Projects:
Bacula Projects Roadmap
- 22 July 2005
+ Status updated 19 March 2008
-The following major projects are scheduled for 1.37:
+Items Completed:
+Summary:
+Item 1: Accurate restoration of renamed/deleted files
+Item 2: Allow FD to initiate a backup
+Item 3: Merge multiple backups (Synthetic Backup or Consolidation)
+Item 4: Implement Catalog directive for Pool resource in Director
+Item 5: Add an item to the restore option where you can select a Pool
+Item 6: Deletion of disk Volumes when pruned
+Item 7: Implement Base jobs
+Item 8: Implement Copy pools
+Item 9: Scheduling syntax that permits more flexibility and options
+Item 10: Message mailing based on backup types
+Item 11: Cause daemons to use a specific IP address to source communications
+Item 12: Add Plug-ins to the FileSet Include statements.
+Item 13: Restore only file attributes (permissions, ACL, owner, group...)
+Item 14: Add an override in Schedule for Pools based on backup types
+Item 15: Implement more Python events and functions
+Item 16: Allow inclusion/exclusion of files in a fileset by creation/mod times
+Item 17: Automatic promotion of backup levels based on backup size
+Item 18: Better control over Job execution
+Item 19: Automatic disabling of devices
+Item 20: An option to operate on all pools with update vol parameters
+Item 21: Include timestamp of job launch in "stat clients" output
+Item 22: Implement Storage daemon compression
+Item 23: Improve Bacula's tape and drive usage and cleaning management
+Item 24: Multiple threads in file daemon for the same job
+Item 25: Archival (removal) of User Files to Tape
-Below, you will find more information on those projects as
-well of other projects planned at a future time.
-Item 1: Implement Base jobs.
- Status: Voted by users not to be implemented in 1.37
+Item 1: Accurate restoration of renamed/deleted files
+ Date: 28 November 2005
+ Origin: Martin Simmons (martin at lispworks dot com)
+ Status:
+
+ What: When restoring a fileset for a specified date (including "most
+ recent"), Bacula should give you exactly the files and directories
+ that existed at the time of the last backup prior to that date.
+
+ Currently this only works if the last backup was a Full backup.
+ When the last backup was Incremental/Differential, files and
+ directories that have been renamed or deleted since the last Full
+ backup are not currently restored correctly. Ditto for files with
+ extra/fewer hard links than at the time of the last Full backup.
+
+ Why: Incremental/Differential would be much more useful if this worked.
+
+ Notes: Merging of multiple backups into a single one seems to
+ rely on this working, otherwise the merged backups will not be
+ truly equivalent to a Full backup.
+
+ Note: Kern: notes shortened. This can be done without the need for
+ inodes. It is essentially the same as the current Verify job,
+ but one additional database record must be written, which does
+ not need any database change.
+
+ Notes: Kern: see if we can correct restoration of directories if
+ replace=ifnewer is set. Currently, if the directory does not
+ exist, a "dummy" directory is created, then when all the files
+ are updated, the dummy directory is newer so the real values
+ are not updated.
+
+Item 2: Allow FD to initiate a backup
+ Origin: Frank Volf (frank at deze dot org)
+ Date: 17 November 2005
+ Status:
+
+ What: Provide some means, possibly by a restricted console that
+ allows a FD to initiate a backup, and that uses the connection
+ established by the FD to the Director for the backup so that
+ a Director that is firewalled can do the backup.
+
+ Why: Makes backup of laptops much easier.
+
+
+Item 3: Merge multiple backups (Synthetic Backup or Consolidation)
+ Origin: Marc Cousin and Eric Bollengier
+ Date: 15 November 2005
+ Status:
+
+ What: A merged backup is a backup made without connecting to the Client.
+ It would be a Merge of existing backups into a single backup.
+ In effect, it is like a restore but to the backup medium.
+
+ For instance, say that last Sunday we made a full backup. Then
+ all week long, we created incremental backups, in order to do
+ them fast. Now comes Sunday again, and we need another full.
+ The merged backup makes it possible to do instead an incremental
+ backup (during the night for instance), and then create a merged
+ backup during the day, by using the full and incrementals from
+ the week. The merged backup will be exactly like a full made
+ Sunday night on the tape, but the production interruption on the
+ Client will be minimal, as the Client will only have to send
+ incrementals.
+
+ In fact, if it's done correctly, you could merge all the
+ Incrementals into single Incremental, or all the Incrementals
+ and the last Differential into a new Differential, or the Full,
+ last differential and all the Incrementals into a new Full
+ backup. And there is no need to involve the Client.
+
+ Why: The benefit is that :
+ - the Client just does an incremental ;
+ - the merged backup on tape is just as a single full backup,
+ and can be restored very fast.
+
+ This is also a way of reducing the backup data since the old
+ data can then be pruned (or not) from the catalog, possibly
+ allowing older volumes to be recycled
+
+Item 4: Implement Catalog directive for Pool resource in Director
+ Origin: Alan Davis adavis@ruckus.com
+ Date: 6 March 2007
+ Status: Submitted
+
+ What: The current behavior is for the director to create all pools
+ found in the configuration file in all catalogs. Add a
+ Catalog directive to the Pool resource to specify which
+ catalog to use for each pool definition.
+
+ Why: This allows different catalogs to have different pool
+ attributes and eliminates the side-effect of adding
+ pools to catalogs that don't need/use them.
+
+ Notes: Kern: I think this is relatively easy to do, and it is really
+ a pre-requisite to a number of the Copy pool, ... projects
+ that are listed here.
+
+Item 5: Add an item to the restore option where you can select a Pool
+ Origin: kshatriyak at gmail dot com
+ Date: 1/1/2006
+ Status:
+
+ What: In the restore option (Select the most recent backup for a
+ client) it would be useful to add an option where you can limit
+ the selection to a certain pool.
+
+ Why: When using cloned jobs, most of the time you have 2 pools - a
+ disk pool and a tape pool. People who have 2 pools would like to
+ select the most recent backup from disk, not from tape (tape
+ would be only needed in emergency). However, the most recent
+ backup (which may just differ a second from the disk backup) may
+ be on tape and would be selected. The problem becomes bigger if
+ you have a full and differential - the most "recent" full backup
+ may be on disk, while the most recent differential may be on tape
+ (though the differential on disk may differ even only a second or
+ so). Bacula will complain that the backups reside on different
+ media then. For now the only solution now when restoring things
+ when you have 2 pools is to manually search for the right
+ job-id's and enter them by hand, which is a bit fault tolerant.
+
+ Notes: Kern: This is a nice idea. It could also be the way to support
+ Jobs that have been Copied (similar to migration, but not yet
+ implemented).
