Managing SQL Server Backups

Procedure

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Table of Contents

1
2

Table of Contents .......................................................................................... iii

Document details ............................................................................................5
2.1
2.2

3
4
5
6
7
8

Introduction .....................................................................................................6
Purpose............................................................................................................6
Scope...............................................................................................................6
Definitions and abbreviations .........................................................................7
Full SQL Server Backup Overview ................................................................8
Inputs / outputs................................................................................................9
8.1
8.2

9
10

Inputs ............................................................................................................... 9
Outputs .......................................................................................................... 10

Full SQL Server Backup Procedure description ...........................................11

Test SQL Server Backups files .....................................................................12
10.1
10.2

11

Review and approval ....................................................................................... 5

Revision history............................................................................................... 5

How it works...................................................................................... 12
How we verify ................................................................................... 12

Documentation ..............................................................................................14
11.1

Referenced Documents ...................................................................... 14

11.1.1 Attachments ................................................................................... 14

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Document details

2.1

Review and approval

The following people have reviewed and approved this document:

Role

Name

Title

Date

Training
Required?

Preparation
Yes

Review

No

Approval

2.2

Revision history

The table below reflects minor revisions (e.g., recent changes, updates, deletions, and
additions):
Versio
n

Description

0.1

Approval of initial draft.

1.0

Final version.

Author

Date

Effective
Date

Introduction

Every SQL Server in the production environment must have a backup plan in order to
recover from partial or entire data loss for the database. A backup Policy created and
based on the business requirements can assure the recovery of lost data to a point in time.
A full backup (a snapshot of the data at a point in time) can be used for these purposes.

Purpose

The purpose of this document is to outline the standard procedure to deal with SQL
Server Backups, the schedule, the retention of the data files to maintain, and the storage
method used with the backed up SQL data files.
This document will also outline how backups are tested to ensure their integrity.

Scope

The scope of the procedure described here is intended for the use of native SQL Server
tools to perform Full SQL Server Backups following the best practices in the industry,
limited only by operating environment restrictions.
If the SBU determines that changes are required in how backups are performed or SQL
Server backup retention because of new directives or to satisfy new SLA agreements
using third party tools, a different procedure may be required.

Definitions and abbreviations

SBU: Strategic Business Unit. An organization within the Company focused on providing
a specific function or serving a client.
Full SQL Backup: A complete SQL backup from a database, this makes a copy of all
physical files that make up the logical database as is known inside SQL Server.
Snapshot: A copy of a SQL Server database that represents the state of the data at the
point in the time that the snapshot was taken.

Full SQL Server Backup Overview

This SQL Server backup procedure takes into account the frequency of how often the
data is changed. It assumes that a backup must occur every working day because each
working day there is new data coming to the databases. It is mandatory to ensure that the
new data is protected from any kind of loss.
In order to do the SQL Server backups, a Stored Procedure was created on each SQL
Server. It is executed by the SQL Agent via a SQL Job and scheduled to automatically
run locally at pre-defined times every night to ensure that there is no overlap with any
other production SQL jobs.
The SQL Server databases use a simple recovery model which truncate all transactions
after completion. This means that backing up the log file is not useful. Taking this as a
base line, we are doing only Full database Backup from each SQL Server database.
The SQL Server databases files being backed up are safely kept in a Network Share
storage to ensure that they can be easily retrieved in the event of a Server disk failure.
The SQL Server backup files are kept until the retention period is satisfied and when that
period is reached, the old SQL Server backed up files are deleted in order to recycle the
disk space to be used by new and fresh SQL Server backups files.
The retention time of the SQL Server Backups files are limited by the physical disk space
available so in the best scenario, the retention of files can be up to 3 days.
When the SQL Server Backup Job finishes, it sends an email the DBA team members
notifying them of the success or failure of the SQL Server Backup Job.

Inputs / outputs

8.1

Inputs

a. The availability of the Network Share is essential to ensure that the new SQL
Server Backups that be generated can be saved
b. The SQL Server DB mail must be enabled and configured to be able to send
emails
c. Is requested that no other maintenance SQL Job runs at the same time of the SQL
Server Backup Job runs due to the nature of accessing the data files at the OS
level.
d. No SQL maintenance Job can be executed during the time that the SQL Backup
Job is running and this includes:

Any Transaction Log Shrink action

Any Rebuild, Defrag or Reindex action over the database indexes being
backed up

Any other action related to database file manipulation.

