Navision Backups

nvg · 2005-08-26

Hi All,

I have to maintain the Customer DBs at my local network where we have set up Development DBs for the customers on a Navision Server in our network.

So when some major change is done and new data is added to the LIVE DB at the customer end, we take that complete Backup (so that we get the data also) and bring that backup here.

Now the problem is that when we want to restore that backup into our Development DB, we cannot do that simply. We first need to delete the DB and recreate that. Then do the restore.

The point is that we want the live data also in our development DB. If only objects are modified, then we can export the FOB and import that here. But to get the actual DATA from the customer, we need to delete the development DB and recreate and restore their data.

Is there a better way of doing this without deleting the DB everytime we have a new backup. And with huge databases of our customers, this takes really long time.

Please advice.

Regards, NVG

skid · 2005-08-26

You didn't say how big your "huge" is though in my personal opinion, if you need database with real data only for development simply zipping all database.fdb will be a much better idea. Some things to consider:

1. It will be A LOT faster. When creating/restoring standard navision backups it needs to read all data, rebuild indexes and etc. this takes way too long for huge databases.

2. System backups take up more space (~5 times more than standard backups (I compared after compressing both system backup and fbk)).

3. Compression works good on fdb (10 times and more).

4. This way you can end up with an inconsistent database (read post http://www.mibuso.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7408), but that is not a problem if you will only use it for development. If things go wrong you can make another copy. Besides, this rearly happens. Even if one part of a database is corrupt most often you will be able to work with the rest of it.

Well.. unless you expanded client database up to something ilogical.

nvg · 2005-08-26

Dear Skid,

U did not get me.

My problem is not the size of the DB. My problem is that each time I receive the complete backup of the DB from the customer, I have to delete the development DB at my end and re-create that again. Then I restore that backup into the newly created development DB.

Simply deleting the Company and then restoring does not work either. In this case, no new data from the backup is visible after the restoration.

I hope I am clear this time. By the way how is Differential Backup possible in Navision??

Regards,
NVG

pindev · 2005-08-26

Differential backups are available in MS SQL - not so simple to migrate everything to another RDBMS, but an idea for large corporate customers.
With the native database you cannot do a lot - however, just copying the database should perform better, than doing the navision backups (useful only for really small implementations) - you have also a hotcopy tool, so you can take customer databases online.

Regards.

Luc_VanDyck · 2005-08-26

Why don't you schedule HOTCOPY.EXE to run at your customer site? This way a copy of the fdb-file can be made, while the database is in use. You will have an exact copy of the fdb file, and no restore is needed.

DenSter · 2005-08-26

You don't have to delete the entire db. You can also just delete the company from the test db and restore the live db into the test system.

nvg · 2005-08-28

Dear DenSter,

U are the only one who got close to understanding my problem. Could be I am not clear with my problem up till now?

I tried deleting just the Company and then doing the restore. But I am afraid to say that I did not see the latest data when I logged in again. This happened with me many times and that is the reason, I felt that there is no other option than to delete the entire DB each time and create a new DB (.FDB) file. And then doing the restore into this new FDB to get the company and the latest data.

Are u 100% sure that just deleting the company and doing the restore works at ur end??

regards,
NVG

DenSter · 2005-08-28

Are you sure that when you log back in, you selected a company? Press F12 after logging in and select one of the companies and you should see the data.

Absolutely, without any exceptions, I have always seen the data of the backup every time I finished any restore into a test database. The only thing I can think that could have gone wrong is that you did not select a company when you created the backup in the first place.

You can create 'data-only' backups by inchecking the Application Objects box, but of course, then the objects in your test database have to be compatible with the data in the backup file.

nvg · 2005-08-30

Dear DenSter,

There is one more aspect to this problem. The tables I am checking for updated data are "DataPerCompany = NO". Which means these are shared tables.

When I restore the backup after just deleting the company, the data in these tables are not updated (with the data from the backup).

The only solution I have is to completely delete the DB and then create a new one and then restore into that.

Any more advice u have on this matter?

Regards,
NVG

DenSter · 2005-08-30

What I am saying is that every single time, without exception, if the data is in the backup, it will end up in your database after you restore. If you don't see the data in your database after the restore, it wasn't in the backup file to begin with.

I don't think the problem is with your restore process, I think it is with the backup file. When you create the backup, and you want to include the common data, you have to check the 'data common to all companies' checkbox in the dialog box.

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