+
+
+
+Item 6: Deletion of disk Volumes when pruned
+ Date: Nov 25, 2005
+ Origin: Ross Boylan <RossBoylan at stanfordalumni dot org> (edited
+ by Kern)
+ Status:
+
+ What: Provide a way for Bacula to automatically remove Volumes
+ from the filesystem, or optionally to truncate them.
+ Obviously, the Volume must be pruned prior removal.
+
+ Why: This would allow users more control over their Volumes and
+ prevent disk based volumes from consuming too much space.
+
+ Notes: The following two directives might do the trick:
+
+ Volume Data Retention = <time period>
+ Remove Volume After = <time period>
+
+ The migration project should also remove a Volume that is
+ migrated. This might also work for tape Volumes.
+
+Item 7: Implement Base jobs
+ Date: 28 October 2005
+ Origin: Kern
+ Status:
What: A base job is sort of like a Full save except that you
will want the FileSet to contain only files that are
pulled in where necessary.
Why: This is something none of the competition does, as far as
- we know (except BackupPC, which is a Perl program that
+ we know (except perhaps BackupPC, which is a Perl program that
saves to disk only). It is big win for the user, it
makes Bacula stand out as offering a unique
optimization that immediately saves time and money.
FD a list of files/attribs, and the FD must search the
list and compare it for each file to be saved.
-Item 2: Add Plug-ins to the FileSet Include statements.
- Status: In progress in 1.37 using Python scripting.
+
+Item 8: Implement Copy pools
+ Date: 27 November 2005
+ Origin: David Boyes (dboyes at sinenomine dot net)
+ Status:
+
+ What: I would like Bacula to have the capability to write copies
+ of backed-up data on multiple physical volumes selected
+ from different pools without transferring the data
+ multiple times, and to accept any of the copy volumes
+ as valid for restore.
+
+ Why: In many cases, businesses are required to keep offsite
+ copies of backup volumes, or just wish for simple
+ protection against a human operator dropping a storage
+ volume and damaging it. The ability to generate multiple
+ volumes in the course of a single backup job allows
+ customers to simple check out one copy and send it
+ offsite, marking it as out of changer or otherwise
+ unavailable. Currently, the library and magazine
+ management capability in Bacula does not make this process
+ simple.
+
+ Restores would use the copy of the data on the first
+ available volume, in order of Copy pool chain definition.
+
+ This is also a major scalability issue -- as the number of
+ clients increases beyond several thousand, and the volume
+ of data increases, transferring the data multiple times to
+ produce additional copies of the backups will become
+ physically impossible due to transfer speed
+ issues. Generating multiple copies at server side will
+ become the only practical option.
+
+ How: I suspect that this will require adding a multiplexing
+ SD that appears to be a SD to a specific FD, but 1-n FDs
+ to the specific back end SDs managing the primary and copy
+ pools. Storage pools will also need to acquire parameters
+ to define the pools to be used for copies.
+
+ Notes: I would commit some of my developers' time if we can agree
+ on the design and behavior.
+
+ Notes: Additional notes from David:
+ I think there's two areas where new configuration would be needed.
+
+ 1) Identify a "SD mux" SD (specify it in the config just like a normal
+ SD. The SD configuration would need something like a "Daemon Type =
+ Normal/Mux" keyword to identify it as a multiplexor. (The director code
+ would need modification to add the ability to do the multiple session
+ setup, but the impact of the change would be new code that was invoked
+ only when a SDmux is needed).
+
+ 2) Additional keywords in the Pool definition to identify the need to
+ create copies. Each pool would acquire a Copypool= attribute (may be
+ repeated to generate more than one copy. 3 is about the practical limit,
+ but no point in hardcoding that).
+
+ Example:
+ Pool {
+ Name = Primary
+ Pool Type = Backup
+ Copypool = Copy1
+ Copypool = OffsiteCopy2
+ }
+
+ where Copy1 and OffsiteCopy2 are valid pools.
+
+ In terms of function (shorthand):
+ Backup job X is defined normally, specifying pool Primary as the pool to
+ use. Job gets scheduled, and Bacula starts scheduling resources.
+ Scheduler looks at pool definition for Primary, sees that there are a
+ non-zero number of copypool keywords. The director then connects to an
+ available SDmux, passes it the pool ids for Primary, Copy1, and
+ OffsiteCopy2 and waits. SDmux then goes out and reserves devices and
+ volumes in the normal SDs that serve Primary, Copy1 and OffsiteCopy2.
+ When all are ready, the SDmux signals ready back to the director, and
+ the FD is given the address of the SDmux as the SD to communicate with.
+ Backup proceeds normally, with the SDmux duplicating blocks to each
+ connected normal SD, and returning ready when all defined copies have
+ been written. At EOJ, FD shuts down connection with SDmux, which closes
+ down the normal SD connections and goes back to an idle state.
+ SDmux does not update database; normal SDs do (noting that file is
+ present on each volume it has been written to).
+
+ On restore, director looks for the volume containing the file in pool
+ Primary first, then Copy1, then OffsiteCopy2. If the volume holding the
+ file in pool Primary is missing or busy (being written in another job,
+ etc), or one of the volumes from the copypool list that have the file in
+ question is already mounted and ready for some reason, use it to do the
+ restore, else mount one of the copypool volumes and proceed.
+
+
+Item 9: Scheduling syntax that permits more flexibility and options
+ Date: 15 December 2006
+ Origin: Gregory Brauer (greg at wildbrain dot com) and
+ Florian Schnabel <florian.schnabel at docufy dot de>
+ Status:
+
+ What: Currently, Bacula only understands how to deal with weeks of the
+ month or weeks of the year in schedules. This makes it impossible
+ to do a true weekly rotation of tapes. There will always be a
+ discontinuity that will require disruptive manual intervention at
+ least monthly or yearly because week boundaries never align with
+ month or year boundaries.
+
+ A solution would be to add a new syntax that defines (at least)
+ a start timestamp, and repetition period.
+
+ An easy option to skip a certain job on a certain date.
+
+
+ Why: Rotated backups done at weekly intervals are useful, and Bacula
+ cannot currently do them without extensive hacking.
+
+ You could then easily skip tape backups on holidays. Especially
+ if you got no autochanger and can only fit one backup on a tape
+ that would be really handy, other jobs could proceed normally
+ and you won't get errors that way.
+
+
+ Notes: Here is an example syntax showing a 3-week rotation where full
+ Backups would be performed every week on Saturday, and an
+ incremental would be performed every week on Tuesday. Each
+ set of tapes could be removed from the loader for the following
+ two cycles before coming back and being reused on the third
+ week. Since the execution times are determined by intervals
+ from a given point in time, there will never be any issues with
+ having to adjust to any sort of arbitrary time boundary. In
+ the example provided, I even define the starting schedule
+ as crossing both a year and a month boundary, but the run times
+ would be based on the "Repeat" value and would therefore happen
+ weekly as desired.
