand, +it is prone to errors. If a single tape fails, all backups that uses chunks +from that tape will not be restorable. If you want to start a new media-set +manually, you can set the currently writable media of the set either to +'full', or set the location to an offsite vault. In that case, a new +media-set will be created. + +Weekday Scheme +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +A slightly more complex scheme, where the goal is to have a tape for each +weekday, e.g. from Monday to Friday. This can be solved by having a seperate +media pool for each day, so 'Monday', 'Tuesday', etc. + +Allocation policy: + should be 'mon' for the 'Monday' pool, 'tue' for the Tuesday pool and so on. + +Retention policy: + overwrite + +There should be a (or more) tape-backup jobs for each pool on the correspondig +weekday. This scheme is still easily managable with one media set per weekday, +which can even be taken off site easily. + +Staggered Pools +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +Alternatively, more complex setups are possible with multiple media pools and +different allocation and retention policies. + +An example would be to have a media pool with weekly allocation: + +Allocation policy: + mon + +Retention policy: + 3 weeks + +This creates a new media set each week, and expires them after the 4th +media set. + +Then in addition, there could be a yearly pool that only gets allocated +once a year, but will not be expired (e.g. for long-term archival purposes): + +Allocation policy: + yearly + +Retention policy: + keep + +In combination with suited prune settings and tape backup schedules, this +achieves long-term storage of some backups, while keeping the current +backups on smaller media sets that get expired every 4 weeks.