4.5 Tracking scheduled and manual backups
Whenever Windows
Server Backup backs up a server, it writes events related to the Windows
event logs. You’ll find events related to shadow copies in the
Application log and all other backup events in the Microsoft\Windows\Backup\Operational log, as shown in Figure 13.
By looking through the Operational log, you can quickly determine when
backups were started, when they were completed, and reasons for failure,
such as when backups were canceled by another administrator or there
was not enough space on the backup target. By looking at the time
difference between when a backup started and when it completed, you can
also determine how long backups are taking.
As shown in Figure 14, Windows Server Backup provides summary details regarding backups
as well. In the Messages pane, you’ll find information regarding
completed, failed, and currently running backups. In the Status
pane, you’ll find details on the last backup, the next scheduled
backup, and all available backups. Tap or click the View Details links
to determine what volumes were backed up, the backup type, and more. In
the Details dialog box, you can track errors that occurred during the
backup on the Errors tab.
Windows Server 2012 provides separate processes for system-state recovery, full-server recovery, and the recovery of individual volumes and files and folders. You use the Recovery
Wizard in Windows Server Backup to recover nonsystem volumes and files
and folders from a backup. For example, if Mary loses a spreadsheet and
there isn’t an available shadow copy of the file, you could recover the
individual file from the backup archive. If John accidentally deletes an
important folder, you can recover the folder and all its contents from a
backup archive.
Before you begin, you should ensure that the computer you are
recovering files to is running an appropriate version of Windows Server.
If you want to recover individual files and folders, you should ensure
that at least one backup exists on an external disk or in a remote
shared folder. You cannot recover files and folders from backups saved
to DVDs.
You can recover data in two ways. You can recover data stored on the
server to which you are currently logged on. Or you can recover data
stored on another server. Because these are different procedures, I’ll
discuss them in different sections.
Recovering data stored on the current server
To recover nonsystem volumes, files and folders, or application data,
start Windows Server Backup. Tap or click Recover in the actions pane
or on the Action menu to start the Recovery Wizard. On the Getting Started page, choose This Server, as shown in Figure 15, and then tap or click Next.
On the Select Backup Date page, shown in Figure 16,
select the date and time of the backup you want to restore using the
calendar and the time list. Backups are available for dates shown in
bold. Tap or click Next.
On the Select Recovery Type page, shown in Figure 17, do one of the following:
-
To restore individual files
and folders, choose Files And Folders and then tap or click Next. On
the Select Items To Recover page, under Available Items, tap or click
the plus sign (+) to expand the list until the folder you want is
visible. Tap or click a folder to display the contents of the folder in
the adjacent pane, tap or click each item you want to restore, and then
tap or click Next.
-
To restore virtual
machines, choose Hyper-V and then tap or click Next. On the Select
Items To Recover page, under Hyper-V Items, tap or click the virtual
machines and components that you want to recover. Tap or click Next.
Because virtual machines might not start if their network settings are
different after recovery, verify the network settings in Hyper-V Manager before starting the virtual machines.
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To restore noncritical, non–operating system volumes,
choose Volumes and then tap or click Next. On the Select Volumes page,
you’ll see a list of source and destination volumes. Select the check
boxes associated with the source volumes you want to recover, and then
select the location to which you want to recover the volume by using the
Destination Volume lists. Tap or click Next. If prompted to confirm the
recovery operation, tap or click Yes.
-
To restore data from applications that have been registered with Windows Server
Backup, choose Applications and then tap or click Next. On the Select
Application page, under Applications, tap or click the application you
want to recover. If the backup you are using is the most recent, you
might see a check box labeled Do Not Perform A Roll-Forward Recovery
Of The Application Databases. Select this check box if you want to
prevent Windows Server Backup from rolling forward the application
database that is currently on your server. Tap or click Next. Because
any data on the destination volume will be lost when you perform the
recovery, make sure that the destination volume is empty or does not
contain information you will need later.
On the Specify Recovery Options page, shown in Figure 18,
specify whether you want to restore data to its original location
(nonsystem files only) or an alternate location. For an alternate
location, type the path to the location or tap or click Browse to select
it. With applications, you can copy application data to an alternate location. You cannot, however, recover applications to a different location or computer.
For file and folder recovery,
choose a recovery technique to apply when files and folders already
exist in the recovery location. You can create copies so that you have
both versions of the file or folder, overwrite existing files with
recovered files, or skip duplicate files and folders to preserve
existing files. By default, the Recovery
Wizard restores the security settings. In most cases, you’ll want to
use this option. Tap or click Next when you are ready to continue.
On the Confirmation page, review the details and then tap or click
Recover to restore the specified items. The wizard displays the progress
of the recovery in the Recovery Progress dialog box. If you tap or
click Close, the recovery will continue to run in the background.
Windows Server Backup provides summary
details regarding recovery in the Messages pane. You’ll find
information regarding completed, failed, and currently running recovery
operations. Windows Server Backup also writes recovery events related to the Windows event logs. You’ll find events related to shadow
copies in the Application log and all other recovery events in the
Microsoft\Windows\Backup\Operational log. By looking through the
Operational log, you can quickly determine when recovery operations were
started, when they were completed, and reasons for failure. By
navigating through the recovery-related events, you can also find an
event that provides the location of a log file that lists all files
restored in the recovery operation. Figure 19 shows an example.
