Preflight Checks for Your Backups

The Preflight Check (PFC) utility enables you to run vital checks on the Arcserve Backup server and agents to detect conditions that may cause backup jobs to fail. The checks performed by PFC fall into the following categories:

• System Checks--These include checking system requirements for the server, available disk space for the database, and RPC service registration.
• Arcserve Backup Checks--These include checking the Arcserve Backup system account and its privileges, the status of the Arcserve Backup engines, SAN server connectivity (if the Arcserve Backup SAN Option is installed), and the health of the tape devices attached to the server.

• Agent Checks--These include checking the connection and credentials for any client and database agents needed for the job.
• Note: The Preflight Check utility does not validate login credentials for the following database agents:
  • Agent for Informix
  • Agent for Lotus Domino
  • Agent for Microsoft SharePoint Server
  • Agent for Microsoft Exchange Server
  • Agent for Microsoft SQL Server
  • Agent for Oracle
  • Agent for Sybase
  • Enterprise Option for SAP R/3 for Oracle

• Media Checks--These include checking the availability of media in the scratch set (if a media pool is specified for the job), checking the media expiration dates, and checking for source and destination conflicts for File System Devices.

The optimum time to run this command is a couple of hours before your jobs are scheduled to run so that you can have ample time to correct any problems that may appear in the PFC report. For more information on the PFC utility and its associated options, see the Command Line Reference Guide.

Before submitting a job, you can run a Preflight Check clicking the Preflight Check button on the Submit Job dialog.

Example: PFC Utility

You submit a job and run the PFC utility. If the PFC utility detects that a device is not assigned to the device group that you are using for the backup job, the PFC utility reports a failed job. To correct the problem, you must either use a device group with an assigned device or assign a device to the device group that you are using for the job. If you do not take corrective action, the job will eventually fail.

This capability is also supported when you run the PFC command line utility. For more information, see the Command Line Reference Guide.