Click here to read Part 1 Click here to read Part 2 Incremental Method This method has a few names and is fairly simple to implement. It involves determining how long you wish to maintain a copy of your data and how many tapes you wish to use. It is based on labeling each backup with a number and then …
If you have a SQL Server you must have a backup and restore plan. If you don’t you’re in for a rude awakening for sure. Backups are absolutely essential for your SQL Server protection from a dropped table to a ransomware attack. But building a backup strategy and restore plan can be daunting task if you’re new at it or …
Build a backup strategy and restore plan from scratch Read more »
Backup Retention Part 2 Backup Retention Part 3 With backup retention times there is always a balance between keeping enough backups and purging those backups quickly to free up space. Some clients I have worked with only keep 2 to 3 days of backups, and others keep multiple years of backups. I generally like to push for something longer term …
I often times get the question similar to “Why is my log file not shrinking when I do regular backups”? It goes to show there the functionality of the SQL Server transaction log is not entirely clear. The way that backups and the log file work is that the log file is made up of internal virtual log files (VLFs). …
Why is my log file not shrinking when I do regular backups? Read more »
In the consulting world we come across many different backup and restore options for SQL Server with the different clients that we work with. Personally I am a big fan of the SQL Server backups using a combination of Full, Differential, and Log backups so that we can do a solid point in time restore when needed. I also like …
When you do a database restore, including log backups, it is very important to get the log chain in the right order, or it won’t work. To restore a full backup, then log backups, the chain of logs could be hard to sort out if you have dozens or hundreds of log backups to restore. Your sure don’t want to …