Veeam Backup Repositories

Veeam Plug-ins store backup files in repositories added to the Veeam Backup & Replication infrastructure. In this section, you can find the list of supported backup repositories and limitations for Veeam Plug-in backups.

Supported Backup Repositories

Veeam Plug-in for SAP HANA supports integration with the following types of repositories added to the Veeam Backup & Replication infrastructure:

HPE StoreOnce

If you plan to use HPE StoreOnce as a backup repository for Veeam Plug-in backups, the total number of stored files (data and metadata) must not exceed 3,000,000 per Catalyst store. If necessary, multiple Catalyst stores may be created on the same StoreOnce system.

If you plan to use an ExaGrid appliance as a backup repository for Veeam Plug-in backups, consider the following:

Make sure the repository is configured as described in the ExaGrid section of the Veeam Backup & Replication User Guide.
In the global.ini settings of SAP HANA, you must set the max_recovery_backint_channels parameter value to a number lower than the number of repository task slots. ExaGrid recommends setting it to 1, and adjust gradually if needed.

Hardened Repository

You can also use scale-out backup repositories that contain repositories supported by Veeam Backup & Replication.

Backup Repository Limitations

Before you start working with Veeam Plug-in backups, consider the following:

For Veeam Plug-in backups, the warning which indicates that free space on a storage device has reached a specified threshold is configured in the veeam_config.xml file of Veeam Plug-in. The warning settings in the Veeam Backup & Replication console does not affect this setting.

To configure the warning settings, add the following parameter in the /opt/veeam/VeeamPluginforSAPHANA/veeam_config.xml file.

Due to specific design of SAP HANA backups, Veeam Plug-in does not use fast cloning. Backups transferred to repositories that use ReFS or XFS as a file system are processed the same way as with NTFS repositories.
The Veeam Plug-in configuration wizard will not show repositories where the Encrypt backups stored in this repository option is enabled. To learn how to disable the encryption option, see Access and Encryption Settings on Repositories.

Make sure that Veeam backup repositories have enough free space to store database backups and transaction log backups. If required, you can use a scale-out backup repository.
Veeam extract utility cannot extract backup files created by Veeam Plug-in.

Veeam Scale-Out Backup Repositories

If you want to store Veeam Plug-in backups on scale-out backup repositories, consider the following:

You cannot rename a scale-out backup repository with Veeam Plug-in backups stored on this repository.
For Veeam Plug-in backups and backup copies, the Performance policy of a scale-out repository functions differently:

Veeam Backup & Replication checks if there are extents without warning on free space insufficiency.

If there is no extents without the warning, Veeam Backup & Replication uses an extent with the largest amount of free space that has a free task slot.

For the extents without the warning, Veeam Backup & Replication checks if there are incremental extents with free task slots.

If there are no incremental extents with free task slots, Veeam Backup & Replication uses a full extent with the least amount of used task slots.

For incremental extents with free task slots, Veeam Backup & Replication sends backup files to an incremental extent with the least amount of used task slots.

If several extents has the same least amount of used tasks, Veeam Backup & Replication uses an extent with the largest amount of free space.

To learn more about file placement policies of scale-out repositories, see Backup File Placement section of the Veeam Backup & Replication guide.

For a scale-out repository configured in the Data Locality policy, the repository extents are selected according to the largest amount of free space for each SAP HANA Backint connection. If the selected extent does not have free task slots, Veeam Backup & Replication uses the extent with the next largest amount of free space.

If there are two extents with only one task slot on each extent, the backup is performed using two parallel streams (one stream per extent).

If you want to add a backup repository which contains Veeam Plug-in backups as an extent to a scale-out backup repository, you must do the following:

On the Veeam Backup & Replication console side

Select Veeam Plug-in backup files that reside in this backup repository and remove them from configuration.

To learn more, see the Removing Backups from Configuration section in the Veeam Backup & Replication User Guide.

Delete the Veeam Plug-in backup job.

To learn more, see the Disabling and Deleting Jobs section in the Veeam Backup & Replication User Guide.

Add the repository as an extent to the scale-out repository.