+
+
+ Schedule {
+ Name = "Week 1 Rotation"
+ #Saturday. Would run Dec 30, Jan 20, Feb 10, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Full
+ Start = 2006-12-30 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ #Tuesday. Would run Jan 2, Jan 23, Feb 13, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Incremental
+ Start = 2007-01-02 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ }
+
+ Schedule {
+ Name = "Week 2 Rotation"
+ #Saturday. Would run Jan 6, Jan 27, Feb 17, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Full
+ Start = 2007-01-06 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ #Tuesday. Would run Jan 9, Jan 30, Feb 20, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Incremental
+ Start = 2007-01-09 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ }
+
+ Schedule {
+ Name = "Week 3 Rotation"
+ #Saturday. Would run Jan 13, Feb 3, Feb 24, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Full
+ Start = 2007-01-13 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ #Tuesday. Would run Jan 16, Feb 6, Feb 27, etc.
+ Run {
+ Options {
+ Type = Incremental
+ Start = 2007-01-16 01:00
+ Repeat = 3w
+ }
+ }
+ }
+
+ Notes: Kern: I have merged the previously separate project of skipping
+ jobs (via Schedule syntax) into this.
+
+
+Item 10: Message mailing based on backup types
+ Origin: Evan Kaufman <evan.kaufman@gmail.com>
+ Date: January 6, 2006
+ Status:
+
+ What: In the "Messages" resource definitions, allowing messages
+ to be mailed based on the type (backup, restore, etc.) and level
+ (full, differential, etc) of job that created the originating
+ message(s).
+
+ Why: It would, for example, allow someone's boss to be emailed
+ automatically only when a Full Backup job runs, so he can
+ retrieve the tapes for offsite storage, even if the IT dept.
+ doesn't (or can't) explicitly notify him. At the same time, his
+ mailbox wouldnt be filled by notifications of Verifies, Restores,
+ or Incremental/Differential Backups (which would likely be kept
+ onsite).
+
+ Notes: One way this could be done is through additional message types, for example:
+
+ Messages {
+ # email the boss only on full system backups
+ Mail = boss@mycompany.com = full, !incremental, !differential, !restore,
+ !verify, !admin
+ # email us only when something breaks
+ MailOnError = itdept@mycompany.com = all
+ }
+
+ Notes: Kern: This should be rather trivial to implement.
+
+
+Item 11: Cause daemons to use a specific IP address to source communications
+ Origin: Bill Moran <wmoran@collaborativefusion.com>
+ Date: 18 Dec 2006
+ Status:
+ What: Cause Bacula daemons (dir, fd, sd) to always use the ip address
+ specified in the [DIR|DF|SD]Addr directive as the source IP
+ for initiating communication.
+ Why: On complex networks, as well as extremely secure networks, it's
+ not unusual to have multiple possible routes through the network.
+ Often, each of these routes is secured by different policies
+ (effectively, firewalls allow or deny different traffic depending
+ on the source address)
+ Unfortunately, it can sometimes be difficult or impossible to
+ represent this in a system routing table, as the result is
+ excessive subnetting that quickly exhausts available IP space.
+ The best available workaround is to provide multiple IPs to
+ a single machine that are all on the same subnet. In order
+ for this to work properly, applications must support the ability
+ to bind outgoing connections to a specified address, otherwise
+ the operating system will always choose the first IP that
+ matches the required route.
+ Notes: Many other programs support this. For example, the following
+ can be configured in BIND:
+ query-source address 10.0.0.1;
+ transfer-source 10.0.0.2;
+ Which means queries from this server will always come from
+ 10.0.0.1 and zone transfers will always originate from
+ 10.0.0.2.
+
+
+Item 12: Add Plug-ins to the FileSet Include statements.
+ Date: 28 October 2005
+ Origin: Kern
+ Status: Partially coded in 1.37 -- much more to do.
What: Allow users to specify wild-card and/or regular
expressions to be matched in both the Include and
plug-in knows how to backup his Oracle database without
stopping/starting it, for example.
-Item 3: Implement a Migration job type that will move the job
- data from one device to another.
- Status: Partially coded in 1.37 -- much more to do.
- What: The ability to copy, move, or archive data that is on a
- device to another device is very important.
-
- Why: An ISP might want to backup to disk, but after 30 days
- migrate the data to tape backup and delete it from
- disk. Bacula should be able to handle this
- automatically. It needs to know what was put where,
- and when, and what to migrate -- it is a bit like
- retention periods. Doing so would allow space to be
- freed up for current backups while maintaining older
- data on tape drives.
-
- Notes: Migration could be triggered by:
- Number of Jobs
- Number of Volumes
- Age of Jobs
- Highwater size (keep total size)
- Lowwater mark
-
-Item 9: Implement data encryption (as opposed to communications
- encryption)
- Status: Landon Fuller has agreed to work on this.
-
- What: Currently the data that is stored on the Volume is not
- encrypted. For confidentiality, encryption of data at
- the File daemon level is essential.
- Data encryption encrypts the data in the File daemon and
- decrypts the data in the File daemon during a restore.
-
- Why: Large sites require this.
-
-
-Items completed for release 1.38.0:
-#4 Embedded Python Scripting (implemented in all Daemons)
-#5 Events that call a Python program (Implemented in all
- daemons, but more cleanup work to be done).
-#6 Select one from among Multiple Storage Devices for Job.
- This is already implemented in 1.37.
-#7 Single Job Writing to Multiple Storage Devices. This is
- currently implemented with a Clone feature.
-#- Full multiple drive Autochanger support (mostly implemented).
-#- We will have built in support for communications
- encryption (TLS) done by Landon Fuller.
-# We will most likely have support for Unicode characters
- (via UTF-8) on Win32 machines thanks to Thorsten Engle.
-Item 8: Break the one-to-one Relationship between a Job and a
- Specific Storage Device (or Devices if #10 is implemented).
-
-Completed items from last year's list:
-Item 1: Multiple simultaneous Jobs. (done)
-Item 3: Write the bscan program -- also write a bcopy program (done).
-Item 5: Implement Label templates (done).
-Item 6: Write a regression script (done)
-Item 9: Add SSL to daemon communications (For now, implement with
- stunnel)
-Item 10: Define definitive tape format (done)
-Item 3: GUI for interactive restore. Partially Implemented in 1.34
- Note, there is now a complete Webmin plugin, a partial
- GNOME console, and an excellent wx-console GUI.
-Item 4: GUI for interactive backup
-Item 2: Job Data Spooling.
- Done: Regular expression matching.
-Item 10: New daemon communication protocol (this has been dropped).
