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Veeam Backup & Replication 9.5 [Archived]
Veeam Backup Explorers User Guide

Considerations and Limitations

When planning for the recovery of Microsoft SharePoint application items, pay attention to the following considerations and limitations:

Status Recovery Limitations

Consider the following when planning for the recovery of the documents/list items:

Restoring Documents, Libraries and Lists

Restoring List Items

Consider that when restoring a list item, Veeam Explorer works in the following way:

  1. Deletes an existing item
  2. Creates item's latest version anew using data from the backup.
  3. Checks whether it is declared as a record.
  4. If the check is a success, the process finishes.
  5. If not, the created version is deleted, and item versions are restored sequentially.

This logic leads to several peculiarities of list item restore, as described below.

If a list or list item(s) column is used as a lookup column in the dependent list, consider that restoring an item from the source list causes corresponding item(s) deletion in the dependent list.

If a lookup column in the dependent list has the enforced relationship behavior set to Cascade Delete, then restoring an item from the source list may cause item deletion in the dependent list - due to Microsoft implementation described at https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Create-list-relationships-by-using-unique-and-lookup-columns-80a3e0a6-8016-41fb-ad09-8bf16d490632

To prevent this issue, it is recommended to turn off enforced relationship behavior. As a work-around, you can roll-back the SharePoint database using Veeam Explorer for Microsoft SQL Server (as described in the corresponding section of this guide), or roll-back the whole SharePoint server VM to the desired state using any Veeam Backup & Replication recovery option.

Also, the following limitations should be considered:

  • If a lookup column in the dependent list has the enforced relationship behavior set to Restrict Delete, then item restore with Veeam Explorer will fail.
  • If an .ASPX page references an item using ItemID, this reference may fail to restore (as the item will be created anew with a different ItemID).
  • If a list item cannot be deleted (for example, site's "Welcome" page), consider that restore process will recover all versions of the item sequentially without deletions, adding them to Version History.
  • Restored Issue list items are assigned new Issue ID.
  • Restore of Time Card list is not supported.

Restoring List Items with Links (Attachments)

Consider the following when planning for the recovery of list items with links (attachments):

Restoring Surveys

Consider the following limitations when planning for the recovery of surveys, survey questions and responses:

Restoring Sites

  1. If you plan to restore SharePoint site pages, consider that Veeam Explorer does not support recovery of items which are not stored in the SharePoint content database (in particular, pages, page references and items based on default templates). Such items cannot be restored (neither by Restore nor by Save menu option), except for data from Wiki Content (text and images) which is stored in the database.  Thus, site pages containing only text and/or images can be restored and displayed properly; other data (Web Parts, App Parts, etc.) cannot be restored and will not appear in the site pages after recovery.

Considerations and Limitations Note:

Consider the following:

  • In case you attempt to restore such items, the following error message will be logged: ”Item <item> is skipped: restoration of items based on SharePoint default template is not supported.”
  • In case you attempt to save such items, the following error message will be logged: “Unable to save document <item>. Document content is not available.”

  1. Web features restore is not supported for SharePoint 2010 sites.
  2. Restore of site navigation is not supported in the current version.

Export and Import

Data Type Limitations

Consider the column (field) data type when planning for the recovery of your SharePoint libraries/lists:

Workflow-related Considerations

You may need to restore the item(s) originally belonging to a list with no content approval required, to another list. If you try to restore such item(s) to a list that requires content approval, item version and status will be modified in the following way:

  1. If a target list is configured to include major versions only – then all versions of restored item will become major (despite the original versioning); item status will be set to Pending.
  2. If a target list is configured to include both major and minor versions – then all versions of restored item will become minor (despite the original versioning); item status will be set as follows:

Also, consider the following when planning for the recovery of list items (with or without content approval originally required):

  1. If the retention policy for target list/document library is configured to Declare record automatically, only the last version of the item will be restored to target list/library. Target retention policy settings will be applied to restored item (Declare record).
    Besides, if Require content approval for submitted items was enabled for the original list, then after recovery item status will be set to Pending.
  2. Alternatively (with different retention policy settings), all versions of the original item will be restored to target list/library.
    Besides, if Require content approval for submitted items was enabled for the original list, then after recovery item status in the content approval workflow will be also restored, except for the states listed (see "Status Recovery Limitations" above).

Considerations and Limitations Note:

Veeam Explorer for Microsoft SharePoint does not support restore via PSDirect, VIX, or Sphere API.

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