PowerProtect Data Manager 19.12 Microsoft Exchange Server User Guide

Add a protection policy for Microsoft Exchange Server database protection

Use the PowerProtect Data Manager UI to add a protection policy for Microsoft Exchange Server database protection.

1. From the left navigation pane, select Protection > Protection Policies.
   The Protection Policies window appears.
2. In the Protection Policies window, click Add.
   The Add Policy wizard appears.
3. On the Type page, specify the following fields, and then click Next:
   • Name—Type a descriptive name for the protection policy.
   • Description—Type a description for the policy.
   • Type—Select Microsoft Exchange.
4. On the Purpose page, select one of the following options to indicate the purpose of the new protection policy group, and then click Next:
   • Centralized Protection—The backup is triggered according to the schedule. PowerProtect Data Manager manages the complete protection life cycle.
   • Self-Service Protection—The backup is triggered manually from the Microsoft Exchange Server. PowerProtect Data Manager manages the complete protection life cycle.
   • Exclusion—Select this type if there are assets within the protection policy that you plan to exclude from data protection operations.
5. On the Assets page, select the unprotected assets that you want to add to the backup of this protection policy group. The window enables you to filter by asset name to locate the required assets.
   NOTE A Microsoft Exchange Server database asset can be protected by only one protection policy at a time.
6. Click Next.
   If you selected Exclusion on the Purpose page, the Summary page appears. Skip to the final two steps.
   If you selected Centralized Protection or Self-Service Protection, the Objectives page appears for creating the protection policy backup configuration.
7. On the Objectives page, complete the steps for the specified type of protection policy group:

   • For Centralized Protection:

     1. Click Add under Primary Backup.

        The Add Primary Backup dialog appears.

     2. On the Target pane of the Add Primary Backup dialog, specify the following fields:

        • Storage Name—Select a backup destination from the list of existing DD systems, or select Add to add a system and complete the details in the Storage Target dialog.

        • Storage Unit—Select whether this protection policy should use a New storage unit on the selected DD system, or select an existing storage unit from the list. Hover over a storage unit to view the full name and statistics for available capacity and total capacity, for example, testvmpolicy-ppdm-daily-123ab (300 GB/1 TB).

          When you select New, a new storage unit in the format policy name hostname unique identifier is created in the storage system upon policy completion, for example, testvmpolicy-ppdm-daily-123cd.

          NOTE The Space field indicates the total amount of space, and the percentage of available space, on the storage system.
        • Network Interface—Select a network interface from the list, if applicable.

        • Retention Lock—Move the Retention Lock slider to the right to enable retention locking for these backups.

          The retention lock mode setting comes from the configuration of the selected storage unit. When you enable retention locking, the Retention Lock Mode field displays the corresponding storage unit setting.

          Setting a retention lock applies to the current backup copy only, and does not impact the retention lock setting for existing backup copies.

          NOTE Primary backups are assigned a default retention lock period of 14 days. Replicated backups, however, are not assigned a default retention lock period. If you enable Retention Lock for a replicated backup, ensure that you set the Retain for field in the Add Replication dialog to a minimum number of 14 days so that the replicated backup does not expire before the primary backup.

     3. On the Schedules pane of the Add Primary Backup dialog:

        1. Specify the following fields to schedule a synthetic full backup of this protection policy:

           • Create a Synthetic Full backup every—Specify how often to create a synthetic full backup. A synthetic full backs up only the data that has changed since the last backup, to create a new, full backup.

           • Retain for—Specify the retention period for the synthetic full backup.

             NOTE For database backups, PowerProtect Data Manager chains the dependent backups together. For example, the synthetic full backups are chained to their base full backup. The backups do not expire until the last backup in the chain expires. This ensures that all synthetic full backups are recoverable until they have all expired.

           • Start and End—The activity window. Specify a time of day to start the synthetic full backup, and a time of day after which backups cannot be started.

             NOTE Any backups started before the End time occurs continue until completion.

        2. Click Add backup if you want to periodically force a full (level 0) backup, and then specify the following fields to schedule the full backup of this protection policy:

           NOTE When you select this option, the backup chain is reset.
           • Create a Full backup every—Specify whether you want to create an hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly full backup.
           • Repeat on—Depending on the frequency of the full backup schedule, specify the hour of the day, day of the week, or the date of the month that the full backup will occur.
           • Retain for—Specify the retention period for this full backup.

           • Start and End—The activity window. Specify a time of day to start the full backup, and a time of day after which backups cannot be started.

             NOTE Any backups started before the End time occurs continue until completion.

        3. Click Add Backup and repeat the procedure for creating full backups if you want to create additional backup copies at different intervals with different retention periods.