To learn more, see the Extending Scale-Out Repositories section in the Veeam Backup & Replication User Guide.

Rescan the scale-out repository.

To learn more, see the Rescanning Scale-Out Repositories section in the Veeam Backup & Replication User Guide.

Note

Make sure that names of backup files and paths to backup files meet the following requirements:

The names of all backup files (VAB, VASM, VACM) and paths to these files contain only allowed alphanumeric (a-zA-Z0-9) and special (_-.+=@^) characters.
The names of backup job metadata files (VASM) and paths to these files do not contain spaces. If names or paths contain spaces, replace them with underscores.

On the Veeam Plug-in side

Set the scale-out repository as the target for backups using the following command:

SapBackintConfigTool --set-repository

Map the imported backups using the following command:

SapBackintConfigTool --map-backup

Capacity Tier

You can configure Veeam Backup & Replication to transfer Veeam Plug-in backup files to a capacity tier. Both policies (Move policy, Copy policy) are supported for Veeam Plug-in backups with the following limitations:

For Veeam Plug-in backup files, capacity tier does not verify whether data that is being moved is unique and has not been offloaded earlier. Thus, it is highly recommended to check the pricing plans of your cloud storage provider to avoid additional costs for offloading and downloading backup data.
To offload Veeam Plug-in backup files to the capacity tier, Veeam Backup & Replication splits data into 1 MB objects and compresses the resulting objects. The default object size will be a compressed 1 MB block, resulting in objects of around 512 KB in size.

Capacity tier does not track dependencies of full and incremental Veeam Plug-in backup files. Thus, consider the following:

[For the Move policy] When backup files are transferred to the capacity tier, Veeam Backup & Replication takes into account only the creation time of backup files. Make sure that the operational restore window is not longer than the whole backup chain cycle period. Otherwise, you may encounter the scenario when full backup files are transferred to the capacity tier and their increment backup files still remain in the performance tier.
The capacity tier immutability expiration date does not have the additional block generation period. The immutability expiration date is based only on the number of days specified in settings of the object storage backup repository.

If a scale-out repository is down, you cannot restore from the Veeam Plug-in backup files stored on the capacity tier. In this case, you can only import the backup files manually and then perform the data recovery operations.

If you use a capacity tier that has been created in Veeam Backup & Replication version 10, you cannot transfer Veeam Plug-in backup files to a capacity tier. However, if you want to transfer them manually, do the following:

If the backup files are created by Veeam Plug-in version 10, upgrade the metadata of backup files as described in the Upgrading Metadata Files to New Format section.
Run the Set-VBRScaleOutBackupRepository PowerShell command with the -EnablePluginBackupOffload parameter to offload backup files to the capacity tier.

If you want to restore from backups stored on the capacity extent, at least one performance extent must be available or you must switch the catalog_backup_using_backint parameter to the False state in the global.ini file. Otherwise, at the end of the restore process, SAP Backint will not be able to back up the catalog and restore will fail.

Hardened Repository

You can configure Veeam Backup & Replication to transfer Veeam Plug-in backup files to a hardened repository. The hardened repository helps to protect Veeam Plug-in backup files from loss as a result of malware activity or unplanned actions. Backup files in the hardened repository become immutable for the time period specified in the backup repository settings. During this period, backup files stored in the repository cannot be modified or deleted.

For Veeam Plug-in for SAP HANA backups, immutability works according to the following rules:

Immutability is applied to backup (VAB) files and backup metadata (VASM) files. Backup job metadata (VACM) files are not immutable.

Backup files become immutable for the configured time period (minimum 7 days, maximum 9999 days).

The count of the immutability period starts when the backup metadata (VASM files) has been created during the backup job session.
The immutability period is not extended for the active backup chain.
Every 1 hour, the immutability service that runs in the background detects backup files that do not have the immutability flag and sets the immutability flag on the necessary backup files.

Data Restore from Hardened Repository

As a result of malware activity or unplanned actions, backup job metadata (VACM) files may become unavailable in the hardened repository. In this case, to restore data from the hardened repository, you must re-create the VACM file. For more information, see Restore from Hardened Repository.