How to catalog backups with Oracle Recovery Manager

12/13/2023 Contributors

You can catalog the backups of Oracle databases using Oracle Recovery Manager (RMAN) to store the backup information in the Oracle RMAN repository.

The cataloged backups can be used later for block-level restore or tablespace point-in-time recovery operations. When you do not need these cataloged backups, you can remove the catalog information.

The database must be in mounted or higher state for cataloging. You can perform cataloging on data backups, archive log backups, and full backups. If cataloging is enabled for a backup of a resource group that has multiple databases, cataloging is performed for each database. For Oracle RAC databases, cataloging will be performed on the preferred node where the database is at least in mounted state.

If you want to catalog backups of a RAC database, ensure that no other job is running for that database. If another job is running, the cataloging operation fails instead of getting queued.

External catalog database

By default, the target database control file is used for cataloging. If you want to add external catalog database, you can configure it by specifying the credential and Transparent Network Substrate (TNS) name of the external catalog using the Database Settings wizard from the SnapCenter graphical user interface (GUI). You can also configure the external catalog database from the CLI by running the Configure-SmOracleDatabase command with the -OracleRmanCatalogCredentialName and -OracleRmanCatalogTnsName options.

RMAN command

If you enabled the cataloging option while creating an Oracle backup policy from the SnapCenter GUI, the backups are cataloged using Oracle RMAN as a part of the backup operation. You can also perform deferred cataloging of backups by running the Catalog-SmBackupWithOracleRMAN command.

After cataloging the backups, you can run the Get-SmBackupDetails command to obtain the cataloged backup information such as the tag for cataloged datafiles, the control file catalog path, and the cataloged archive log locations.

Naming format

If the ASM disk group name is greater than or equal to 16 characters, from SnapCenter 3.0, the naming format used for the backup is SC_HASHCODEofDISKGROUP_DBSID_BACKUPID. However, If the disk group name is less than 16 characters, the naming format used for the backup is DISKGROUPNAME_DBSID_BACKUPID, which is the same format used in SnapCenter 2.0.

The HASHCODEofDISKGROUP is an automatically generated number (2 to 10 digit) unique for each ASM disk group.

Crosscheck operations

You can perform crosschecks to update outdated RMAN repository information about backups whose repository records do not match their physical status. For example, if a user removes archived logs from disk with an operating system command, the control file still indicates that the logs are on disk, when in fact they are not.

The crosscheck operation enables you to update the control file with the information. You can enable crosscheck by running the Set-SmConfigSettings command and assigning the value TRUE to the ENABLE_CROSSCHECK parameter. The default value is set to FALSE.

sccli Set-SmConfigSettings-ConfigSettingsTypePlugin-PluginCodeSCO-ConfigSettings "KEY=ENABLE_CROSSCHECK, VALUE=TRUE"

Remove catalog information

You can remove the catalog information by running the Uncatalog-SmBackupWithOracleRMAN command. You cannot remove the catalog information using the SnapCenter GUI. However, information of a cataloged backup is removed while deleting the backup or while deleting the retention and resource group associated with that cataloged backup.

When you force a deletion of the SnapCenter host, the information of the cataloged backups associated with that host are not removed. You must remove information of all the cataloged backups for that host before forcing the deletion of the host.

If the cataloging and uncataloging fails because the operation time exceeded the time out value specified for the ORACLE_PLUGIN_RMAN_CATALOG_TIMEOUT parameter, you should modify the value of the parameter by running the following command:

/opt/Netapp/snapcenter/spl/bin/sccli Set-SmConfigSettings-ConfigSettingsType Plugin -PluginCode SCO-ConfigSettings "KEY=ORACLE_PLUGIN_RMAN_CATALOG_TIMEOUT,VALUE=user_defined_value"

After modifying the value of the parameter, restart the SnapCenter Plug-in Loader (SPL) service by running the following command:

/opt/NetApp/snapcenter/spl/bin/spl restart

The information regarding the parameters that can be used with the command and their descriptions can be obtained by running Get-Help command_name. Alternatively, you can refer to the SnapCenter Software Command Reference Guide.