           Within this protection policy, when a full schedule conflicts with another full backup schedule, a message appears, indicating that there is a conflict. Schedule occurrences can conflict with each other when the activity windows are identical or occur entirely within the same time range. To avoid full schedule conflicts in a policy, edit the activity windows. If you proceed with conflicting schedules, the backup of the lower priority schedule will be skipped. Schedule priority is ranked according to the following criteria:

           • Full schedules have a higher priority than Synthetic Full schedules.
           • For schedules of the same backup type, the schedules that run less frequently have a higher priority than schedules that run more frequently.
           • For schedules with the same backup type and frequency, the schedule with the longest activity window has the higher priority. If the activity windows are also identical, only one of these schedules will run.
           NOTE When a schedule conflict between full backups occurs, PowerProtect Data Manager retains the full backup with the longest retention period.

     4. Click Save to save the changes and return to the Objectives page.

        The Objectives page updates to display the name and location of the target storage system under Primary Backup.

        After completing the objective, you can change any details by clicking Edit next to the objective.

        NOTE

        When a new asset is added to a protection policy during a scheduled backup window, the backup starts right away. However, if an asset is added to a protection policy outside of the scheduled backup window, the backup does not start until the next time that backups are configured to run.

        If a new asset is added to a protection policy that has a weekly or monthly backup schedule and the current time is within the scheduled Start and End times, the backup runs right away, regardless of the date. If the current time is not within the scheduled Start and End times, the backup does not start until the next time that backups are configured to run.

   • For Self-Service Protection:

     1. Click Add under Primary Retention.

        The Add Primary Retention dialog appears.

     2. On the Target pane of the Add Primary Retention dialog, specify the following fields:

        • Storage Name—Select a backup destination from the list of existing DD systems, or select Add to add a system and complete the details in the Storage Target dialog.

        • Storage Unit—Select whether this protection policy should use a New storage unit on the selected DD system, or select an existing storage unit from the list. Hover over a storage unit to view the full name and statistics for available capacity and total capacity, for example, testvmpolicy-ppdm-daily-123ab (300 GB/1 TB).

          When you select New, a new storage unit in the format policy name hostname unique identifier is created in the storage system upon policy completion, for example, testvmpolicy-ppdm-daily-123cd.

          NOTE The Space field indicates the total amount of space, and the percentage of available space, on the storage system.
        • Network Interface—Select a network interface from the list, if applicable.

        • Retention Lock—Move the Retention Lock slider to the right to enable retention locking for these backups.

          The retention lock mode setting comes from the configuration of the selected storage unit. When you enable retention locking, the Retention Lock Mode field displays the corresponding storage unit setting.

          Setting a retention lock applies to the current backup copy only, and does not impact the retention lock setting for existing backup copies.

          NOTE Primary backups are assigned a default retention lock period of 14 days. Replicated backups, however, are not assigned a default retention lock period. If you enable Retention Lock for a replicated backup, ensure that you set the Retain for field in the Add Replication dialog to a minimum number of 14 days so that the replicated backup does not expire before the primary backup.

     3. On the Retention (Self Service) pane of the Add Primary Retention dialog, change any required retention times.

        By default, all backup types have the same retention time. To change the retention times for specific backup types, clear Set the same retention time for all backup types and change the Retain <backup_type> For field values as required.

        When a different retention time for all backup types is set, you can create additional full backup patterns with different retention times. For example, you can add a full backup pattern Retain full backups created every week on the Monday and Tuesday for 2 months.

     4. Click Save to save the changes and return to the Objectives page.

        The Objectives page updates to display the name and location of the target storage system under Primary Retention.

        After completing the objective, you can change any details by clicking Edit next to the objective.

8. Optionally, replicate the backups:
   NOTE

   To enable replication, ensure that you add remote protection storage as the replication location. The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides detailed instructions about adding remote protection storage.

   When creating multiple replicas for the same protection policy, it is recommended to select a different storage system for each copy. If you select a storage unit that is the target of another objective for the same policy, the UI issues a warning. The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides information about replicating to shared protection storage to support PowerProtect Cyber Recovery. Verify the storage targets and the use case before you continue.

   When you create a replication objective, you can specify either scheduled replication or replication after backup completion.

   NOTE For replication after backup completion, PowerProtect Data Manager 19.12 or later and application agents 19.10 or later are required. It is recommended that you update the application agents to the latest version.

   For replicas of centralized backups, when you set retention periods for different backup types, any undefined types use the full backup retention period. For example, if you do not define a log backup in the primary objective, the log backup for the replication objective is also undefined. After you run a manual log backup, replicas of that log backup use the same retention period as the full backup.

   1. Click Replicate next to Primary Backup or Primary Retention. An entry for Replicate is created to the right of the primary backup objective.
   2. Under Replicate, click Add.
      The Add Replication dialog appears, with information in the left pane for each schedule that has been added for the primary backup objective of this protection policy.

