RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Discussion on remote replication.
bidmead
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RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

I'm doing RTRR from a TS-451+ to a TS-451, each RAID 10 with 4x6TB Reds. Firmware: 4.3.6:0805 on each NAS. No snapshotting is involved

I set this up in the summer of last year to RTRR four directories on the TS-451+ to the TS-451. Two of the four RTRR jobs are scheduled, two are real-time. Everything has been working as expected, except…

THE TARGET DIRECTORIES PERIODICALLY DISAPPEAR.

Yes, they just vanish from time to time. Not all at once. I get an alert that RTRR has failed and it turns out to be a pairing error because the relevant target directory is gone. I recreate the directory, restart the job and all is well. Until, perhaps several weeks later, the target directory or some other target directory, one or more of them is/are gone again.

I've recently had to replace a failing drive on the source NAS, but this problem began to happen long before and has happened again since a successful replacement and rebuild.

This is a "feature" of RTRR that I simply can't fathom.

Anyone got any ideas?

--
Chris
bidmead
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Chaps, this is still happening months later.

The backup works for weeks on end, and then, quite suddenly, the target directories have vanished and the following backup sessions all fail.

I can't believe I'm the only person experiencing this.

If I'm not supplying enough detail here, please let me know.

--
Chris
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

What backup application, Backup Station or Hybrid Backup Sync?

The jobs that aren't real-time are they scheduled?

Does all directories disappear or only those that are real-time synchronized?

What connects the two NASes (LAN, WAN, VPN or what)?

Any network issues reported?

What does the logs say?

Unless you haven't done so already, I would recommend that you contact Qnap support.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
bidmead
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Thanks for that response, P3R.

I'm using Backup Station. I've tried both real-time backup and scheduled backup but both methods seem vulnerable to this failure.

The two NAS are linked across my LAN. I'm getting no network issues.

I believe that in the past (this has been going on for at least a year) all the directories have disappeared at various times. Except the backup of my Gmail backup. That seems to remain solid.

The only difference I've been able to discern is that the failing Folder Pairs are:
<path>/<directory name>-->/Public/<directory name>
…whereas the Gmail Folder Pair is:
/Public/Backup/Gmail-->/Public
The Gmail backup target directory then becomes /Public/Backup/Gmail/<my gmail address>

Ah-ha!

So the failing backups name the original directory in the target description. The robust backup only names the directory inside which the target directory is to be created!

We might be on to something here. Thanks.

I'm going to try rewriting the Folder Pair that is currently /Public/calibre-->/Public/calibre as /Public/calibre-->/Public

I shall, of course, report back here.

But as a preliminary observation, if the first formulation of this Folder Pair is wrong---why does it work at all. And reliably for several months? And if it's vulnerable to eventual drastic failure, shouldn't Backup Station warn the user?

Contacting QNAP support is, of course, the eventual goal. But as this failure is so very intermittent I wanted to collect local evidence (and hoped to collect other users evidence) before bothering them with it.

By definition, it seems it's going to take quite a while to verify my new analysis of the problem (formed on the fly as I write this). Meanwhile, if anyone else is able to pitch in (eg, to verify how the Folder Pairs ought to look), that would be more than welcome.

MOMENTS LATER

Dammit, no, that's not it. Trying to set up the new Folder Pair/Public/calibre-->/Public throws up an error message that says I have a conflict with the Gmail backup backup. So you can't, after all, back up two different directories into the same main directory and hope they'll both appear there as subdirectories.

In which case, the logic of this complete baffles me. If the formulation of the Folder Pairs for the three eventually failing backups works and is right (and the disappearing target problem is down to something completely different), how does the Gmail backup backup get away with it?

--
Chris
Last edited by bidmead on Thu Jun 27, 2019 3:54 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

I haven't been using Backup Station since Hybrid Backup Sync was released as it's replacement. HBS is regularly updated so any bugs will at least be fixed faster there, if Backup Station is at all updated any more. But I've never had any of the problems you report with either application. I run versioned backups to both a locally connected USB-disk and another Qnap as well as multiple synchronizations to CIFS/SMB servers. I only run them scheduled though.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
bidmead
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Ah, I wasn't aware that Hybrid Backup Sync was a replacement for Backup Station. Are you suggesting I switch to that and that Backup Station is now deprecated?

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Chris
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

I'm not sure if it will solve your issue but if/when you contact Qnap support I would expect them to recommend a move to HBS as that's for sure actively updated. If all goes well HBS should inherit the Backup Station jobs when being installed and Backup Station will disappear.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
bidmead
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Joined: Tue Dec 16, 2014 5:05 am

Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Everything seems to have gone completely nuts now.

I've installed Hybrid Backup Sync on both NASes. Running them. Backup Station has simply vanished, and HBS is trying to take over its jobs. Failing like crazy and has just wiped the three previously vulnerable directories on my second NAS.

I see that you mention the disappearance of Backup Station and this attempt to take over the old jobs in your missive that has just crossed with this one. Ho hum... I wasn't ready for this and it's not what I would call "expected behaviour".

I'm now trying to set up Storage Space in my target NAS and find that from my source NAS but so far getting nothing but errors. I want to start by deleting these old Backup Station jobs, but without Backup Station I have no intuitive understanding of how to do that.

