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  1. Home
  3. NetBackup™ for Oracle Administrator's Guide
  5. Configuring Oracle policies
  7. About Oracle Intelligent Policies (OIP)
  9. Oracle tab
NetBackup™ for Oracle Administrator's Guide

Oracle tab

This tab includes the additional options that are available for Oracle backups.

Table: Oracle tab fields

Field

Description

Tablespace or datafile options

Number of parallel streams is the number of parallel backup streams that can be used in a backup operation.

When an Oracle RAC is included in the policy, setting the Number of parallel streams option sets the streams per node. For example, if the Oracle RAC has two nodes that are active and the Number of parallel streams is set to 2, NetBackup uses four streams. NetBackup uses two parallel streams per active node.

Select Specify read-only tablespace options to enable read-only tablespace options. SKIP means to skip the read-only tablespace during backup. FORCE means that RMAN backs up all files.

Select Offline (cold) database backup to shut down the Oracle database and put it in the mount state.

  • When this option is used with a PDB, the PDB is put in a mounted state for the backup. Once the backup has completed, the PDB is returned to the state it was in before the backup.

Select Skip offline datafiles to direct the backup operation to not access offline data files.

Tablespace or datafile options (continued)

The Data Guard backup options let you specify a policy to always back up the primary or a standby database:

  • None - NetBackup does not look at the Data Guard role. At the policy run time each database or RAC database in the policy is backed up.

  • Require primary - This option backs up the primary Data Guard database in the list of databases (or RAC databases) in the policy.

    If the primary is not available, the backup fails. A message appears in the job details that indicates NetBackup cannot find the primary database.

  • Require standby - This option backs up a standby Data Guard database in the list of databases (or RAC databases) in the policy. The first standby database NetBackup finds, is backed up. Currently there is no way to set a priority order for the standby databases.

    Oracle Intelligent Policies do not support RMAN proxy type backups of Data Guard standby databases.

    If the standby is not available, the backup fails. A message appears in the job details that indicates NetBackup cannot find the standby database.

  • Prefer standby - This option backs up a standby Data Guard database in the list of databases (or RAC databases) in the policy. If a standby database is not found and the primary is available, then the primary database is backed up.

    Oracle Intelligent Policies do not support RMAN proxy type backups of Data Guard standby databases.

Note:

If you choose Require primary, Require standby, or Prefer standby, then the following applies:

Only one database is backed up at policy run time.

All databases or RAC databases that are listed in a policy must be part of the same Data Guard configuration. Each Data Guard configuration needs a separate policy.

The policy cannot have the backup type Database Backup Shares or Whole Database - Datafile Copy Share selected. These selections are incompatible with Data Guard aware policies.

MSDP storage

The option Use multiple MSDP nodes allows backups of Oracle data files in parallel, which accelerates the backup and restore jobs. You can use multiple MSDP storage units, a storage unit of an MSDP cluster, or a storage unit of an MVG (MSDP volume group) volume.

The dropdown list contains the available storage items, including MSDP storage units and SLPs that are configured in the system. Select the storage to which you want to distribute the data:

  • MSDP storage units or SLPs. Select each storage unit that you want to use.

    If replication is needed, all SLP targets must be in the same target domain. (These targets include the policy storage SLP and the selected storage SLPs.) This configuration ensures that the Oracle data files, archived redo log, and control file are in the same domain after replication.

  • A storage unit of an MSDP cluster.

    Note:

    Select only this one storage unit. Do not select any other storage units with this selection.

    This option distributes Oracle data files to multiple nodes in the cluster. The recommended value for Number of parallel streams is a multiple of the number of cluster nodes. If there are 4 nodes in the cluster, the value is 4n. For example: 4, 8, or 12.

  • A storage unit of an MVG (MSDP volume group) volume.

    Note:

    Select only this one storage unit. Do not select any other storage units with this selection.

    This option distributes Oracle data files to the MSDP disk volumes in the MVG volume. The recommended value for Number of parallel streams is a multiple of the number of MSDP disk volumes. If there are 4 MSDP disk volumes in the MVG volume, the value is 4n. For example: 4, 8, or 12.

By default, FILESPERSET is set to 1 for the best deduplication ratio. You can modify this value manually to tune the restore performance for the Oracle RAC environment.

