NetBackup™ for Oracle Administrator's Guide

Integration with NetBackup role-based access control (RBAC)

The NetBackup web UI provides RBAC capability to control which NetBackup users can manage Oracle clone operations in NetBackup. The user does not need to be a NetBackup administrator to manage Oracle clone operations.

Oracle instance management

NetBackup automatically discovers Oracle instances in the environment. You can also perform manual discovery.

After instances are registered, the Oracle administrator can create a policy to protect Oracle assets.

Oracle DBAs can use the nboraadm command on the NetBackup client to manage instances, instance groups, and their credentials. This command is very useful in environments where the Oracle credentials are known only by the DBAs and not by the NetBackup administrators.

Oracle Intelligent Policies

The Oracle Intelligent Policy (OIP) protects multiple Oracle instances that are spread over multiple clients. You select instances for a policy from a list of instances that are automatically discovered in the NetBackup environment. OIP does not require you to know how RMAN functions or how to use scripts. The feature is instance-based and not scripting based.

Scheduling facilities

NetBackup scheduling facilities on the primary server can be used to schedule automatic and unattended Oracle backups.

This feature also lets you choose the times when these operations can occur. For example, to prevent interference with normal daytime operations, you can schedule your database backups to occur only at night.

Transparent Oracle and regular file system backup and restore operations

All backups and restores run simultaneously and transparently without any action from the NetBackup administrator. The database administrator can run database backup and restore operations through NetBackup. An administrator or any other authorized user can use NetBackup to run database backups and restores.

If you use the command line interface or scripts, you must use script-based Oracle policies. These policies use Oracle's Recovery Manager (RMAN) as if NetBackup were not present.

Centralized and networked backup operations

From the NetBackup primary server, you can schedule database backups or start them manually for any client or instance. The Oracle databases can also reside on the hosts that are different from the devices on which NetBackup stores the backups.

Recovery points

The web UI provides recovery points from which you can easily create a clone from a database or pluggable database. If instant access is configured, you can also create an instant access database from a recovery point.

Sharing the same storage units that are used for other file backups

You can share the same devices and media that are used for other backups or give Oracle exclusive use of certain devices and media. NetBackup for Oracle can use the Media Manager, disk, or Media Server Deduplication Pool (MSDP) storage units.

Compression

Compression increases backup performance over the network and reduces the size of the backup image that NetBackup writes to the storage unit.

Multiplexed backups and restores

NetBackup for Oracle lets you take advantage of NetBackup's multiplexing capabilities. Multiplexing directs multiple data streams to one backup device, thereby reducing the time necessary to complete the operation.

Parallel backup and restore operations

NetBackup for Oracle supports the parallel backup and restore RMAN capabilities. For example, you can run more than one tape device at a time for a single Oracle backup or restore. This capability reduces the time necessary to complete the operation.

Support on a NetBackup appliance for backup to an appliance share (NetBackup Copilot for Oracle)

Oracle Copilot enhances the Oracle Intelligent Policy by giving you options for protecting an Oracle database using a share on a NetBackup appliance. This feature gives you better control of backups when an Oracle database backup is placed in a database share by the DBA. This feature also lets you choose a database share as the destination for the first backup copy. The backup copy is a full set of database data file copies created, incrementally updated, and protected by NetBackup. You must create a share on the appliance for this option using the NetBackup Appliance Shell Menu.

Oracle backups only work on an NFS share on the NetBackup appliance.

For more information about how to set up the share, see Creating a share from the NetBackup Appliance Shell Menu in the NetBackup 52xx and 5330 Appliance Administrator's Guide.

Immediate backup for Oracle DBA

The Oracle DBA can start an immediate backup from the client using the nboraadm -immediate command. The Oracle DBA can start the backup instead of waiting for the backup to be initiated based on the NetBackup schedule. This command option is useful if the Oracle DBA wants to perform a backup before maintenance. The command must be initiated from the client where the instance resides.

Support for Container and Pluggable databases

Oracle 12c introduced the container databases (CDB) and pluggable databases (PDB). The Oracle Intelligent Policy is enhanced and allows a backup to include single or multiple PDBs.

This feature also lets you select one or more Oracle 12c instances along with non-Oracle 12c instances in OIP.

Full Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) support in Oracle Intelligent Policies

In the NetBackup web UI you can create an Oracle policy to support Oracle RAC. (The NetBackup Administration Console does not support an Oracle RAC policy.)

Oracle RAC load balanced backups

NetBackup can be set up to load balance the Oracle instances. Use this feature to distribute the backup load across all of the instances and to exclude specific Oracle instances from backups. This feature is not available in the NetBackup Administration Console.

NetBackup Dedupe Direct for Oracle

NetBackup Dedupe Direct for Oracle offers a lightweight plug-in for RMAN backups to MSDP storage.

The Oracle database administrator can control the whole protection and life-cycle stages without NetBackup client. It also enables client-side deduplication to minimize network traffic and improves overall backup speed.

Support for Replication Director

Replication director can be used to create snapshots of the Oracle database. The snapshots can then be replicated to other NetApp disk arrays or backup the snapshot to a storage unit. To use Replication Director, the Oracle database must exist on a NetApp NAS disk array. Replication Director is not supported on SAN storage at this time.

Oracle snapshot backups that use Replication Director are supported on UNIX and Linux platforms only.