I foresee hours of harmless amusement in front of me.

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Chris
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

bidmead wrote: Thu Jun 27, 2019 4:33 am ...and it's not what I would call "expected behaviour".
Me neither.

The transition worked flawlessly on both my NASes but on the other hand I didn't have the problems you had to begin with.
I'm now trying to set up Storage Space in my target NAS and find that from my source NAS but so far getting nothing but errors.
I think you should be able to uninstall HBS and be back to Backup Station if you want to.

There's of course always a learning period with a new application but if you tell us what the exact problems are and ask questions I (and maybe others) will try my best to guide you.
I want to start by deleting these old Backup Station jobs, but without Backup Station I have no intuitive understanding of how to do that.
That's not complicated. Click on All Jobs in the left hand menu and then the Remote Jobs tab. From there you mark all jobs and click on Delete.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
bidmead
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Joined: Tue Dec 16, 2014 5:05 am

Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Thanks, P3R. That's all really helpful.

I managed to find the jobs transferred from Backup Centre and have now deleted them. So I'm now (hopefully) starting afresh.

I assume I need to be running HBS on both NASes and that I must set up Storage Space on my target NAS before I can get anything done.

I'll wade through the documentation on this and report back here.

--
Chris
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

bidmead wrote: Fri Jun 28, 2019 2:50 pm I assume I need to be running HBS on both NASes...
I don't know if it's absolutely mandatory but for best compatibility and the easiest configuration using the same updated software on both sides is of course a very strong recommendation.
...and that I must set up Storage Space on my target NAS before I can get anything done.
No, as far as I can remember (it was probably more than a year ago that I setup my last job) that's not necessary. Storage space isn't a big deal, it's easy to create it in the guide when creating the job.

Click All Jobs in the left menu and then choose what type of job you want to create using the guide in the upper right corner. It shouldn't be terribly complicated and you should recognize many things from Backup Station.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
js-chong
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by js-chong »

I guess you're not the only one experience this. This should be a bug because it can be replicate by:
1.) Create new Replication Job at RTRR. In this example, my local source folder is root directory "\" and remote destination folder is "YKH-Backup".
Image

2.) Note that, when first create the job, the Real-time option is not available. So I first created the job as periodically sync and edit the job later by selecting "Real-time".
Image

3.) After I clicked "OK" on the previous screen, when I switched to "Folder Pairs" tab, I noticed that the dropdown list for "local source folder" no longer able to select root directory as source and my remote destination folder is now been changed to "KH-Backup" which is not the directory name that I first created, thus, giving me the target directory cannot be access error message when executing the job.
Image
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by P3R »

js-chong wrote: Sun Jun 30, 2019 12:43 pm This should be a bug because it can be replicate by:
It looks like you use Backup Station (I don't know why it haven't been removed yet). If it's really a bug, I doubt that it will be fixed in Backup Station as the Hybrid Backup Sync app is the recommended backup application today.
1.) Create new Replication Job at RTRR. In this example, my local source folder is root directory "\"...
Have you made root a shared folder? If so that's known to cause issues later.

If you haven't made root a shared folder, I think that it's a bug that root is allowed in the setup wizard. As far as I can remember root haven't been a valid source.

Anyway, this community can't fix any bugs. Only Qnap do that so please open a case with Qnap support.
RAID have never ever been a replacement for backups. Without backups on a different system (preferably placed at another site), you will eventually lose data!

A non-RAID configuration (including RAID 0, which isn't really RAID) with a backup on a separate media protects your data far better than any RAID-volume without backup.

All data storage consists of both the primary storage and the backups. It's your money and your data, spend the storage budget wisely or pay with your data!
js-chong
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by js-chong »

P3R wrote: Sun Jun 30, 2019 4:27 pm
js-chong wrote: Sun Jun 30, 2019 12:43 pm This should be a bug because it can be replicate by:
It looks like you use Backup Station (I don't know why it haven't been removed yet). If it's really a bug, I doubt that it will be fixed in Backup Station as the Hybrid Backup Sync app is the recommended backup application today.
1.) Create new Replication Job at RTRR. In this example, my local source folder is root directory "\"...
Have you made root a shared folder? If so that's known to cause issues later.

If you haven't made root a shared folder, I think that it's a bug that root is allowed in the setup wizard. As far as I can remember root haven't been a valid source.

Anyway, this community can't fix any bugs. Only Qnap do that so please open a case with Qnap support.
Thanks P3R, didn't realize Backup Station has been replaced by Backup Sync.

No, I didn't share the "root" as share folder. However, I could perform sync with other sync option (schedule and immediate) except Real-time. Maybe it's a bug... :'

Yes, a ticket has been submitted. Thanks for your kind respond anyway. :)
bidmead
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Re: RTRR Target Directories Disappear!

Post by bidmead »

Apologies, js-chong, for not having responded sooner. I've been exploring this issue with QNAP support and it didn't occur to me to check back here. Of course, I should have done so.

No, my target directories aren't directly under root: they're under Public. I haven't made root a shared directory.

QNAP support has been digging around inside both my QNAPs but the issue is still on-going. I'll do my best to report back here in due course.

--
Chris
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