On each Oracle RAC node, in the /usr/openv/netbackup/bp.conf, add a configuration parameter ORACLE_MULTIPLE_STORAGE_OVERRIDE_FILESPERSET. For example, ORACLE_MULTIPLE_STORAGE_OVERRIDE_FILESPERSET = 8.

Specify maximum limits

Select Specify maximum limits to access several I/O and backup set limits. The following parameters should only have to be modified on rare occasions. If these values are not changed, the backup uses the default values that are defined in RMAN. RMAN default values usually provide the best performance.

Maximum I/O Limits parameters:

  • Read rate (KB/sec) (RATE) specifies the maximum number of kilobytes (KB) that RMAN reads each second on this channel. This parameter sets an upper limit for bytes read so that RMAN does not consume too much disk bandwidth and degrade performance.

  • Size of backup piece (KB) (MAXPIECESIZE) specifies the maximum size of each backup piece that is created on this channel.

  • Number of open files (MAXOPENFILES) controls the maximum number of input files that the backup operation can have open at any given time.

  • Section size (SECTION SIZE) enables RMAN's multisection backup during an RMAN backup. When a multisection backup does run, an RMAN channel can process each file section independently (serially or in parallel). The multisection backup uses multiple channels to back up a single file. This option lets you set the Section size to either MB or GB.

    Size of backup piece (KB) and Section size are mutually exclusive. NetBackup automatically sets the Size of backup piece (KB) to 0 if this option is enabled.

Maximum backup set limits parameters:

  • Number of files per backup set (FILESPERSET) specifies the maximum number of input files to include in each output backup set.

  • Size of the backup set (KB) (MAXSETSIZE) specifies a maximum size for a backup set in kilobytes.

Backup identifier options

Backup set identifier: (TAG) specifies a user-specified tag name for a backup set, proxy copy, data file copy, or control file copy. The tag is applied to the output files that the backup generates.

Datafile copy tag: This option specifies a user-specified tag name when the Whole Database - Datafile Copy Share option is used. The tag is associated with the data files that are located on the appliance and is used during the incremental merge process.

Archived redo log options

Select Include archived redo logs in full and incremental schedules to include the archived redo logs on the full and the incremental schedule backups.

Select Delete after making copies to delete the archived redo logs after the selected number of backups are successful. Clear the box or set to 0 to skip the delete operation and retain the logs after backup.

Select Delete archived redo logs after (Hours) so that only the redo logs that are older than the selected value are deleted after a backup.

Number of parallel streams controls the degree of parallelism within a backup. This number specifies the maximum number of connections between RMAN and a database. Each connection initiates an Oracle database server session on the target database. This server session performs the work of backing up backup sets.

When an Oracle RAC is included in the policy, setting the Number of parallel streams option sets the streams per node. For example, if the Oracle RAC has two nodes that are active and the Number of parallel streams is set to 2, NetBackup uses four streams. NetBackup uses two parallel streams per active node.

Specify Specify maximum limits to set custom limits for the archive redo logs.

  • Number of files per backup set specifies the maximum number of archived redo log files to include in each output backup set.

  • Size of backup set (KB) (MAXSETSIZE) specifies a maximum size for a backup set of archived redo logs on kilobytes.

User specified backup file name formats

Select Specify backup file name formats to set up formats for various backup file names for data files, archived redo logs, the control file, and Fast Recovery Area (FRA).

Ensure that the format that is specified for all RMAN backup piece names (except for auto-backups of the control file) uses the _%u and ends with _%t. NetBackup uses this timestamp as part of its search criteria for catalog images. Without this timestamp, performance might degrade as the NetBackup catalog grows. These recommendations help to ensure proper backup, restore, and crosscheck functionality.

Database backup share options

These options let you set a time when backup sets and backup copies (data and control file copies) are automatically deleted from the appliance share. However, the files are only deleted if they have been successfully backed up from the share. The two options are Delete protected backup sets from share after and Delete protected backup copies from share after. The deletion is based on the age of the file in the share. The original dump time or the update time (if an incremental merge is done on the file) determines the age of the file.

These options are only available when the Database backup shares option is selected in the Backup selections tab.

Use the dropdowns to set the minutes, hours, days, or weeks.

Note:

The delete options in the Database backup share opions can only be configured when the media server is a NetBackup appliance. This option does not work with any other type of media server. This feature requires a NetBackup appliance with software version 2.7.1 or later.

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