+Item 13: Restore only file attributes (permissions, ACL, owner, group...)
+ Origin: Eric Bollengier
+ Date: 30/12/2006
+ Status: Implemented by Eric, see project-restore-attributes-only.patch
+
+ What: The goal of this project is to be able to restore only rights
+ and attributes of files without crushing them.
+
+ Why: Who have never had to repair a chmod -R 777, or a wild update
+ of recursive right under Windows? At this time, you must have
+ enough space to restore data, dump attributes (easy with acl,
+ more complex with unix/windows rights) and apply them to your
+ broken tree. With this options, it will be very easy to compare
+ right or ACL over the time.
+
+ Notes: If the file is here, we skip restore and we change rights.
+ If the file isn't here, we can create an empty one and apply
+ rights or do nothing.
+
+ This will not work with win32 stream, because it seems that we
+ can't split the WriteBackup stream to get only ACL and ownerchip.
+
+Item 14: Add an override in Schedule for Pools based on backup types
+Date: 19 Jan 2005
+Origin: Chad Slater <chad.slater@clickfox.com>
+Status:
+
+ What: Adding a FullStorage=BigTapeLibrary in the Schedule resource
+ would help those of us who use different storage devices for different
+ backup levels cope with the "auto-upgrade" of a backup.
+
+ Why: Assume I add several new devices to be backed up, i.e. several
+ hosts with 1TB RAID. To avoid tape switching hassles, incrementals are
+ stored in a disk set on a 2TB RAID. If you add these devices in the
+ middle of the month, the incrementals are upgraded to "full" backups,
+ but they try to use the same storage device as requested in the
+ incremental job, filling up the RAID holding the differentials. If we
+ could override the Storage parameter for full and/or differential
+ backups, then the Full job would use the proper Storage device, which
+ has more capacity (i.e. a 8TB tape library.
+
+
+Item 15: Implement more Python events and functions
+ Date: 28 October 2005
+ Origin: Kern
+ Status:
+
+ What: Allow Python scripts to be called at more places
+ within Bacula and provide additional access to Bacula
+ internal variables.
+
+ Implement an interface for Python scripts to access the
+ catalog through Bacula.
+
+ Why: This will permit users to customize Bacula through
+ Python scripts.
+
+ Notes: Recycle event
+ Scratch pool event
+ NeedVolume event
+ MediaFull event
+
+ Also add a way to get a listing of currently running
+ jobs (possibly also scheduled jobs).
+
+
+ to start the appropriate job.
+
+
+Item 16: Allow inclusion/exclusion of files in a fileset by creation/mod times
+ Origin: Evan Kaufman <evan.kaufman@gmail.com>
+ Date: January 11, 2006
+ Status:
+
+ What: In the vein of the Wild and Regex directives in a Fileset's
+ Options, it would be helpful to allow a user to include or exclude
+ files and directories by creation or modification times.
+
+ You could factor the Exclude=yes|no option in much the same way it
+ affects the Wild and Regex directives. For example, you could exclude
+ all files modified before a certain date:
+
+ Options {
+ Exclude = yes
+ Modified Before = ####
+ }
+
+ Or you could exclude all files created/modified since a certain date:
+
+ Options {
+ Exclude = yes
+ Created Modified Since = ####
+ }
+
+ The format of the time/date could be done several ways, say the number
+ of seconds since the epoch:
+ 1137008553 = Jan 11 2006, 1:42:33PM # result of `date +%s`
+
+ Or a human readable date in a cryptic form:
+ 20060111134233 = Jan 11 2006, 1:42:33PM # YYYYMMDDhhmmss
+
+ Why: I imagine a feature like this could have many uses. It would
+ allow a user to do a full backup while excluding the base operating
+ system files, so if I installed a Linux snapshot from a CD yesterday,
+ I'll *exclude* all files modified *before* today. If I need to
+ recover the system, I use the CD I already have, plus the tape backup.
+ Or if, say, a Windows client is hit by a particularly corrosive
+ virus, and I need to *exclude* any files created/modified *since* the
+ time of infection.
+
+ Notes: Of course, this feature would work in concert with other
+ in/exclude rules, and wouldnt override them (or each other).
+
+ Notes: The directives I'd imagine would be along the lines of
+ "[Created] [Modified] [Before|Since] = <date>".
+ So one could compare against 'ctime' and/or 'mtime', but ONLY 'before'
+ or 'since'.
+
+
+Item 17: Automatic promotion of backup levels based on backup size
+ Date: 19 January 2006
+ Origin: Adam Thornton <athornton@sinenomine.net>
+ Status:
+
+ What: Amanda has a feature whereby it estimates the space that a
+ differential, incremental, and full backup would take. If the
+ difference in space required between the scheduled level and the next
+ level up is beneath some user-defined critical threshold, the backup
+ level is bumped to the next type. Doing this minimizes the number of
+ volumes necessary during a restore, with a fairly minimal cost in
+ backup media space.
+
+ Why: I know at least one (quite sophisticated and smart) user
+ for whom the absence of this feature is a deal-breaker in terms of
+ using Bacula; if we had it it would eliminate the one cool thing
+ Amanda can do and we can't (at least, the one cool thing I know of).
+
+
+Item 18: Better control over Job execution
+ Date: 18 August 2007
+ Origin: Kern
+ Status:
+
+ What: Bacula needs a few extra features for better Job execution:
+ 1. A way to prevent multiple Jobs of the same name from
+ being scheduled at the same time (ususally happens when
+ a job is missed because a client is down).
+ 2. Directives that permit easier upgrading of Job types
+ based on a period of time. I.e. "do a Full at least
+ once every 2 weeks", or "do a differential at least
+ once a week". If a lower level job is scheduled when
+ it begins to run it will be upgraded depending on
+ the specified criteria.
+
+ Why: Obvious.
+
+
+Item 19: Automatic disabling of devices
+ Date: 2005-11-11
+ Origin: Peter Eriksson <peter at ifm.liu dot se>
+ Status:
+
+ What: After a configurable amount of fatal errors with a tape drive
+ Bacula should automatically disable further use of a certain
+ tape drive. There should also be "disable"/"enable" commands in
+ the "bconsole" tool.
+
+ Why: On a multi-drive jukebox there is a possibility of tape drives
+ going bad during large backups (needing a cleaning tape run,
+ tapes getting stuck). It would be advantageous if Bacula would
+ automatically disable further use of a problematic tape drive
+ after a configurable amount of errors has occurred.
+
+ An example: I have a multi-drive jukebox (6 drives, 380+ slots)
+ where tapes occasionally get stuck inside the drive. Bacula will
+ notice that the "mtx-changer" command will fail and then fail
+ any backup jobs trying to use that drive. However, it will still
+ keep on trying to run new jobs using that drive and fail -
+ forever, and thus failing lots and lots of jobs... Since we have
+ many drives Bacula could have just automatically disabled
+ further use of that drive and used one of the other ones
+ instead.
