Backup Copy Job Wizard: Retention

Important
This page is not displayed if the new scheduler is enabled.

After each job run, NAKIVO Backup & Replication creates a recovery point in the Backup Repository for each instance. A recovery point represents the backed-up instance as of a particular moment in time and allows you to recover individual files, application objects, or the entire instance from the Backup Repository. You can specify how many recovery points to retain in the Backup Repository. The recovery points are retained based on the grandfather-father-son (GFS) backup rotation scheme.

When Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, generic S3-compatible storage, Wasabi, Azure Blob Storage, Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, or Local Folder is selected as the Backup Repository Type for the only backup destination, you can make recovery points in these repositories immutable. With immutability enabled, the recovery points are immutable and stored using the write-once-read-many (WORM) model. In case of Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, generic S3-compatible storage, Wasabi, Azure Blob Storage, or Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage types of Backup Repository, immutable recovery points cannot be overwritten, deleted, or changed by the root user, until the specified period has expired. For Local Folder type of Backup Repository, the root user can still clear immutability.

Retention Settings

Here you can set the retention settings for the backup job. Set the following options:

  • Maintain exact copy of the source backup: When this option is selected, the backup copy job creates and maintains an exact copy of the source backup and recovery points. To set a different retention policy, deselect this option and choose one of the options below. This option only appears if Disk was selected in the Destination step.

  • Keep all recovery points forever: When this option is selected, the backup copy job keeps all available recovery points until they are manually removed. To set a different retention policy, deselect this option and choose one of the options below. This option only appears if Tape was selected in the Destination step.

  • Synchronize recovery points and apply custom retention: With this option selected, the recovery points kept in the target are synchronized with the recovery points kept in the source.

  • Copy 1 latest recovery point only and apply custom retention: With this option selected, only 1 latest recovery point is copied from the source when the backup copy job runs on the corresponding schedule.

  • Keep x last recovery points: Keeps the specified number of last recovery points for each VM in the job.

  • Keep one recovery point per day for x days: Retains one last recovery point per day for the specified number of days.

  • Keep one recovery point per week for x weeks: Retains the last available backup of every week for the specified number of weeks.

  • Keep one recovery point per month for x months: Retains the last available backup of every month for the specified number of months.

  • Keep one recovery point per year for x years: Retains the last available backup of every year for the specified number of years.

Immutability

In this section, you can configure the Make recovery points immutable for x days option. The recovery points remain immutable for the specified number of days.

Note
For the Immutability section to be available, the following conditions must be met:

  • Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, generic S3-compatible storage, Wasabi, Azure Blob Storage, Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, or Local Folder must be selected for Backup Repository Type on the Destination page of the wizard.

  • If Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, generic S3-compatible storage, Wasabi, Azure Blob Storage, or Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage is selected as the Backup Repository type, Object Lock or version-level immutability support and Versioning must be enabled bucket or blob container respectively where your Backup Repository is located.

  • For Local Folder type of Backup Repository, see feature requirements.

For more details and an example of job retention settings, refer to the Keeping Recovery Points article in the Knowledge Base.