How to Archive Netvault Logs (78911)

NetVault logs can be kept online for as long as you wish. However, since NetVault uses a Binary format, when it is opened, it must do a complete sort of the log from beginning to end before it can open up. So as the log gets larger and larger the time it takes to open and view the log becomes longer and longer.

Log Purging parameters can be set in the NetVault Configurator under the “Logging Daemon” Tab.  Detailed explanation of each of these functions can be found in the NetVault Backup (NVBU) Configuration Guide on the Quest Website:

http://www.quest.com/netvault-backup/

When changing the Log Purging parameters, the changes represent what NetVault will do with entries from this point forward. Any changes you make are NOT retrospective. For example, if you change the setting to Auto-purge entries that are older then 120 days (its default) to 30 days, this tells NetVault that from this day forward any NEW entries that get put in the log need to be purged when that entry becomes 30 days old. It has no effect on log entries already present when the change was made.

A good way to manage your logs is doing a Binary Log Dump for a scheduled period of time then do a purge after the dump.

When you open to view the Binary Log it will only display back two days or 5000 entries, which ever is greater. So this limits the amount of data you can get in a single Binary Dump. You can certainly go into the Filter option and choose the “To and From” dates for it to display, but remember it will stop at 5000 entries. You can raise this 5000 limitation from the NVBU Configurator:

NVBU Configurator -> GUI tab -> Logging

Raising this number too high can cause potential problems with your computer resources and caution should be used, especially with systems with limited resources or has other vital applications running on it.

So keeping all this in mind as to how much you can get into one log display you can use the log dumping process to offline your logs. This is the same procedure support asks you do when sending in your logs is required.

1. Open up the NetVault GUI.
2. Open up Log Manager.
3. Select Dump logs to file Icon just to the right of Filter icon in upper left hand side.
4. Give the log a meaningful name that will help ID it later (no extension).
5. Keep selection at "Binary".
6. Press OK
7. Log will be saved to "../netvault/logs/dumps/binary" directory

To view the log dump from the Log Manager you select “Options” then “Select Logs Source” it will open a browser to the directory that the log was put in with an .nlg extension. Select log of your choice, and click “OK”

Now that you have the log safely archived, you can purge the online log:
1. Open the NVBU Logs window.
2. Click Purge Logs on the Options menu.
3. In the Purge Log Entries To box, enter the date up to which you want to
delete the logs.
4. Click OK.

You can also use 'nvlogpurge' executable. Instructions for this command line utility can be found in the NetVault Command Line Interface (CLI) Guide from our website.

There is another utility tool that can be found in the "../NetVault/util" directory called 'nvlogdump'. Syntax for using this can be found by typing nvlogdump in either command or terminal window or look in the CLI user guide.

It should be possible if you are proficient enough in scripting to use nvlogdump and nvlogpurge that will help automate some if not all the process of log archiving

NOTE: Helping you write scripts is outside the parameters of Quest NetVault Support. If you require help with this it would be suggested to seek out a third party consultant to do this for you.