Release Notes
LiteSpeed™ for SQL Server® 8.5
Release Notes
November 2016
These release notes provide information about the LiteSpeed™ for SQL Server® 8.5 release.
About LiteSpeed™ for SQL Server® 8.5
LiteSpeed for SQL Server 8.5 is a major release, with new features and functionality. See New and Updated Features. LiteSpeed for SQL Server, or LiteSpeed, is a fast and flexible backup and recovery solution that allows DBAs to easily maintain complete control over the backup and recovery process. Its low-impact, high-performance compression and encryption technology enables users to reduce storage costs and protect data, while improving both backup and disaster recovery times. With the improved compression and LiteSpeed's Fast Compression technology, LiteSpeed for SQL Server can further reduce disk space and backup time up to another 85% over traditional, compressed full backup solutions. The result is a unique backup and recovery approach, unmatched in flexibility, that greatly reduces backup times, creates a significantly smaller storage footprint, and maintains a high level of recoverability.
Key Benefits
-
Cloud backup for Microsoft Azure Blob storage and Amazon S3
- Reduce storage requirements to save valuable disk space with Fast Compression (reduce storage and improve backup times up to 85% over traditional full backup solutions)
- Optimize use of available server resources with LiteSpeed's Adaptive Compression
- Reduce backup times to improve maintenance windows
- Reduce restore times to avoid excessive downtime
-
Automate backup testing and running database consistency checks using Automated Restore
- Easily configure backup jobs and maintenance plans on multiple instances by deploying LiteSpeed Backup Templates
- Easily configure and monitor Log Shipping using the Create LiteSpeed Log Shipping Plan Wizard and Monitoring tab in the LiteSpeed UI Console
- Recover data and schema from backups using LiteSpeed's Object Level Recovery
- Undo critical transactions using LiteSpeed's Transaction Log Reader
- View backup performance across the enterprise using LiteSpeed's centralized reporting repository
- Easily manage SQL Agent jobs across multiple servers using LiteSpeed's Job Manager
- Easily configure maintenance plans across the enterprise using LiteSpeed's Maintenance Plan Designer
- Leverage LiteSpeed's advanced engine tuning, including CPU Affinity, CPU Throttling, and Threading options
- Analyze your environment for best backup performance and identify bottlenecks using LiteSpeed's Backup Analyzer
- Eight highly optimized levels of compression
- Secure data using backup encryption up to AES-256
New Features
New and Updated Features
New and updated features in LiteSpeed Version 8.5.
SQL Server 2016 support
- Support of Sql Server 2016 has been added.
Object Level Recovery performance
- Object Level Recovery has been enhanced by adding multi-threading support which results in a significant (marked) improvement of Object Level Recovery speed.
- Note that on the Recover Table Wizard | Advanced Options | Direct Mode is selected by default and performs faster than the Bulk Insert alternative.
Transaction Log Reader scalability
- The Log Reader has been enhanced by adding multi-threading support which results in a significant (marked) improvement of Transaction Log Reader scalability.
Restore from a different SQL Server instance
- In the Restore Wizard you can now select the SQL Server instance and database to restore from.
Automated Restore
- Restore Verify Only option has been added. This allows you to verify backups in Automated Restore without real database restoring.
- New option Verify the latest full or differential backup has been added. Use this to check only the latest backup without needing to check the full restore chain of backups.
Restore to Different Instance reporting
- A new report Restore by Source has been added to the LiteSpeed activity reports.
- The report shows restore activities performed on different SQL Server instances for backups created on the selected SQL Server instance in the tree.
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Note: Central repository is required. |
Backup
- The default backup name and description can now include the AlwaysOn Availability Group name by using the variable %AG%. This allows you to group databases into folders based on the AlwaysOn Availability Group name. It is ignored for databases that are not in an AlwaysOn Availability Group.
Backup Templates
- The location for Transaction Log backups can now be set independent of the Fast Compression / Full backups location. The path can be modified for each instance at deployment time.
