I recall once asking W to help me train two new (very bright) young men in TSM... as fast as possible, like a week to prepare and a week to teach. Her reply was as constructive and helpful as it was humorous.
I live in Baltimore, I have to help, but having said that: Management Classes and Copy Groups are much too much to teach in an e-mail. You will have to read, but don't despair! Tom, Migration is important, it is housekeeping. It moves data from higher tier storage to lower tier storage. It doesn't age your data or expire it. It should not scare you. It helps keep disk space free. In our shop, we backup to disk then migrate to tape. Probably every restore I have ever done has come from tape. Most restores were pretty fast painless events. Having data on disk makes if fast to restore, but tape is pretty fast too, and it's cheaper. Backing up to disk gives you the advantage of being able to backup more clients (concurrently) than you have tape drives. Management Classes and Copy Groups are basic setup of retention Without those, you don't have retention. Somewhere, someone has defined them, even if it is the defaults. (I work in the command line, you may be using the graphical interface. I may have difficulty giving you guidance you can use because of that.) Management Classes are labels and folders holding the definitions of retention. Copy Groups ARE the definitions of retention. The terms confuse people a lot. People look up management classes when they want copy group definitions. You define (create) a mgmt class and then define a copy group that is tied to that mgmt class. (Actually it should be a pair of copy groups, but that can wait.) TSM is POLICY oriented. Management classes are part of a POLICY Domain. They have individualized names that are often meaningful to admins. Copy Groups, are retention policy definitions tied to a given Management Class. They are all named "Standard". Clients belong to a particular DOMAIN. Clients have access to any of the Management Classes that are defined in the Domain to which they belong. (The Domain in the Active Policy Set...) MgmtClasses can be applied individually for each client in the client's options file (dsm.opt or dsm.sys...or a separate include/exclude file, just to keep things confusing.) There should always be a DEFAULT mgmtclass for each domain that is applied at the TSM server. You can get information about YOUR Management Classes and Copy Groups from the command line. Try: - q mg * active (or add f=d (format=detail)) - q co * active (or add f=d (format=detail)) - TSM gives you online "man pages" for the command line. - help def mg - help def co You should see things like this: tsm: <TSM_Server>>q mg * active Policy Policy Mgmt Default Description Domain Set Name Class Mgmt Name Name Class ? --------- --------- --------- --------- ------------------------ Broker_ORA ACTIVE DATA Yes Broker Oracle MGMT Class Broker_UNIX ACTIVE APP_MC No Broker App MGMT Class Broker_UNIX ACTIVE AUDITLOGS_MC No 7yr Audit Log Archive Broker_UNIX ACTIVE LONGTERM_MC No 10yr Archive Broker_UNIX ACTIVE MKSYSB_MC No mksysb 30day MGMT Class Broker_UNIX ACTIVE SHORTTERM_MC No 3yr Archive Broker_UNIX ACTIVE UNIX_MC Yes Broker Unix MGMT Class Broker_WIN ACTIVE WINDOWS_MC Yes Broker Windows MGMT Class LEGACYBroker ACTIVE 7YR_MC Yes Legacy Broker 7yr MGMT Class //...// tsm: <TSM_Server>>q co * active Policy Policy Mgmt Copy Versions Versions Retain Retain Domain Set Name Class Group Data Data Extra Only Name Name Name Exists Deleted Versions Version --------- --------- --------- --------- -------- -------- -------- ------- Broker_ORA ACTIVE DATA STANDARD 1 0 0 0 Broker_UNIX ACTIVE APP_MC STANDARD 3 1 180 365 Broker_UNIX ACTIVE MKSYSB_MC STANDARD 4 1 30 No Limit Broker_UNIX ACTIVE UNIX_MC STANDARD 3 3 90 60 Broker_WIN ACTIVE WINDOWS_MC STANDARD 3 3 180 365 LEGACYBroker ACTIVE 7YR_MC STANDARD No Limit No Limit 2,600 2,600 Dealer_ORA ACTIVE DATA STANDARD 1 0 0 0 Dealer_UNIX ACTIVE APP_MC STANDARD 3 1 180 365 Dealer_UNIX ACTIVE UNIX_MC STANDARD 3 3 90 90 Dealer_WIN ACTIVE WINDOWS_MC STANDARD 3 3 180 365 Q MG queries your management classes. It tells you what Domain and Policy Set each one belongs to, the name of each MgmtClass, whether or not it is the Default MgmtClass for that Domain, and a Description (maybe). The description is just what some admin thought would be descriptive about each MgmtClass. That tells you what is available and what should be getting applied by default. It DOESN'T tell you what your retention is! Q CO queries your Copy Groups. It tells you what MgmtClass each belongs to, and lists the same Domain and PolicySet names that are listed for it's MgmtClass. It also tells you what your retention is for Inactive objects. (Active Objects are never deleted. That is how incremental backup works.) Versions Data Exists = (How MANY) old versions of objects that are still on the client host should be kept Versions Data Deleted = (How MANY) old versions of objects that have been deleted from the client host should be kept Retain Extra Versions = (How LONG) should a given object be retained after it has become inactive Retain Only Version = (How LONG) should the last remaining Inactive version be retained. (In case you want to keep the LAST inactive version of a file (object) for a different period, like..forever.) ACTIVE Objects are objects that were on the client host as of the most recent backup (even if it was 5 years ago, eg: server backed up, shutdown, then powered off...but never removed from TSM). They are never expired, UNLESS, they become: INACTIVE Objects, by being deleted from the client host (or renamed) AND the client is backed up afteward. (Versions Data Deleted) Or an Active object can "generate" inactive objects without being deleted. If it is touched or changed (without being deleted or renamed), then it stays an Active Object to TSM, but the version from yesterday's backup becomes an InActive version (version of an active object). (Versions Data Exists - version of objects that still exists on the host.) ||| Have I confused you enough?