Knowledgebase

Dynamic Dump Restore Fails

Restoring files from a dynamic dump stream file may fail for various reasons. Some examples include:

• The dump restore script is missing.
• The dump restore script contains invalid options or options that are inconsistent with FairCom DB settings.
• An error occurs when the dump restore attempts to restore files to the dump time.
• The dump restore is performed in a directory with files that interfere with the restore procedure (such as existing transaction logs).

When a dump restore operation fails, the ctrdmp utility logs error messages to the file CTSTATUS.FCS. Check this file for a FairCom DB error code that explains the cause of the failure and take the appropriate action. Review the dump restore procedure to ensure that the proper steps were followed.

Data and index files are dumped to the dump stream file by reading the contents of the file from disk. Because a file is not instantaneously read in its entirety, a data or index file in the dump stream file may consist of the file contents as they appear over a period of time. Dump recovery includes the transaction log activity during the dump time, so that the file can be restored to its state at the time the dump began. For this reason, if the dump restore successfully extracts files from the dynamic dump stream file but fails when attempting to restore the files to the dump time, the restored data and index files are in an unknown state.

If ctrdmp fails when attempting to restore the files to the dump time and no solution can be found, the affected data and index files can be rebuilt to ensure the data and index files are in sync, but the rebuild may fail because the data file may contain a mixture of record images from different points in time, or the files can be restored from a different backup.

Note: Consider performing dump restore operations offline immediately after the dynamic dump backup is performed so that dump restore failures can be resolved at backup time rather than at restore time.