- You can now use the Backup Template to exclude individual databases within the selected categories of all databases, system databases, user databases and databases matching a wildcard or regular expression. Further to this, individual databases can be excluded at deployment. The path to the Transaction Log backup is visible from the LiteSpeed Console.
Multi-Database Backup
- There is a new Exclude Databases step to the Backup Wizard. If you selected to include all databases, system databases or user databases then you can use the Exclude Databases step to select those databases you do not want backed up.
Backup folder creation now has automatic retry logic
- LiteSpeed now makes 3 attempts for folder creation at 0.5 second intervals.
Database Properties
- The Database Properties dialog from the Backup Manager now indicates whether FileStream is enabled. A new Stretch Database property is also included for SQL Server 2016 Stretch Databases.
Support for IAM Roles on Amazon EC2
- LiteSpeed now supports IAM Roles authentication on Amazon EC2 virtual machines connecting to S3 storage.
Regions added to Amazon S3 Cloud
- US East (Ohio) is added to the Amazon S3 Cloud region selection list.
- Mumbai India is added to the Amazon S3 Cloud region selection list.
Azure Cold Storage
- LiteSpeed has been tested with Azure Cold Storage. It is fully compatible.
Enhancements
The following is a list of enhancements implemented in LiteSpeed 8.5.
This section can be removed if there are no customer-requested enhancements. Enhancements should have a
tracking number; otherwise, they can be considered new features.
Use the optional groups to organize enhancements logically, as it applies to your product (for example, by
feature/functionality). Start with General Enhancements.
Do not use letter prefixes in defect numbers:
• Correct: 56479
• Incorrect: TF56479
Table 1: Backup and restore enhancements
| Enhancement | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| "Dryrun" option added to all backup procedures including FC | 116151 |
| "Keep original data file names" option added for restore to new database | 119669 |
| Multi-Database Backup and Backup Templates supports exclude database function | 116591 |
Table 2: OLR enhancements
| Enhancement | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| OLR performance was significantly improved and can with files more than 1,5 TB in size | 119576 |
| Memory usage of the xp_objectrecovery_viewcontents procedure significantly decreased | 117439 |
Table 3: Log Shipping enhancements
| Enhancement | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Log Shipping file naming logic was re-built to avoid path string size limitations in the Operating System. | 116700 |
Table 4: Common enhancements
| Enhancement | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| LiteSpeed fully supports custom fields in connection strings, like Encrypt=yes and applicationintent=readonly | 114407 114598 |
Resolved Issues
In LiteSpeed 8.5
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.5.
Table 5: Backup and Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Performance issue related to mirrored backups resolved | 115926 |
| Issue with hanging backups on high load systems resolved | 119546 119800 |
| LiteSpeed install on windows 2012/2016 servers does not need NET 3.5 any more | 119868 |
| “Provider” parameter added to LS Core ini file | 119658 |
Table 6: Fast Compression resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Number of threads from LiteSpeed defaults correctly applied in Fast Compression | 119711 |
| Escalation events do not raise error status for backup | 119780 |
| Fast Compression can figure out special cases caused by SmartCleanup | 119735 |
Table 7: Remote Deploy resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Remote deploy wizard opens normally on all systems | 119799 |
Table 8: OLR resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Filtered Index is supported | 119598 |
| NTEXT,TEXT, IMAGE types can be restored via Direct Mode | 119724 |
Table 9: Maintenance plans resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Maintenance plan reports can be emailed in all cases | 119476 |
| Striped backups can be deleted from cloud with “delete files older then” option | 119689 |
Table 10: Instance Configuration Wizard resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| AlwaysOn Group listener can be used for the central repository connection | 119600 119596 |
In LiteSpeed 8.2
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.2.
