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Agent-Specific Migration Overviews
The primary purpose of a migration archiving operation is to move data from primary storage to secondary storage, in order to free up primary storage space and to reduce the amount of data that is backed up. Significant cost savings can be realized by not storing infrequently used data on primary storage, and by minimizing the time it takes to perform backups. Also, archived data can be easily recovered when it is needed, from either the CommCell Console or through the use of a third-party application.
The data that will be archived is determined first by the agent, which is designed to handle one or more types of data. Then, the subclient content configuration determines what specific data of the supported data types will be archived.
Each agent is designed to archive one or more specific data types. For example, to archive Exchange Server data you would use the Exchange Mailbox Archiver Agent and the Exchange Public Folder Archiver Agent. Likewise, to archive files residing on a file system you would use one of the following DataArchiver Agents:
File Archiver for NetWare
File Archiver for Unix
File Archiver for Windows
To find out what data types an agent is designed to archive, read the Product Overview for the agent.
Subclient content will determine what volumes, folders, libraries (document and picture), directories, mailboxes or public folders are scanned for archiving on a given client when rules-based migration archiving operations are performed. Rules-based archiving migrates data on the basis of user-defined factors such as high and low watermarks for volumes or folders, mailbox space quotas, as well as the age and size of data objects. Non-rules-based archiving uses other methods to migrate data including the use of Outlook to Add To or Remove from Archive List selected Exchange Mailbox data for archiving, and use of the On Demand File List for supported File Archiver Agents.
For information on subclients, and assigning content to subclients, see Subclients. Also, for more information on the archiving rules available for a particular agent, refer to the Archiving Rules for:
The File Archiver for Windows Agent also supports On Demand Data Protection Operations, which allows content to be specified via Contents Files in conjunction with a Directive File instead of through a Subclient Properties (Content) tab. For more information, see Defining Content for On Demand Data Protection Operations.
You may want to exclude data that is contained within subclient content from migration archiving operations. This is useful to prevent the system from archiving data that you do not want to be archived, such as application and system files.
For information on methods of excluding data from data protection operations, see Excluding Data from Data Protection Operations - Overview.
Each subclient is associated to a storage policy. How long the archived data will be retained on the media is determined by the retention rules set in the Storage Policy Copy Properties dialog box. This will affect media usage, and is an important consideration when planning data protection operations. A longer retention period, for example, could use more media for securing the data over time. The storage policy allows you to define the number of days that you want to retain the archived data, and it is retained or pruned on this basis.
For detailed information and advanced concepts on Data Aging and retention, see Data Aging.
The system allows you to schedule or initiate migration archiving operations at the subclient or archive set level. Scheduled data protection operations provide a convenient means of archiving data without user intervention. When scheduling data protection operations, you can establish a schedule for each subclient. If you want a subclient to use a schedule policy, then the appropriate schedule policy can be associated with the subclient at the time of subclient creation, or the schedule policy can be associated later. For more information, see Schedule Policy.
For an overview of this feature, see the All Agent Types Data Protection Schedule Policy.
Once you have selected your migration archiving operations type, you can choose to apply Advanced Archive Options to your operation. The advanced archive options provide media management tools at the operation level, as well as tools to optimize your migration archiving operations for specific circumstances.
For a description for each of the Advanced Archiving options and why you would use them, see Advanced Backup/Archive Options.
To find out which Advanced Archive options are available for a given agent, see Advanced Backup/Archive Options - Support.
Given below is a list of supported Agents. The corresponding linked page provides information on the Agent specific Migration options and procedures.
The Calendar Archive Job Summary Report provides the total amount of archive jobs run (along with their job status) for a specified time period.
The Archive Job Summary Report provides a list of archive jobs that displays the coverage or the latest trend for each subclient.
The Stub Recall Summary Report provides a summary of stub recall job history.