      NOTE Backups for all of the listed schedules will be replicated. You cannot select individual schedules for replication.
   3. Select a storage target:
      • Storage Name—Select a destination from the list of protection storage. Or, select Add to add a protection storage system and complete the details in the Storage Target window.
      • Storage Unit—Select an existing storage unit on the protection storage system. Or, select New to automatically create a storage unit.
      • Network Interface—Select a network interface from the list, if applicable.

      • Retention Lock—Move the Retention Lock slider to the right to enable retention locking for these replicas.

        The retention lock mode setting comes from the configuration of the selected storage unit. When you enable retention locking, the Retention Lock Mode field displays the corresponding storage unit setting.

      The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides more information about replication targets.

   4. Select when to replicate the backups:

      Replication triggers provides more information.

      • To replicate after the backup finishes, move the Replicate immediately upon backup completion slider to on.

      • For scheduled replication, move the Replicate immediately upon backup completion slider to off, and then complete the schedule details in the Add Replication dialog.

        For replication of the primary backup, the schedule frequency can be every day, week, month, or x hours.

        For daily, weekly, and monthly schedules, the numeric value cannot be modified. For hourly, however, you can edit the numeric value. For example, if you set Create a Full backup every 4 hours, you can set a value of anywhere from 1 to 12 hours.

      By default, all replicas of the primary backup objective inherit the retention period from the Retain For value of the synthetic full and full backup schedules.

   5. To specify a different retention period for individual synthetic full and full replicas, clear Set the same retention time for all replicated copies, click Edit in the row of each schedule that you want to change, update the value in the Retain For field, and then click Save.
      CAUTION Setting a retention period for the replicas of other backup types (such as log backups, incremental, and differential backups, where applicable) that is shorter than the retention period of the corresponding full backup may result in being unable to recover from those replicas.
   6. Click Save to save your changes and return to the Objectives page.
9. Optionally, to move backups from protection storage to Cloud Tier, add a Cloud objective for the primary or replication objective:
   NOTE To move a backup or replica to Cloud Tier, objectives must have a retention time of 14 days or more. PowerProtect Data Manager also requires the discovery of protection storage with a configured Cloud unit.
   1. Click Cloud Tier next to Primary Backup or Primary Retention. Or, if adding a Cloud objective for a replication objective that you have added, click Cloud Tier under Replicate.
      An entry for Cloud Tier is created to the right of the primary objective, or below the replication objective.
   2. Under the entry for Cloud Tier, click Add.
      The Add Cloud Tier Backup dialog appears, with summary information for the parent objective to indicate whether you are adding this Cloud Tier objective for the primary objective or the replication objective.
   3. Keep the All applicable full backups slider to the right if you want to tier the backups from all of the full primary backup or replication schedules of this policy. Otherwise, move the slider to the left and select the full schedule(s) that you want to tier.
      NOTE If the retention period of a schedule is less than the minimum 14 days required before tiering occurs, or is less than the value in the Tier After field, you can still select this schedule for tiering. However, if you do not edit the retention period of this schedule or its backup or replication copy to a value greater than the Tier After field before the retention period of the copy expires, the backup or replication copy of this schedule will not be cloud tiered.
   4. Complete the objective details in the Add Cloud Tier Backup dialog, and then click Save to save your changes and return to the Objectives page.
      The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides detailed instructions for adding a Cloud objective for a primary or replication objective.
10. Click Next.
    The Options page appears.
11. On the Options page, select the additional options that are required for the policy:

    • Data Consistency Check—Select one of the following options to enable the consistency checking of the Microsoft Exchange Server database and logs:

      • None—No consistency check is performed.
      • All—Both the database and logs are checked for consistency.

      • Database—Only the database is checked for consistency.

        NOTE A consistency check of only the database does not ensure the complete consistency of the backup, but the check takes less time to perform.
      • Logs—Only the logs are checked for consistency.

      The Microsoft Exchange Server consistency check occurs at backup time and verifies that the database and its transaction logs do not contain errors, such as on-disk data corruption. The consistency check improves the Microsoft Exchange Server backup quality and performance, validating that the backup is viable and will not cause issues when restored.

      NOTE Consistency checking can affect the backup performance and increase the backup window.
    • Troubleshooting—Select this option to enable the debug logs for troubleshooting purposes.
12. Click Next.
    The Summary page appears.
13. Review the protection policy group configuration details. You can click Edit next to any completed window's details to change any information. When completed, click Finish.
    An informational message appears to confirm that PowerProtect Data Manager has saved the protection policy. When a new protection policy is created, PowerProtect Data Manager performs the first full backup and subsequent backups according to the specified schedule.
14. Click OK to exit the window, or click Go to Jobs to open the Jobs window to monitor the backup of the new protection policy group.

    You can monitor and view detailed information in the Jobs window for both centralized and self-service backups and restores of database application agents.

    NOTE The Cancel and Retry options are not available for self-service jobs that are created by database application agents.