What Backup Optimization does in RMAN backup

•You can see whether your backup optimization is on or off by issuing following commands,

RMAN> SHOW BACKUP OPTIMIZATION;

RMAN configuration parameters are:
CONFIGURE BACKUP OPTIMIZATION OFF; # default

By default it is OFF. To make it ON issue,

RMAN> CONFIGURE BACKUP OPTIMIZATION ON;

Now the question is if backup optimization is on then how RMAN behaves while taking
backup. In the following section I will try to make understand.

•In a straight-forward if you enable backup optimization, then the BACKUP command skips
backing up files when the identical file has already been backed up to the specified device
type. Now question is how RMAN check whether the file is identical or not?

-In case of datafile RMAN compares the DBID, checkpoint SCN, creation SCN, and
RESETLOGS SCN and time as a datafile already in a backup. If they are identical then skip
to take backup again.

-In case of archived redo log RMAN compares thread, sequence number, and RESETLOGS
SCN and time.

-In case of backupset RMAN compares recid and stamp.

Besides these comparison RMAN further checks to determine whether to skip the file,
because both the retention policy and the backup duplexing feature are factors in the
algorithm that determines whether RMAN has sufficient backups on the specified device
type.

•Backup optimization applies to only commands,

-BACKUP DATABASE
-BACKUP ARCHIVELOG with ALL or LIKE options
-BACKUP BACKUPSET ALL

•You can override optimization at any time by specifying the FORCE option on the
BACKUP command.
Like,

RMAN>BACKUP DATABASE FORCE;

RMAN>BACKUP DEVICE TYPE sbt BACKUPSET ALL FORCE;
Posted by Arju at 11:44 PM
Labels: Backup, RMAN
 RMAN backup Optimization

Oracle Tips by Burleson Consulting

May 10, 2010

Question:  What is the RMAN backup optimization feature and how does it work?

Answer:  The RMAN backup optimization feature is controlled by these commands:

RMAN> configure backup optimization on;

RMAN> configure backup optimization off;

When you turn on backup optimization, all backup commands will skip backups of any file if
it has not changed and if it has already been backed up to the allocated device type.  A file
can be any dbf file, an archived redo log or an RMAN "backup set".  Here are some of the
main features of the RMAN configure backup optimization on command:

 In order to back up the flash recovery area itself using RMAN, you must set configure backup
optimization to ON.
 Setting backup optimization on stops the backups of Read Only Tablespaces (ROT), whenever
a valid backup of the tablespace already exists in the RMAN catalog database.
 If backup optimization is enabled, then RMAN skips backups of archived logs that have
already been backed up to the allocated device.