Table 11: Backup template resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Fast Compression templates, that use the “Create a subdirectory” option, and are deployed as Maintenance Plans, no longer deploy with a duplicate backup path name. | 118797 |
Table 12: LiteSpeed Activity resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Improved performance when collecting native backup statistics. | 118737 |
Table 13: Log Reader resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| The Transaction Log Reader now uses a longer timeout to avoid issues when reading large log files. | 118501 |
Table 14: Log Shipping resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Log Shipping now automatically adjusts filename length to meet any OS file/pathname length maximums. | 116700 |
|
LiteSpeed 8.2 now allows editing of Log Shipping plans created with LiteSpeed 8.0. |
119344 |
Table 15: Maintenance Plans resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Maintenance Plan “Run as” settings (as set in Management Studio) are now preserved after editing a maintenance plan in LiteSpeed. | 118502 |
| Maintenance Plans no longer fail to send reports using Database Mail. | 119476 |
Table 16: OLR resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| OLR now supports tail log processing for objects with page compression. | 118299 |
|
OLR is now able to properly restore tables that were configured with page compression. |
119099 |
Table 17: Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| When restoring transaction logs using the Restore Wizard, LiteSpeed now properly defaults file paths to the new database instead of the original paths from the backup. | 118296 |
In LiteSpeed 8.1
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.1.
Table 18: OLR resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Reading backups that contain page compression are supported. | 118154 |
|
OLR performance is now improved for backups with attached files. |
116073 |
| OLR running "generate DDL script" on a stored procedure with a large number of rows has been resolved. | 116575 |
Table 19: LogReader resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| User information has been added to the LogReader. | 106600 |
Table 20: Log Shipping resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| A network resiliency parameter has been added to the Log Shipping Wizard. This should help users specify network resiliency on restore performed by the Log Shipping plan in the Log Shipping Wizard. | 113019 |
|
The ability to have more than one subscriber on one instance has been added to Log Shipping. This gives users the ability to have more than one subscriber database per SQL instance per Log Shipping plan. Clarification: 1 subscriber host 2 databases, that happen to be subscribers, with 1 publisher on the same instance. |
100767 |
Table 21: Maintenance Plans resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| The ability to format the Subject Line in Maintenance Plan "notify operator task" with LiteSpeed %vars has been added to UI. | 112775 |
| Shrink Database, Update Statistics, Rebuild Index, and Reorganize Index activity now can be tracked on the LiteSpeed Activity view. | 117035 |
Table 22: Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
|
Restore of large Tlog files with many threads has been resolved. |
117190 |
| LiteSpeed successfully runs while restoring attached files. | 115440 |
| LiteSpeed now supports direct restore of master database. | 114110 |
Table 23: Cloud resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Backing up large database to the S3 Cloud has been resolved. | 116149 116121 116120 |
Table 24: DCR resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Double Click Restore now works properly for a backup with loader being made on a network share. | 115962 |
Table 25: Backup resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Backup jobs that were getting hung due to in use attached files are now running successfully. | 116627 |
|
Mirror backup details now go into msdb..backupmediafamily for LiteSpeed backups. |
73991 |
Table 26: Other resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Backup File Browser fix – now shows the Modified Date instead of the Create Date. | -- |
In LiteSpeed 8.0.4
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.0.4.
Table 27: Backup/Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Improved Amazon S3 backup algorithm which reduces memory usage while improving backup speed. | 117053 |
|
Fast Compression fix to prevent accidental reuse of an existing differential backup name which caused backup escalations to occur. |
117393 |
| LiteSpeed fix to avoid a possible restore issue with large transaction log backups (>1GB). | 117190 |
In LiteSpeed 8.0.3
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.0.3.
Table 28: Backup/Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Amazon S3 cloud backup and restore are now optimized to better support large databases. | 116121, 116120, 116326, 116149 |
| Amazon S3 backup / restore now supports EU (Frankfurt) region. | 116322 |
| LiteSpeed backups with mirroring now avoid a possible incorrectly formed header error when using the @mirror option to a network path. | 116545 |
| LiteSpeed backups now properly support appending 8.0+ backups to pre-8.0 backup files and no longer report failures on restore. | 116549 |
| Multiple backup jobs that are running in parallel may not complete. | 116627 |
Table 29: Maintenance Plans resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| LiteSpeed maintenance plans no longer fail when backing up to TSM with the “Stripe on TSM object” option. | 116528 |
| LiteSpeed maintenance plans to TSM no longer fail when backing up multiple databases as a result of an incorrect value for the TSM object exists check option. | 116648 |
Table 30: OLR resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| LiteSpeed Object-Level Recovery could throw an exception when generating DDL scripts for large stored procedures. | 116575 |
In LiteSpeed 8.0.2
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.0.2.