8.2

Outputs
a. As a result of the SQL Server Backup Job execution, the SQL Server databases
back up files are saved on the Network Share assigned to this purpose.
b. An email is sent to the DBA Team members as result of a successful operation or
an email is sent to Help Desk requesting to open an Incident Ticket as a result of
a unsuccessfully operation.

Full SQL Server Backup Procedure description

The automatized SQL Server Backup Job starts at 12:05 am EST daily.
The SQL Backups will be saved as files on disk: \\Filer1\SQLBackups\
The retention time is 2 days due to space restrictions on the Network Share Onsite
\\Filer1\SQLBackups\.
The Stored Procedure defined to execute the SQL Server Backup does the following
actions:

Create an initial list of the last time that each database was backed up from the
SQL Server and name it SQL_Devices.

Create an initial list of all databases present in the DATABASE catalog on the
SQL Server, leaving out databases from Development, Test, installations or
DEMO purposes and databases for Sorts purposes also.

Does a Full backup of the qualifying databases and writes it to the Network
Share location.

After each database is backed up successfully, it deletes the corresponding old

back up file on the Network Share where the retention date is greater than the
retention time defined by the SQL Backup Job.

Validates that all databases were backed up doing a second cycle and checking
that all databases have their new backup created.

If the Stored Procedure defined to do the SQL Backups finish successfully then, send an
email listing the newly backed up databases to the DBA team members.
If the Stored Procedure defined to do the SQL Backups finishes unsuccessfully or with
errors then, send an email to Help Desk requesting to create un Incident Ticket and
assign it to the Database queue of the Division and SBU given the SQL Server name and
IP address and describing that SQL Server Backup Job Fails.
The last email (Successfully or not) completes the SQL Backup Procedure.
If the job is unsuccessful an Incident ticket is generated and assigned to the members of
the DBA team. After the root cause of the issue is resolved, the DBA execute the SQL
Server Backup manually once more in order to take a fresh full SQL backup.

10

Test SQL Server Backups files

As a regular task the DBA team does a weekly back up report each Monday in order to
check the current state of each database backup from the last SQL Server Backup action.
With this report we check to ensure we have a successful backup from each database. If
not, we investigate the root cause of the failure and resolve it. When this is fixed, we do a
manually backup of that failed database backup. You can see a sample of this report in
the Attachments section.
In order to assure that the SQL Server Backup procedure is working properly it is
necessary to periodically verify the process and file integrity. To accomplish this task
each quarter we randomly select and restore a set of backed up files on to the test SQL
Server within a controlled environment of restore.

10.1

How it works

With restoring each database from a previously backed up database , we are sure that the
SQL Server Backup process described in this procedure is working properly because
when SQL Server does a database restore, it verifies the internal structures of the backed
up database and all objects contained within such as tables, indexes, views, stored
procedures functions, triggers, etc.
If the previously backed up database can be restored into the SQL Server then we are sure
at 100% that SQL Server Backup process is working and the integrity of the backed up
files is being consistently maintained over time.

10.2

How we verify

A Stored Procedure is defined to execute the SQL Server Backup Restore Test that does
the following actions for each database:

Create an initial list of the last time that each database was backed up from the
SQL Server and name it SQL_Devices, it includes the databases name and path
location.

Check the drive to ensure there is enough space to handle the restore.

Restore the qualifying database that was written on the Network Share location
by the SQL Server Backup process naming it with the RESTORED prefix.

If the Restore action was successful the test of this database backup is successful.

If the test is successful, detach and delete the restored database, if was not
successful, report and investigate the cause and do a remediation on why it was
not able to be restored, identifying if the failure is due by some current action or
by some issue with the backed up database file.

Document and log the Restore results of this test using the SQL Backup Test
Review template and save it on the under folder Shared Documents/ Backup
Tests Reviews/Division/SBU Name and select the proper folder for SQL
instance Server also in there. These folders are over the Database Administration
Team
site
(DBAs
sharepoint)
located
on
https://internalnetwork.com/sites/DB/default.aspx . The template exists on the
root folder of Backup Tests Reviews/ of the same site.

If there was some failed restore due to backed up database file issue, resolve the cause of
it and find out why this was not discovered before.

11

Documentation

11.1

Referenced Documents

11.1.1

Attachments

Sample_WeeklyBack
upReview_0430.xlsx

SQL_Backup_Test_R
eview_Template.xlsx