Configuring the VHS Recovery Utility

The configuration of the VHS Recovery utility will vary depending on your unique recovery situation. For backfilling a new history database after a Quick Recovery event, CygNet recommends restoring history from Journal Files and then attempting to restore data from the "dirty" database created by the Quick Recovery process. When restoring history data for any reason, CygNet recommends using filtering only where absolutely necessary. Unnecessary filter criteria can dramatically slow the recovery process. This is especially true when the filter contains UDC or Facility as the history service does not store this information and must cross reference against the Point service to obtain it.

Configuring the VHS Recovery Utility

1. Click … to select the VHS Service to which you wish to restore data.
2. Type the Domain on which the service is located.
3. Click … to select a Status Tag if desired. See Status Tag for more information.

1. Browse to select the CVS Site.Service.
2. Select the Status Tag from the list.
3. Click the OK button.

4. Add a recovery item to the recovery plan.

1. Click either Add Journal Recovery Item  or Add Database Recovery Item  icon on the toolbar, as appropriate.
2. Browse to select either the Journal File or Database Folder of the history data you wish to restore. The multiple character wildcard (*) can be used to specify multiple journal files or database folders.

For example, *.JNL will restore from all journal files in the selected folder; Journal_20110505*.JNL will restore data from all journal files created on May 5, 2011; and Journal_20110505000014.JNL will restore from exactly one file created on May 5, 2011 at 14 seconds past midnight.

Using a wildcard to specify multiple database folders may be useful after events such as a succession of power failures, where Quick Recovery has created several "dirty" database directories in a small amount of time. Setting the database folder to QR_DirtyDB_20110505* would recover data from all database files created on May 5, 2011. In the multiple power failure scenario, some of those database files may have been online long enough to collect data from the current value services before the power was lost and the databases were archived during Quick Recovery. It would be important to recover this data even though the database was only operational for a short time.

3. If desired, enable Include Only When File Time Suffix is After. This will only include files or folders that are more recent than the time specified. This can be either a wildcard (for example, T-1) or an exact time.

Journal files and "dirty" database folders are named with a suffix indicating the timestamp of their creation. The VHS Recovery utility can filter files/folders based on that timestamp using the Include Only When File Time Suffix is After option.

Click … to Select Date and Time after which files should be included. Options are: Absolute Date/Time, Relative Date/Time, or Relative Day. Click OK when done.

For example, to include only journal folders created today, specify that the File Time Suffix must be after T-1 (yesterday). An absolute time may also be used instead of a relative date reference.

See Date and Time Wildcards for more information about using wildcards in timestamps.

4. If desired, add filter rules. Click Edit Filter to view the History Data Filter dialog box. Filtering should be used only as necessary, as it can slow the recovery process. See Using CygNet Filter Rules for a general discussion on using CygNet filter rules.
5. Ensure Enable Recovery Item is enabled.
6. Click OK.

5. Repeat step 4 until all the appropriate steps have been added to the recovery plan.
6. Use the Up and Down icons on the toolbar to change the order of the recovery steps, if necessary.
7. Click the Save icon on the toolbar to save the configuration to an .xml file for re-use.
8. To execute the recovery, select Execute from the File menu. When prompted to confirm, click Yes to start the recovery and begin writing history data to the specified service, or click No to cancel.

Command-Line Usage

A recovery can be initiated via a command line. The command-line syntax is defined as:

[<filename.xml> [/A [/d <domain>] [/s <site.service>] ]]

where:

• filename.xml is the name of the recovery XML file to open upon execution
• /A is the auto-run parameter, which when added will automatically perform the recovery steps defined in the recovery XML file without invoking the dialog box
• When the auto-run parameter (/A) is supplied, the following parameters can be added to override the values contained in the recovery XML file. This allows a single generic recovery file to be used in many similar circumstances.
  • /d to specify the domain, and/or
  • /s to specify a history site and service.

Example