+
+Item 20: An option to operate on all pools with update vol parameters
+ Origin: Dmitriy Pinchukov <absh@bossdev.kiev.ua>
+ Date: 16 August 2006
+ Status: Patch made by Nigel Stepp
+
+ What: When I do update -> Volume parameters -> All Volumes
+ from Pool, then I have to select pools one by one. I'd like
+ console to have an option like "0: All Pools" in the list of
+ defined pools.
+
+ Why: I have many pools and therefore unhappy with manually
+ updating each of them using update -> Volume parameters -> All
+ Volumes from Pool -> pool #.
+
+
+Item 21: Include timestamp of job launch in "stat clients" output
+ Origin: Mark Bergman <mark.bergman@uphs.upenn.edu>
+ Date: Tue Aug 22 17:13:39 EDT 2006
+ Status:
+
+ What: The "stat clients" command doesn't include any detail on when
+ the active backup jobs were launched.
+
+ Why: Including the timestamp would make it much easier to decide whether
+ a job is running properly.
+
+ Notes: It may be helpful to have the output from "stat clients" formatted
+ more like that from "stat dir" (and other commands), in a column
+ format. The per-client information that's currently shown (level,
+ client name, JobId, Volume, pool, device, Files, etc.) is good, but
+ somewhat hard to parse (both programmatically and visually),
+ particularly when there are many active clients.
+
+
+
+Item 22: Implement Storage daemon compression
+ Date: 18 December 2006
+ Origin: Vadim A. Umanski , e-mail umanski@ext.ru
+ Status:
+ What: The ability to compress backup data on the SD receiving data
+ instead of doing that on client sending data.
+ Why: The need is practical. I've got some machines that can send
+ data to the network 4 or 5 times faster than compressing
+ them (I've measured that). They're using fast enough SCSI/FC
+ disk subsystems but rather slow CPUs (ex. UltraSPARC II).
+ And the backup server has got a quite fast CPUs (ex. Dual P4
+ Xeons) and quite a low load. When you have 20, 50 or 100 GB
+ of raw data - running a job 4 to 5 times faster - that
+ really matters. On the other hand, the data can be
+ compressed 50% or better - so losing twice more space for
+ disk backup is not good at all. And the network is all mine
+ (I have a dedicated management/provisioning network) and I
+ can get as high bandwidth as I need - 100Mbps, 1000Mbps...
+ That's why the server-side compression feature is needed!
+ Notes:
+
+Item 23: Improve Bacula's tape and drive usage and cleaning management
+ Date: 8 November 2005, November 11, 2005
+ Origin: Adam Thornton <athornton at sinenomine dot net>,
+ Arno Lehmann <al at its-lehmann dot de>
+ Status:
+
+ What: Make Bacula manage tape life cycle information, tape reuse
+ times and drive cleaning cycles.
+
+ Why: All three parts of this project are important when operating
+ backups.
+ We need to know which tapes need replacement, and we need to
+ make sure the drives are cleaned when necessary. While many
+ tape libraries and even autoloaders can handle all this
+ automatically, support by Bacula can be helpful for smaller
+ (older) libraries and single drives. Limiting the number of
+ times a tape is used might prevent tape errors when using
+ tapes until the drives can't read it any more. Also, checking
+ drive status during operation can prevent some failures (as I
+ [Arno] had to learn the hard way...)
+
+ Notes: First, Bacula could (and even does, to some limited extent)
+ record tape and drive usage. For tapes, the number of mounts,
+ the amount of data, and the time the tape has actually been
+ running could be recorded. Data fields for Read and Write
+ time and Number of mounts already exist in the catalog (I'm
+ not sure if VolBytes is the sum of all bytes ever written to
+ that volume by Bacula). This information can be important
+ when determining which media to replace. The ability to mark
+ Volumes as "used up" after a given number of write cycles
+ should also be implemented so that a tape is never actually
+ worn out. For the tape drives known to Bacula, similar
+ information is interesting to determine the device status and
+ expected life time: Time it's been Reading and Writing, number
+ of tape Loads / Unloads / Errors. This information is not yet
+ recorded as far as I [Arno] know. A new volume status would
+ be necessary for the new state, like "Used up" or "Worn out".
+ Volumes with this state could be used for restores, but not
+ for writing. These volumes should be migrated first (assuming
+ migration is implemented) and, once they are no longer needed,
+ could be moved to a Trash pool.
+
+ The next step would be to implement a drive cleaning setup.
+ Bacula already has knowledge about cleaning tapes. Once it
+ has some information about cleaning cycles (measured in drive
+ run time, number of tapes used, or calender days, for example)
+ it can automatically execute tape cleaning (with an
+ autochanger, obviously) or ask for operator assistance loading
+ a cleaning tape.
+
+ The final step would be to implement TAPEALERT checks not only
+ when changing tapes and only sending the information to the
+ administrator, but rather checking after each tape error,
+ checking on a regular basis (for example after each tape
+ file), and also before unloading and after loading a new tape.
+ Then, depending on the drives TAPEALERT state and the known
+ drive cleaning state Bacula could automatically schedule later
+ cleaning, clean immediately, or inform the operator.
+
+ Implementing this would perhaps require another catalog change
+ and perhaps major changes in SD code and the DIR-SD protocol,
+ so I'd only consider this worth implementing if it would
+ actually be used or even needed by many people.
+
+ Implementation of these projects could happen in three distinct
+ sub-projects: Measuring Tape and Drive usage, retiring
+ volumes, and handling drive cleaning and TAPEALERTs.
+
+Item 24: Multiple threads in file daemon for the same job
+ Date: 27 November 2005
+ Origin: Ove Risberg (Ove.Risberg at octocode dot com)
+ Status:
+
+ What: I want the file daemon to start multiple threads for a backup
+ job so the fastest possible backup can be made.
+
+ The file daemon could parse the FileSet information and start
+ one thread for each File entry located on a separate
+ filesystem.
+
+ A confiuration option in the job section should be used to
+ enable or disable this feature. The confgutration option could
+ specify the maximum number of threads in the file daemon.
+
+ If the theads could spool the data to separate spool files
+ the restore process will not be much slower.
+
+ Why: Multiple concurrent backups of a large fileserver with many
+ disks and controllers will be much faster.
+
+Item 25: Archival (removal) of User Files to Tape
+ Date: Nov. 24/2005
+ Origin: Ray Pengelly [ray at biomed dot queensu dot ca
+ Status:
+
+ What: The ability to archive data to storage based on certain parameters
+ such as age, size, or location. Once the data has been written to
+ storage and logged it is then pruned from the originating
+ filesystem. Note! We are talking about user's files and not
+ Bacula Volumes.
