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Procedure documentation Preparing for a Full-System Cold Restore (ON-Archive)  Locate the document in its SAP Library structure

Use

This section tells you what to do before performing a full-system cold restore of your Informix database if you use ON-Archive as your data recovery tool (that is, for your archives and backups).

Note

To make a restore easier, label your tapes after every archive or backup. Include all essential information required for a restore, such as date of archive or backup, save set id, volume set and volume, dbspace names, logical-log file numbers, and so on. This is important since the SAPDBA recovery report or the archive.log file might be damaged or lost when you want to do a restore, making it very difficult to identify the required tapes.

Procedure

  1. Identify the required tapes for a restore in one of the following ways:

    2. · Use SAPDBA recovery reports (strongly recommended)

    If you have been using SAPDBA to produce recovery reports automatically, the easiest way to see the tapes you need is to refer to the latest available report. If correctly installed, the report is automatically produced after every archive and backup so that you always have the most up-to-date information for a recovery.

    For more information about how you can use the reports to speed up the recovery process, including examples, see Recovery Report with SAPDBA. The recovery report in SAPDBA makes it much easier to identify the required tapes.

    · Use the archive.log file

    This file contains history information regarding archives and backups. A typical entry to set up the dbspace sets for a parallel archive looks like this:

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:00 #00000000# <10480> onarchive (arcadm) Defined SET000072A: DEFINE/DBSPACESET=SET000072A/DBSPACE=(psapsource,psappool,psapload,psapprot,psapclu,rootdbs)

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:02 #00000000# <10482> onarchive (arcadm) Defined SET000072B: DEFINE/DBSPACESET=SET000072B/DBSPACE=(psapstab,psapdocu,psapddic,psapbtab,logdbs,physdbs,psapuser1)

    The result of a parallel archive looks like the following example:

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:05 #00000000# <10484> onarchive (arcadm) Created request #00000001#: ARCHIVE/APART/DBSPACESET=SET000072A/LEVEL=0/VSET=DBTAP

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:09 #00000000# <10493> onarchive (arcadm) Created request #00000003#: ARCHIVE/APART/DBSPACESET=SET000072B/LEVEL=0/VSET=DBTAP2

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:11 #00000001# <10489> onautovop (arcadm) Begin archive to DBTAP

    Apr 06 1995 16:59:14 #00000003# <10498> onautovop (arcadm) Begin archive to DBTAP2

    18:40:03 #00000003# <10498> Processing logdbs to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:04 #00000003# <10498> Processing physdbs to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:04 #00000003# <10498> Processing psapdocu to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:04 #00000003# <10498> Processing psapuser1 to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:05 #00000003# <10498> Processing psapstab to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:05 #00000003# <10498> Processing psapbtab to DBTAP2:0001

    18:40:05 #00000003# <10498> Processing psapddic to DBTAP2:0001

    Apr 06 1995 18:41:07 #00000003# <10498> onautovop (arcadm) End archive: SUCCESS

    18:47:09 #00000001# <10489> Processing rootdbs to DBTAP:0001

    18:47:09 #00000001# <10489> Processing psapsource to DBTAP:0001

    18:47:09 #00000001# <10489> Processing psappool to DBTAP:0001

    18:47:09 #00000001# <10489> Processing psapprot to DBTAP:0001

    18:47:09 #00000001# <10489> Processing psapclu to DBTAP:0001

    18:47:10 #00000001# <10489> Processing psapload to DBTAP:0001

    Apr 06 1995 18:48:13 #00000001# <10489> onautovop (arcadm) End archive: SUCCESS

    This information tells you the names of the volume sets and volumes used and also the allocation of dbspaces to volumes. For example, volume 0001 of volume set DBTAP2 contains dbspaces logdbs , physdbs , psapdocu , and so on. Volume 0001 of volume set DBTAP contains dbspaces rootdbs , psapsource , psappool , and so on

    A sequential archive of all dbspaces looks very similar, except that the archive result appears in one section, with a single timestamp and volume set, and all dbspaces are listed.

    The same principles apply to logical-log backups.

  2. Gather the tapes containing the most recent level-0, level-1, and level-2 archives.

    3. You need to gather the best set of archive tapes possible for the restore. You need at least a full set of tapes for a level-0 archive. Use the level-1 and level-2 archives if available, since they speed up the restore (that is, the restore runs more quickly than if you use the logical-log backup tapes).

  3. Gather the tapes containing the corresponding logical-log backups.

    4. You need the tapes containing logical-log backups corresponding to the archive tapes gathered in the previous step. How you proceed depends on what kind of archive you are using to restore:

    · Normal sequential archive

    Gather the logical-log file backups dating from the latest archive of all dbspaces that you intend to use for the restore. The latest archive can be at any level.

    · Parallel archive

    Gather the logical-log file backups dating from the beginning of the first archive that you intend to use for the restore. These backups are needed to synchronize the different components of the parallel archive.

  4. Identify the tape volume containing the archive of dbspace rootdbs.

    5. To start a cold restore you must first restore the dbspace set containing the most recent level-0 archive of the dbspace rootdbs . In the example shown above it is SET000072A .

  5. Verify your database server configuration.

You need to make sure that the current database server configuration is compatible with, and accommodates, all ONCONFIG parameter values assigned after the most recent archive. Use the copy of this file that was in use at the time of the archive.

All raw devices or files that have been used since the level-0 archive must be available. Changes can include, for example, chunks added, dbspaces dropped, dbspaces mirrored, and so on.

For more information, see the Informix documentation.

Result

Now you can go on to Salvaging Logical Logs for Full-System Cold Restore (ON-Archive).

 

See also:

Informix documentation