System Administrator’s Guide U42252-J-Z915-1-76
6 Using NSR-ORA with NetApp Filers
This chapter describes how to configure and use NSR-ORA with NetApp Filers

6.1 Running NSR-ORA with NAS devices

NSR-ORA allows database files stored on a Network Attached Storage (NAS)
you to be backed up or recover or recovered using NDMP (Network Data
Management Protocol). The data is written and read directly from the NAS
device to the backup media, so the performance of the database computer is
not degraded during the backup process. The NetWorker server controls the
tape drives, labeling and initiates tape changers to provide tape media. The
database itself is managed (start, stop, set to “Backup Mode”) by NSR-ORA on
the database computer.
Currently, NSR-ORA only works together with the NAS devices from
NetworkAppliance®(NetApp), called NetApp Filers. Fujitsu Siemens Computers
will provide support for other systems in future.
As a special feature of NSR-ORA using NetApp Filers the software supports the
NetApp Snapshot feature. A NetApp Snapshot is a snapshot of the database at
the moment the NetApp Snapshot is created. This snapshot file will not be
changed even though the database is still operating and its data is being contin-
uously. Due to NetApp’s specific working method the snapshots are created in
a very short time and generally request only a small amount of storage.
Therefore several snapshots can be held on a NetApp Filer.
The integration of NetApp snapshots provides the following benefits:
●Using a Snap-Restore (Restore of a snapshot) can considerably reduce the
time needed for a recovery operation.
●Using NetApp snapshots allows the administrator to back up the database
more often. This reduces the time needed for recovering a database after a
logical error has occurred, because the number of redo logs to be re-
adjusted will be smaller.
●An online backup of the database takes only a few minutes (from the
database server’s point of view). Since the database in a consistent state is
already stored on a snapshot a following tape backup of the data is
completely independent of the backup itself.