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:

• Windows Server
• Linux Server
• CIFS (SMB) Share
• Dell Data Domain
• 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.
• Quantum DXi
• NFS File Share
• ExaGrid. If you plan to use an ExaGrid appliance as a backup repository for Veeam Plug-in backups, mind 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.

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

Backup Repositories Limitations

• 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 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 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.

• If you use Veeam Plug-in for SAP HANA version 9.5 Update 4, Veeam Backup & Replication backup copy jobs does not process and copy the backups created by the plug-in.

• Veeam extract utility cannot extract backup files created by Veeam Plug-in.
• For security reasons, it is recommended to use separate repositories for different users and grant access to backup repositories only for required users.

Scale-Out Backup Repositories

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

• For Veeam Plug-in backups and backup copies, the Performance policy of a scale-out repository functions differently:

1. Veeam Backup & Replication checks if there are extents without warning on free space insufficiency. If all extents have the warning, Veeam Backup & Replication uses an extent with the largest amount of free space that has a free task slot.
2. If there are 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.
3. If there are 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 the amount of used tasks is the same, an extent with the largest amount of free space.

• If a scale-out repository is configured in the Data locality policy, repository extents will be selected according to the amount of free space for each SAP HANA Backint connection. If there are two extents with one slot on each extent, the backup will be launched in two streams (one on each extent).

• If you want to add a backup repository as an extent to a scale-out backup repository and Veeam Plug-in backups are present on this backup repository, you must do the following:

1. In the Veeam Backup & Replication console, select Veeam Plug-in backup files that reside in this backup repository and remove them from configuration. For details, see Removing backups from configuration. Note that this action does not delete the backups from the repository.
2. In the Veeam Backup & Replication console, delete the Veeam Plug-in backup job. For details, see Deleting Jobs.
3. Add the repository as an extent to the scale-out repository. For details, see Extending Scale-Out Repositories.
4. Rescan the scale-out repository. For details, see Rescanning Scale-Out Repositories.

5. On the Veeam Plug-in server, set the scale-out repository as the target for backups using the following command:

6. Map the imported backups using the following command:

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.

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

1. If the backup files are created by Veeam Plug-in version 10, upgrade the metadata of backup files as described in Upgrading Metadata Files to New Format.
2. 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.