+
+ Why: This would allow fully automatic storage management which becomes
+ useful for large datastores. It would also allow for auto-staging
+ from one media type to another.
+
+ Example 1) Medical imaging needs to store large amounts of data.
+ They decide to keep data on their servers for 6 months and then put
+ it away for long term storage. The server then finds all files
+ older than 6 months writes them to tape. The files are then removed
+ from the server.
+
+ Example 2) All data that hasn't been accessed in 2 months could be
+ moved from high-cost, fibre-channel disk storage to a low-cost
+ large-capacity SATA disk storage pool which doesn't have as quick of
+ access time. Then after another 6 months (or possibly as one
+ storage pool gets full) data is migrated to Tape.
+
+
+
+
+========== Items on put hold by Kern ============================
+
+Item h1: Split documentation
+ Origin: Maxx <maxxatworkat gmail dot com>
+ Date: 27th July 2006
+ Status: Approved, awaiting implementation
+
+ What: Split documentation in several books
+
+ Why: Bacula manual has now more than 600 pages, and looking for
+ implementation details is getting complicated. I think
+ it would be good to split the single volume in two or
+ maybe three parts:
+
+ 1) Introduction, requirements and tutorial, typically
+ are useful only until first installation time
+
+ 2) Basic installation and configuration, with all the
+ gory details about the directives supported 3)
+ Advanced Bacula: testing, troubleshooting, GUI and
+ ancillary programs, security managements, scripting,
+ etc.
+
+ Notes: This is a project that needs to be done, and will be implemented,
+ but it is really a developer issue of timing, and does not
+ needed to be included in the voting.
+
+
+Item h2: Implement support for stacking arbitrary stream filters, sinks.
+Date: 23 November 2006
+Origin: Landon Fuller <landonf@threerings.net>
+Status: Planning. Assigned to landonf.
+
+ What: Implement support for the following:
+ - Stacking arbitrary stream filters (eg, encryption, compression,
+ sparse data handling))
+ - Attaching file sinks to terminate stream filters (ie, write out
+ the resultant data to a file)
+ - Refactor the restoration state machine accordingly
+
+ Why: The existing stream implementation suffers from the following:
+ - All state (compression, encryption, stream restoration), is
+ global across the entire restore process, for all streams. There are
+ multiple entry and exit points in the restoration state machine, and
+ thus multiple places where state must be allocated, deallocated,
+ initialized, or reinitialized. This results in exceptional complexity
+ for the author of a stream filter.
+ - The developer must enumerate all possible combinations of filters
+ and stream types (ie, win32 data with encryption, without encryption,
+ with encryption AND compression, etc).
+
+ Notes: This feature request only covers implementing the stream filters/
+ sinks, and refactoring the file daemon's restoration implementation
+ accordingly. If I have extra time, I will also rewrite the backup
+ implementation. My intent in implementing the restoration first is to
+ solve pressing bugs in the restoration handling, and to ensure that
+ the new restore implementation handles existing backups correctly.
+
+ I do not plan on changing the network or tape data structures to
+ support defining arbitrary stream filters, but supporting that
+ functionality is the ultimate goal.
+
+ Assistance with either code or testing would be fantastic.
+
+ Notes: Kern: this project has a lot of merit, and we need to do it, but
+ it is really an issue for developers rather than a new feature
+ for users, so I have removed it from the voting list, but kept it
+ here, but at some point, it will be implemented.
+
+Item h3: Filesystem watch triggered backup.
+ Date: 31 August 2006
+ Origin: Jesper Krogh <jesper@krogh.cc>
+ Status:
+
+ What: With inotify and similar filesystem triggeret notification
+ systems is it possible to have the file-daemon to monitor
+ filesystem changes and initiate backup.
+
+ Why: There are 2 situations where this is nice to have.
+ 1) It is possible to get a much finer-grained backup than
+ the fixed schedules used now.. A file created and deleted
+ a few hours later, can automatically be caught.
+
+ 2) The introduced load on the system will probably be
+ distributed more even on the system.
+
+ Notes: This can be combined with configration that specifies
+ something like: "at most every 15 minutes or when changes
+ consumed XX MB".
+
+Kern Notes: I would rather see this implemented by an external program
+ that monitors the Filesystem changes, then uses the console
+
+
+Item h4: Directive/mode to backup only file changes, not entire file
+ Date: 11 November 2005
+ Origin: Joshua Kugler <joshua dot kugler at uaf dot edu>
+ Marek Bajon <mbajon at bimsplus dot com dot pl>
+ Status:
+
+ What: Currently when a file changes, the entire file will be backed up in
+ the next incremental or full backup. To save space on the tapes
+ it would be nice to have a mode whereby only the changes to the
+ file would be backed up when it is changed.
+
+ Why: This would save lots of space when backing up large files such as
+ logs, mbox files, Outlook PST files and the like.
+
+ Notes: This would require the usage of disk-based volumes as comparing
+ files would not be feasible using a tape drive.
+
+ Notes: Kern: I don't know how to implement this. Put on hold until someone
+ provides a detailed implementation plan.
+
+
+Item h5: Implement multiple numeric backup levels as supported by dump
+Date: 3 April 2006
+Origin: Daniel Rich <drich@employees.org>
+Status:
+What: Dump allows specification of backup levels numerically instead of just
+ "full", "incr", and "diff". In this system, at any given level, all
+ files are backed up that were were modified since the last backup of a
+ higher level (with 0 being the highest and 9 being the lowest). A
+ level 0 is therefore equivalent to a full, level 9 an incremental, and
+ the levels 1 through 8 are varying levels of differentials. For
+ bacula's sake, these could be represented as "full", "incr", and
+ "diff1", "diff2", etc.
+
+Why: Support of multiple backup levels would provide for more advanced backup
+ rotation schemes such as "Towers of Hanoi". This would allow better
+ flexibility in performing backups, and can lead to shorter recover
+ times.
+
+Notes: Legato Networker supports a similar system with full, incr, and 1-9 as
+ levels.
+
+Notes: Kern: I don't see the utility of this, and it would be a *huge*
+ modification to existing code.
+
+Item h6: Implement NDMP protocol support
+ Origin: Alan Davis
+ Date: 06 March 2007
+ Status:
+
+ What: Network Data Management Protocol is implemented by a number of
+ NAS filer vendors to enable backups using third-party
+ software.
+
+ Why: This would allow NAS filer backups in Bacula without incurring
+ the overhead of NFS or SBM/CIFS.