Table 31: Backup resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Small backup files no longer increase in size to 32 MB when running LiteSpeed in some environments. | 116333 |
Table 32: Log Shipping resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Existing Log Shipping advanced options are now properly displayed when editing Log Shipping plans. | 116329 |
| Log Shipping backups now use a .TRN extension instead of a temporary backup file extension of .WRK when backup is in progress. | 116439 |
Table 33: Log Reader resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| The LiteSpeed Options dialog for the Log Reader now properly allows users to change the “Check log file every X seconds” option. | 116346 |
| The tab control in the LiteSpeed user-interface for the Log Reader now properly responds to mouse clicks. | 116345 |
Table 34: Other resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| The LiteSpeed About screen now displays the full LiteSpeed version. | 116094 |
In LiteSpeed 8.0.1
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.0.1.
Table 35: Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| In rare cases, LiteSpeed could hang on an Attached File restore. | 115440 |
|
When using the OLRMAP=1 option when backing up, the Object Level Recovery operation can be slow. |
115440 |
Table 36: Log Shipping resolved issue
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
|
Log Shipping cleanup could not properly remove transaction log backup files due to the read-only attribute. Now, cleanup works properly because the read only attribute is removed before deleting the backup files. |
115925 |
| Log Shipping transaction log backup files could be copied before they are completed by the subscribers. Now, LiteSpeed prevents any in-progress backups from being copied until they are complete. | 115895 |
Table 37: Drive detection resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| A backup drive type detection regression issue in LiteSpeed 8.0 has been resolved to ensure that backups properly detect the destination drive type in order to optimize for best performance. | 115928 |
Table 38: Double Click Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
|
A Double Click Restore regression issue in LiteSpeed 8.0 has been resolved to properly handle backups larger than 4 GB. |
115410 |
In LiteSpeed 8.0
The following is a list of issues addressed in release 8.0.
Table 39: Fast Compression resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Fast Compression reuses file names of prior backups once they have been deleted by SmartCleanup. | 115014 |
| Ability to use the same path for striping backup in Maintenance Plans and Backup Wizards | 113519, 113520 |
Table 40: Log Reader resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Removing columns from Summary tab caused exception. | 113265 |
Table 41: Log Shipping resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Create plan may fail with “The INSERT statement conflicted with the FOREIGN KEY constraint "FK_LogShippingPublisher_LiteSpeedDatabase" on case-sensitive SQL Server. | 111900 |
Table 42: Maintenance Plans resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Clean Up History task does not remove history from central repository if LiteSpeed is not installed there. | 112947 |
| Ability to not delete empty subfolders within “Delete files older than” in Clean Up Maintenance Plans task. | 112386 |
| No backup file on main destination made when the network path for mirror backup was not found. | 111936 |
| The %A variable does not work to name a file or folder "Sunday." | 115008 |
| Maintenance Plans may generate duplicated report files. | 115122 |
Table 43: Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Describe Transaction log backup options to make it clear that NO_TRUNCATE will cause database to be in restoring state. | 114745 |
| Automated restore may fail with “Failed extract LSN number value from XML” for pre-7.x LiteSpeed backups. | 113935 |
| Ability to restore attached files to new directories that do not exist at the moment of a restore. | 112048 |
| Failed to restore tape backup. | 115420 |
Table 44: Automated Restore resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
| Ability to exclude databases that are part of a replication plan. | 107675 |
Table 45: Other resolved issues
| Resolved Issue | Issue ID |
|---|---|
|
Information on other resolved issues may be found in the Dell Knowledge Base under Knowledge Base Article 127199. These resolved issues include the following change requests: 112365, 112362, 112320, 112213, 111035, and 111027. |
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