Forum ©XSIBackup: ©VMWare ©ESXi Backup Software

NextLevel

Member

Registered: 2019-03-11

Posts: 33

How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

I need to free up some space on the backup target repository. It is already limited with xsibackup-prune to 6Gb.

There are backups of certain VMs that are not needed any more. How can I remove all backups of a VM (including the blocks) from the repository?

Greetings

NextLevel

admin

Administrator

Registered: 2017-04-21

Posts: 2,072

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

You can't prune VMs alone, just backup folders. Create a new repository without that VM or prune the backup folders containing that VM once you have accumulated a number of backups that don't contain the VM.

NextLevel

Member

Registered: 2019-03-11

Posts: 33

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

That's a pity. So orphaned blocks will never be removed? Isn't there a script for that at least?

admin

Administrator

Registered: 2017-04-21

Posts: 2,072

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

Pruning does remove blocks, but on a per backup basis, not per virtual machine. Your solution is pretty simple.
Start accumulating backups with the new set, which does not include the old VM. Then, after a couple of cycles delete the backup sets that do contain the old VM.

NextLevel

Member

Registered: 2019-03-11

Posts: 33

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

Well, as said, I need to free up some space, so open a new set is not an option, since there is not enough space 

Conclusion:

I cannot run any further backups unless I delete all (instead just the ones I don't need).

Feature request: Pruning by VM name from repository or an option to cleanup a repository by search and delete orphaned blocks.

Last edited by NextLevel (2019-06-14 11:19:16)

admin

Administrator

Registered: 2017-04-21

Posts: 2,072

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

Jotted down!.

Free up some space by deleting the eldest backups and once you have freed up some space follow the suggested procedure. You can always do that, unless you are fitting things so tightly that you can't breath. If that is the case the problem is not the backup software feature set, but the lack of backup room.

bheide

Member

Registered: 2017-08-29

Posts: 4

Re: How to delete all XSITool backups of a VM ?

[quote=NextLevel]Well, as said, I need to free up some space, so open a new set is not an option, since there is not enough space 

Conclusion:

I cannot run any further backups unless I delete all (instead just the ones I don't need).

Feature request: Pruning by VM name from repository or an option to cleanup a repository by search and delete orphaned blocks.[/quote]

Well the official (and only supported) way is to use different sets of repositories. In the beginning I was also using one XSI repository and tried to cleanup on the go. I'm now using one repository per month (date +%Y-%m) and simply remove the second oldest repository with a cron job. This way I'm always having at least 4 weeks worth of backups.

Nevertheless, I've created a quick and dirty shell script which can "clean up" an XSItools repository (the data blocks). It simply goes through the list of all referenced blocks (the *-flat.vmdk files in the XSItools repo lists the hashes of all the blocks used by this vmdk) and compares this list with the list of physical blocks stored under the data directory in the XSItools repo.

Drop me a note if you want to have a look at this script.

Regards,
Bernhard