+
+ Notes: Further information is available:
+ http://www.ndmp.org
+ http://www.ndmp.org/wp/wp.shtml
+ http://www.traakan.com/ndmjob/index.html
+
+ There are currently no viable open-source NDMP
+ implementations. There is a reference SDK and example
+ app available from ndmp.org but it has problems
+ compiling on recent Linux and Solaris OS'. The ndmjob
+ reference implementation from Traakan is known to
+ compile on Solaris 10.
+
+ Notes: Kern: I am not at all in favor of this until NDMP becomes
+ an Open Standard or until there are Open Source libraries
+ that interface to it.
+
+Item h7: Commercial database support
+ Origin: Russell Howe <russell_howe dot wreckage dot org>
+ Date: 26 July 2006
+ Status:
+
+ What: It would be nice for the database backend to support more
+ databases. I'm thinking of SQL Server at the moment, but I guess Oracle,
+ DB2, MaxDB, etc are all candidates. SQL Server would presumably be
+ implemented using FreeTDS or maybe an ODBC library?
+
+ Why: We only really have one database server, which is MS SQL Server
+ 2000. Maintaining a second one for the backup software (we grew out of
+ SQLite, which I liked, but which didn't work so well with our database
+ size). We don't really have a machine with the resources to run
+ postgres, and would rather only maintain a single DBMS. We're stuck with
+ SQL Server because pretty much all the company's custom applications
+ (written by consultants) are locked into SQL Server 2000. I can imagine
+ this scenario is fairly common, and it would be nice to use the existing
+ properly specced database server for storing Bacula's catalog, rather
+ than having to run a second DBMS.
+
+ Notes: This might be nice, but someone other than me will probably need to
+ implement it, and at the moment, proprietary code cannot legally be
+ mixed with Bacula GPLed code. This would be possible only providing
+ the vendors provide GPLed (or OpenSource) interface code.
+
+Item h8: Incorporation of XACML2/SAML2 parsing
+ Date: 19 January 2006
+ Origin: Adam Thornton <athornton@sinenomine.net>
+ Status: Blue sky
+
+ What: XACML is "eXtensible Access Control Markup Language" and
+ "SAML is the "Security Assertion Markup Language"--an XML standard
+ for making statements about identity and authorization. Having these
+ would give us a framework to approach ACLs in a generic manner, and
+ in a way flexible enough to support the four major sorts of ACLs I
+ see as a concern to Bacula at this point, as well as (probably) to
+ deal with new sorts of ACLs that may appear in the future.
+
+ Why: Bacula is beginning to need to back up systems with ACLs
+ that do not map cleanly onto traditional Unix permissions. I see
+ four sets of ACLs--in general, mutually incompatible with one
+ another--that we're going to need to deal with. These are: NTFS
+ ACLs, POSIX ACLs, NFSv4 ACLS, and AFS ACLS. (Some may question the
+ relevance of AFS; AFS is one of Sine Nomine's core consulting
+ businesses, and having a reputable file-level backup and restore
+ technology for it (as Tivoli is probably going to drop AFS support
+ soon since IBM no longer supports AFS) would be of huge benefit to
+ our customers; we'd most likely create the AFS support at Sine Nomine
+ for inclusion into the Bacula (and perhaps some changes to the
+ OpenAFS volserver) core code.)
+
+ Now, obviously, Bacula already handles NTFS just fine. However, I
+ think there's a lot of value in implementing a generic ACL model, so
+ that it's easy to support whatever particular instances of ACLs come
+ down the pike: POSIX ACLS (think SELinux) and NFSv4 are the obvious
+ things arriving in the Linux world in a big way in the near future.
+ XACML, although overcomplicated for our needs, provides this
+ framework, and we should be able to leverage other people's
+ implementations to minimize the amount of work *we* have to do to get
+ a generic ACL framework. Basically, the costs of implementation are
+ high, but they're largely both external to Bacula and already sunk.
+
+ Notes: As you indicate this is a bit of "blue sky" or in other words,
+ at the moment, it is a bit esoteric to consider for Bacula.
+
+Item h9: Archive data
+ Date: 15/5/2006
+ Origin: calvin streeting calvin at absentdream dot com
+ Status:
+
+ What: The abilty to archive to media (dvd/cd) in a uncompressed format
+ for dead filing (archiving not backing up)
+
+ Why: At work when jobs are finished and moved off of the main file
+ servers (raid based systems) onto a simple Linux file server (ide based
+ system) so users can find old information without contacting the IT
+ dept.
+
+ So this data dosn't realy change it only gets added to,
+ But it also needs backing up. At the moment it takes
+ about 8 hours to back up our servers (working data) so
+ rather than add more time to existing backups i am trying
+ to implement a system where we backup the acrhive data to
+ cd/dvd these disks would only need to be appended to
+ (burn only new/changed files to new disks for off site
+ storage). basialy understand the differnce between
+ achive data and live data.
+
+ Notes: Scan the data and email me when it needs burning divide
+ into predefined chunks keep a recored of what is on what
+ disk make me a label (simple php->mysql=>pdf stuff) i
+ could do this bit ability to save data uncompresed so
+ it can be read in any other system (future proof data)
+ save the catalog with the disk as some kind of menu
+ system
+
+ Notes: Kern: I don't understand this item, and in any case, if it
+ is specific to DVD/CDs, which we do not recommend using,
+ it is unlikely to be implemented except as a user
+ submitted patch.
+
+
+Item h10: Clustered file-daemons
+ Origin: Alan Brown ajb2 at mssl dot ucl dot ac dot uk
+ Date: 24 July 2006
+ Status:
+ What: A "virtual" filedaemon, which is actually a cluster of real ones.
+
+ Why: In the case of clustered filesystems (SAN setups, GFS, or OCFS2, etc)
+ multiple machines may have access to the same set of filesystems
+
+ For performance reasons, one may wish to initate backups from
+ several of these machines simultaneously, instead of just using
+ one backup source for the common clustered filesystem.
+
+ For obvious reasons, normally backups of $A-FD/$PATH and
+ B-FD/$PATH are treated as different backup sets. In this case
+ they are the same communal set.
+
+ Likewise when restoring, it would be easier to just specify
+ one of the cluster machines and let bacula decide which to use.
+
+ This can be faked to some extent using DNS round robin entries
+ and a virtual IP address, however it means "status client" will
+ always give bogus answers. Additionally there is no way of
+ spreading the load evenly among the servers.
+
+ What is required is something similar to the storage daemon
+ autochanger directives, so that Bacula can keep track of
+ operating backups/restores and direct new jobs to a "free"
+ client.
+
+ Notes: Kern: I don't understand the request enough to be able to
+ implement it. A lot more design detail should be presented
+ before voting on this project.
