Overview

x360Recover Tiered Retention cleanup is a very efficient way to optimize storage for protected system backup history while maintaining a reasonable degree of granularity in available recovery points, but its automated selection of which snapshots to purge is not very flexible when partners need to retain a specific recovery point indefinitely.

Starting with release 17.5.0, x360recover now has a new feature to allow forcing the retention of specific recovery points: Pinned Snapshots.

Use Case

Pinning a snapshot blocks it from being removed via retention cleanup and also prevents manual deletion of the recovery point.

This can be useful to preserve a specific point in time on the protected system for various reasons:

• The server has just been migrated to new hardware
• A major application is about to be/has just been updated
• You need one or more points in time preserved for a Legal Hold requirement
• A specific recovery point has data that exists in no other backup

Pinning and Unpinning Snapshots

Selecting the Pin icon from the Actions column of the Snapshots table marks the recovery point as Pinned. A pop-up dialog appears briefly, stating that the snapshot is now pinned.

To Unpin the snapshot, click the active Pin icon again. A dialog appears requesting confirmation.

Be aware that when unpinning snapshots, they become eligible for deletion by the retention cleanup process. Cleanup could occur immediately after it is unpinned, or run sometime within the next hour.

If the Protected System has an Encryption Passphrase assigned, you need to enter this when unpinning a previously pinned snapshot.

Pinned Snapshots and AutoVerify

Recovery Points tested via AutoRecovery are automatically soft-pinned and retained throughout the Keep-One-Snapshot-Per-Day tier. In practice, this means you will most likely have TWO snapshots retained each day in this tier: one will be the last backup taken during the day, and the other will be the snapshot tested via AutoVerify; these are rarely the same recovery point.

AutoVerify tested snapshots are now marked in the Snapshots table, and a history of previous results is stored and accessible for review. Previously, only the most recent AutoVerify details were preserved and accessible within the Details page.

You can all filter by type to quickly locate snapshots that are In-Use by a recovery operation, manually pinned, or have been tested via AutoVerify.

Best Practices

Pinned Snapshots are meant to be used sparingly and with purpose, not as a means to circumvent retention limits.

When pinning a snapshot, it is recommended to also add a note on the recovery point explaining why it was pinned, for later reference. Click the Note icon in the Actions pane to view or edit the note attached to the snapshot.