(Since v2.2 - Enteprise Edition only)
An incremental backup generates smaller backup files by storing only the delta between two versions of the database. This is useful when you execute a backup on a regular basis and you want to avoid having to back up the entire database each time.
Every time a backup is executed, OrientDB writes a file named last-backup.json in the database directory. This is an example of the content:
{
"lsn": 8438432,
"startedOn": "2015-08-17 10:33:23.943",
"completedOn": "2015-08-17 10:33:45.121"
}The most important information is the lsn field that is the WAL LSN (Last Serial Number). Thanks to this number, OrientDB is able to understand the last change in the database, so the next incremental backup will be done starting from last lsn + 1.
Backup Database console command accepts -incremental as an optional parameter to execute an incremental backup. In this case the new backup is executed from the last backup (file last-backup.json is read if present). If this is the first incremental backup, a full backup is executed. Example:
orientdb> connect plocal:/databases/mydb admin admin
orientdb {db=Whisky}> backup database /tmp/backup -incremental
The incremental backup setting also allows you to specify an LSN version to start with. Example:
orientdb> connect plocal:/databases/mydb admin admin
orientdb {db=Whisky}> backup database /tmp/backup -incremental=93222
You can perform an incremental backup via the Java API too.
NOTE The remote protocol is supported, but the specified path is relative to the server.
If you are managing an ODocumentDatabase you have to call the incrementalBackup() method that accepts a String path parameter to the backup directory:
ODatabaseDocumentTx documentDatabase = new ODatabaseDocumentTx(dbURL);
documentDatabase.open("root", "password");
documentDatabase.incrementalBackup("/tmp/backup");
If you are using the OrientGraph interface you have to get the raw graph before calling the incrementalBackup() method:
OrientGraph graphDatabase = new OrientGraphNoTx(dbURL);
graphDatabase.open("root", "password");
graphDatabase.getRawGraph().incrementalBackup("/tmp/backup");
Restore Database console command automatically recognizes if a backup contains incremental data. Restoring an incremental backup creates a new database with the restored content. You cannot perform an in-place incremental restore on an existing database. The execution of the create database command with the option -restore builds a fresh database and performs the incremental restore starting from the backup path.
Example:
orientdb> create database remote:localhost/mydb root root plocal graph -restore=/tmp/backup
Creating database [remote:localhost/mydb] using the storage type [plocal]...
Connecting to database [remote:localhost/mydb] with user 'admin'...OK
Database created successfully.
Current database is: remote:localhost/mydb
You can perform an incremental restore via the Java API too.
To create a database from an incremental backup you can call from Java ODatabase#create(path-to-incremental-backup-directory).
The incremental backup is used in the Distributed Architecture when a server node restarts. This avoids having to backup and tranfer the entire database across the network.
In case of incremental backup, the content of the zip file is not the database directory, but rather meta files needed to update the database with the delta. Example of the content:
- Employee.pcl
- Person.pcl.incremental
- Person.pcm.incremental
This means only three files are changed. Employee.pcl is a full file, while the other two files with extension ".incremental" are incremental. Incremental files contain all the page changes and have the following format:
+----------------+-----------------+
| PAGE NUMBER | PAGE CONTENT |
| (long) | byte[] |
+----------------+-----------------+