Recovery Manager for AD Disaster Recovery Edition 10.0.1 - User Guide

Managing deleted or recycled objects

With Recovery Manager for Active Directory, you can perform the following tasks on deleted or recycled Active Directory objects:

• View a list of deleted and/or recycled objects in a particular Active Directory domain.
• Selectively recover deleted Active Directory objects by either undeleting (reanimating) them or restoring the objects from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.
• To undelete (reanimate) an object, Recovery Manager for Active Directory fully relies on the functionality provided by Active Directory, therefore to use this method you need no Active Directory backups. Note that you can only undelete objects in an Active Directory forest whose functional level is higher than Windows 2000.
• Recycle deleted Active Directory objects (only when Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin feature is enabled in your environment).
• Recover recycled Active Directory objects from backups created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

In order you could selectively recover Active Directory objects, the user account under which Recovery Manager for Active Directory is running must have specific permissions. For more information on these permissions, see Permissions required to use Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

The result of the undelete operation performed on an object depends on whether Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin feature is enabled or disabled in your environment. Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin is a new feature that first appeared in the Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system. For more information on Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin feature, see What's New in AD DS: Active Directory Recycle Bin (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=141392).

In an Active Directory environment where Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin feature is not supported or disabled, a deleted object is retained in Active Directory for a specified configurable period of time that is called tombstone lifetime. A deleted object becomes a tombstone that retains only a partial set of the object’s attributes that existed prior to object’s deletion. During the tombstone lifetime period, you can use Recovery Manager for Active Directory to undelete (reanimate) the object or restore it from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory. Performing the undelete operation on the object will only recover the object’s attributes retained in the tombstone.

When an object is deleted in a forest where Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin feature is enabled, the object goes through the following states:

• Deleted state. The object retains all its attributes, links, and group memberships that existed immediately before the moment of deletion. The object remains in this state for a specified configurable period of time that is called deleted object lifetime. When the applicable deleted object lifetime period expires, the object is transferred to the next state—“recycled”.

While an object remains in the “deleted” state, you can use Recovery Manager to undelete (reanimate) the object with all its attributes, links, and group memberships that existed immediately before the object’s deletion.

Alternatively, you can authoritatively restore the object to its backed-up state from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

If necessary, you can use Recovery Manager for Active Directory to override the applicable deleted object lifetime setting and manually transfer specific deleted object state from “deleted” to “recycled” state. For more information, refer to Recycling deleted objects.

• Recycled state. After a deleted object is transferred to the “recycled” state, most of the object’s attributes are purged (stripped away), and the object retains only those few attributes that are essential to replicate the object’s new state to other domain controllers in the forest. The object remains in the recycled state for a specified configurable period of time that is called recycled object lifetime.

To manage recycled objects, you can use the Deleted Objects container provided by Recovery Manager for Active Directory. In this container, you can view a list of all recycled objects in the domain, selectively recycle deleted objects, and recover recycled objects from backups created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

For more information, see Recycling deleted objects.

In this section:

• Recovering deleted objects
• Recycling deleted objects
• Recovering recycled objects

Recovering deleted objects

This section provides instructions on how to selectively recover deleted objects in a domain and how to recover all deleted objects in an organization unit.

To selectively recover deleted objects

1. On the Recovery Manager for Active Directory computer, start the Recovery Manager Console, then expand the appropriate console tree node nodes to locate the Deleted Objects container in the domain where you want to recover deleted objects.

2. If necessary, browse to select the subcontainer that includes the deleted objects you want to recover.
3. In the right pane, select the objects you want to recover. To select multiple objects, hold down CTRL, and click the objects you want to select.

To locate specific deleted objects, you can:

Table 9: Locating deleted objects

4. From the main menu, select Action | Recover Deleted Objects.
5. Follow the steps in the wizard to complete the recovery operation. You can either undelete the objects or restore them from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

To recover all deleted objects in an organizational unit

1. On the Recovery Manager for Active Directory computer, start the Recovery Manager Console, then expand the appropriate console tree node nodes to locate the Deleted Objects container in the domain where you want to recover deleted objects.

2. Browse to select the organization unit in which you want to recover all deleted objects.
3. From the main menu, select Action | Recover Deleted Objects.
4. Follow the steps in the wizard to complete the recovery operation. You can either undelete the objects or restore them from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.

Recycling deleted objects

In the Active Directory forest where Microsoft’s Active Directory Recycle Bin is enabled, you can use Recovery Manager for Active Directory to override the applicable deleted object lifetime setting and manually change the state of a deleted object from “deleted” to “recycled”. For more information about the “recycled” state, see Managing deleted or recycled objects.

To manually recycle deleted objects

1. On the Recovery Manager for Active Directory computer, start the Recovery Manager Console, then expand the appropriate console tree node nodes to locate the Deleted Objects container in the domain where you want to recycle deleted objects.

2. If necessary, browse to select the subcontainer that includes the deleted objects you want to recycle.
3. In the right pane, select the deleted objects you want to recycle. To select multiple objects, hold down CTRL, and click the objects you want to select.

To locate specific deleted objects, you can:

Table 10: Locating deleted objects

4. From the main menu, select Action | Recycle Deleted Objects.

You can also recycle deleted objects by using cmdlets supplied with the Recovery Manager for Active Directory Management Shell.

Recovering recycled objects

With Recovery Manager for Active Directory you can only recover recycled objects by restoring them from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory. Therefore, make sure that you have at least one backup that includes the recycled objects you want to recover.

To recover recycled objects

1. On the Recovery Manager for Active Directory computer, start the Recovery Manager Console, then expand the appropriate console tree node nodes to select the Deleted Objects container in the domain where you want to view a list of recycled objects.

2. From the main menu, select Action | View as Flat List.
3. Filter the objects by the recycled state:

4. In the right pane, select the recycled objects you want to recover. To select multiple objects, hold down CTRL, and click the objects you want to select.
5. From the main menu, select Action | Recover Deleted Objects.
6. Follow the steps in the wizard to restore the selected recycled objects from a backup created with Recovery Manager for Active Directory.