+
+========= Added since the last vote =================
+
+Item: Store and restore extended attributes, especially selinux file contexts
+ Date: 28 December 2007
+ Origin: Frank Sweetser <fs@wpi.edu>
+ What: The ability to store and restore extended attributes on
+ filesystems that support them, such as ext3.
+
+ Why: Security Enhanced Linux (SELinux) enabled systems make extensive
+ use of extended attributes. In addition to the standard user,
+ group, and permission, each file has an associated SELinux context
+ stored as an extended attribute. This context is used to define
+ which operations a given program is permitted to perform on that
+ file. Storing contexts on an SELinux system is as critical as
+ storing ownership and permissions. In the case of a full system
+ restore, the system will not even be able to boot until all
+ critical system files have been properly relabeled.
+
+ Notes: Fedora ships with a version of tar that has been patched to handle
+ extended attributes. The patch has not been integrated upstream
+ yet, so could serve as a good starting point.
+
+ http://linux.die.net/man/2/getxattr
+ http://linux.die.net/man/2/setxattr
+ http://linux.die.net/man/2/listxattr
+ ===
+ http://linux.die.net/man/3/getfilecon
+ http://linux.die.net/man/3/setfilecon
+
+Item 1: enable/disable compression depending on storage device (disk/tape)
+ Origin: Ralf Gross ralf-lists@ralfgross.de
+ Date: 2008-01-11
+ Status: Initial Request
+
+ What: Add a new option to the storage resource of the director. Depending
+ on this option, compression will be enabled/disabled for a device.
+
+ Why: If different devices (disks/tapes) are used for full/diff/incr
+ backups, software compression will be enabled for all backups
+ because of the FileSet compression option. For backup to tapes wich
+ are able to do hardware compression this is not desired.
+
+
+ Notes: http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.sysutils.backup.bacula.devel/cutoff=11124
+ It must be clear to the user, that the FileSet compression option must
+ still be enabled use compression for a backup job at all. Thus a name
+ for the new option in the director must be well-defined.
+
+ Notes: KES I think the Storage definition should probably override what
+ is in the Job definition or vice-versa, but in any case, it must
+ be well defined.
+
+
+Item 1: Backup and Restore of Windows Encrypted Files through raw encryption functions
+
+ Origin: Michael Mohr, SAG Mohr.External@infineon.com
+
+ Date: 22 February 2008
+
+ Status:
+
+ What: Make it possible to backup and restore Encypted Files from and
+ to Windows systems without the need to decrypt it by using the raw encryption
+ functions API
+ (see: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa363783.aspx)
+
+ that is provided for that reason by Microsoft.
+ If a file ist encrypted could be examined by evaluating the
+ FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ENCRYTED flag of the GetFileAttributes
+ function.
+
+ Why: Without the usage of this interface the fd-daemon running
+ under the system account can't read encypted Files because
+ the key needed for the decrytion is missed by them. As a result
+ actually encrypted files are not backed up
+ by bacula and also no error is shown while missing these files.
+
+ Notes: ./.
+
+ Item 1: Possibilty to schedule Jobs on last Friday of the month
+ Origin: Carsten Menke <bootsy52 at gmx dot net>
+ Date: 02 March 2008
+ Status:
+
+ What: Currently if you want to run your monthly Backups on the last
+ Friday of each month this is only possible with workarounds (e.g
+ scripting) (As some months got 4 Fridays and some got 5 Fridays)
+ The same is true if you plan to run your yearly Backups on the last
+ Friday of the year. It would be nice to have the ability to use the builtin
+ scheduler for this.
+
+ Why: In many companies the last working day of the week is Friday (or
+ Saturday), so to get the most data of the month onto the monthly tape, the
+ employees are advised to insert the tape for the monthly backups on the last
+ friday of the month.
+
+ Notes: To give this a complete functionality it would be nice if the "first"
+ and "last" Keywords could be implemented in the scheduler, so it is also
+ possible to run monthy backups at the first friday of the month and many things
+ more. So if the syntax would expand to this {first|last} {Month|Week|Day|Mo-Fri}
+ of the {Year|Month|Week} you would be able to run really flexible jobs.
+
+ To got a certain Job run on the last Friday of the Month for example one could
+ then write
+
+ Run = pool=Monthly last Fri of the Month at 23:50
+
+ ## Yearly Backup
+
+ Run = pool=Yearly last Fri of the Year at 23:50
+
+ ## Certain Jobs the last Week of a Month
+
+ Run = pool=LastWeek last Week of the Month at 23:50
+
+ ## Monthly Backup on the last day of the month
+
+ Run = pool=Monthly last Day of the Month at 23:50
+
+ Date: 20 March 2008
+
+ Origin: Frank Sweetser <fs@wpi.edu>
+
+ What: Add a new SD directive, "minimum spool size" (or similar). This
+ directive would specify a minimum level of free space available for
+ spooling. If the unused spool space is less than this level, any new
+ spooling requests would be blocked as if the "maximum spool size"
+ threshold had bee reached. Already spooling jobs would be unaffected
+ by this directive.
+
+ Why: I've been bitten by this scenario a couple of times:
+
+ Assume a maximum spool size of 100M. Two concurrent jobs, A and B, are
+ both running. Due to timing quirks and previously running jobs, job A
+ has used 99.9M of space in the spool directory. While A is busy
+ despooling to disk, B is happily using the remaining 0.1M of spool
+ space. This ends up in a spool/despool sequence every 0.1M of data.
+ In addition to fragmenting the data on the volume far more than was
+ necessary, in larger data sets (ie, tens or hundreds of gigabytes) it
+ can easily produce multi-megabyte report emails!
+
+========== Already implemented ================================
+
+Item n: make changing "spooldata=yes|no" possible for
+ manual/interactive jobs
+ Origin: Marc Schiffbauer <marc@schiffbauer.net>
+ Date: 12 April 2007)
+ Status:
+
+ What: Make it possible to modify the spooldata option
+ for a job when being run from within the console.
+ Currently it is possible to modify the backup level
+ and the spooldata setting in a Schedule resource.
+ It is also possible to modify the backup level when using
+ the "run" command in the console.
+ But it is currently not possible to to the same
+ with "spooldata=yes|no" like:
+
+ run job=MyJob level=incremental spooldata=yes
+
+ Why: In some situations it would be handy to be able to switch
+ spooldata on or off for interactive/manual jobs based on
+ which data the admin expects or how fast the LAN/WAN
+ connection currently is.
+
+ Notes: ./.
+
+============= Empty Feature Request form ===========
+Item n: One line summary ...
+ Date: Date submitted
+ Origin: Name and email of originator.
+ Status:
+
+ What: More detailed explanation ...
+
+ Why: Why it is important ...
+
+ Notes: Additional notes or features (omit if not used)
+============== End Feature Request form ==============
projects / bacula / bacula / blobdiff