||| FYI stuff below here: tsm: <TSM_Server>>help def mg 3.14.23 DEFINE MGMTCLASS (Define a management class) Use this command to define a new management class in a policy set. To allow clients to use the new management class, you must activate the policy set that contains the new class. You can define one or more management classes for each policy set in a policy domain. A management class can contain a backup copy group, an archive copy group, or both. The user of a client node can select any management class in the active policy set or use the default management class. Note: The DEFINE MGMTCLASS command fails if a copy storage pool is specified as the destination for space-managed files. Privilege class To issue this command, you must have system privilege, unrestricted policy privilege, or restricted policy privilege for the policy domain to which the management class belongs. Syntax >>-DEFine MGmtclass--domain_name--policy_set_name--class_name---> .-SPACEMGTECHnique--=--NONE----------. >--+------------------------------------+-----------------------> '-SPACEMGTECHnique--=--+-AUTOmatic-+-' +-SELective-+ '-NONE------' .-AUTOMIGNOnuse--=--0----. >--+------------------------+-----------------------------------> '-AUTOMIGNOnuse--=--days-' .-MIGREQUIRESBkup--=--Yes-----. >--+-----------------------------+------------------------------> '-MIGREQUIRESBkup--=--+-Yes-+-' '-No--' .-MIGDESTination--=--SPACEMGPOOL-. >--+--------------------------------+---------------------------> '-MIGDESTination--=--pool_name---' >--+-----------------------------+----------------------------->< '-DESCription--=--description-' more... (<ENTER> to continue, 'C' to cancel) ================================================== tsm: <TSM_Server>help def co 3.14.8 DEFINE COPYGROUP (Define a copy group) Use this command to define a new backup or archive copy group within a specific management class, policy set, and policy domain. The server uses the backup and archive copy groups to control how clients back up and archive files, and to manage the backed-up and archived files. To allow clients to use the new copy group, you must activate the policy set that contains the new copy group. You can define one backup and one archive copy group for each management class. To ensure that client nodes can back up files, include a backup copy group in the default management class for a policy set. Note: The DEFINE COPYGROUP command fails if you specify a copy storage pool as a destination. The DEFINE COPYGROUP command has two forms, one for defining a backup copy group and one for defining an archive copy group. The syntax and parameters for each form are defined separately. Table 54. Commands related to DEFINE COPYGROUP +----------------------------------+----------------------------------+ | Command | Description | +----------------------------------+----------------------------------+ | ASSIGN DEFMGMTCLASS | Assigns a management class as | | | the default for a specified | | | policy set. | //...// 3.14.8.1 DEFINE COPYGROUP -- backup Use this command to define a new backup copy group within a specific management class, policy set, and policy domain. Privilege class To issue this command, you must have system privilege, unrestricted policy privilege, or restricted policy privilege for the policy domain to which the copy group belongs. Syntax >>-DEFine COpygroup--domain_name--policy_set_name--class_name---> .-STANDARD-. .-Type--=--Backup-. >--+----------+--+-----------------+----------------------------> '-STANDARD-' '-Type--=--Backup-' .-FREQuency--=--0----. >--DESTination--=--pool_name--+--------------------+------------> '-FREQuency--=--days-' .-VERExists--=--2-----------. >--+---------------------------+--------------------------------> '-VERExists--=--+-number--+-' '-NOLimit-' .-VERDeleted--=--1-----------. >--+----------------------------+-------------------------------> '-VERDeleted--=--+-number--+-' more... (<ENTER> to continue, 'C' to cancel) '-NOLimit-' .-RETExtra--=--30----------. .-RETOnly--=--60----------. >--+--------------------------+--+-------------------------+----> '-RETExtra--=--+-days----+-' '-RETOnly--=--+-days----+-' '-NOLimit-' '-NOLimit-' .-MODE--=--MODified-----. >--+-----------------------+------------------------------------> '-MODE--=--+-MODified-+-' '-ABSolute-' .-SERialization--=--SHRSTatic------. >--+----------------------------------+-------------------------> '-SERialization--=--+-SHRSTatic--+-' +-STatic-----+ +-SHRDYnamic-+ '-DYnamic----' >--+----------------------------------+------------------------>< '-TOCDestination--=----pool_name---' Parameters domain_name (Required) Specifies the policy domain for which you are defining the copy group. policy_set_name (Required) Specifies the policy set for which you are defining the copy group. You cannot define a copy group for a management class that belongs to the ACTIVE policy set. George Huebschman (George H.) 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