Backup And Shadow Copies - HP ProLiant 300 Series Administration Manual

Backup and shadow copies

Shadow copies are only available on the network via the client application and only at a file or folder
level as opposed to the entire volume. Hence the standard backup associated with a volume backup
will not work to back up the previous versions of the file system. To answer this particular issue, shadow
copies are available for back up in two situations. If the backup software in question supports the use of
shadow copies and can communicate with underlying block device, it is supported and the previous
version of the file system will be listed in the backup application as a complete file system snapshot. Lastly,
if the built-in backup application NTbackup is utilized, the backup software forces a snapshot and then
uses the snapshot as the means for back up. The user is unaware of this activity and it is not self evident
although it does address the issue of open files.
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HP ProLiant Storage Server administration guide