Problem

The SAS Deployment Backup and Recovery tool might report a failure to back up the database and at the same time report an email notification failure as in the example shown here:

When the problem occurs and you examine the configuration-directory\Levn\Backup\backupserver.log files for the backup and recovery tool, you find the following INFO messages recorded in the log at the time the backup failed.

The configuration-directory\Levn\Web\Logs\SASServer1_X\SASDeploymentBackup9.4.log records the following ERROR messages in the log at the time the backup failed.

Cause

The SAS Deployment Backup and Recovery tool uses a backup.journal file to maintain a status of all backup server requests. After a request is completed, the backup.journal file should then be updated to indicate the request is no longer running. In some cases, it might be possible that a request is completed but the step to update the backup.journal file fails, leaving the file in a state that is inconsistent with the state of the backup. When this problem occurs, new requests to the backup server might fail because the backup.journal file indicates that a previous request is still running.

If the problem described in this SAS Note occurs, a request is sent to the backup server to back up the database. The request fails because the state of the backup.journal file incorrectly indicates that a request is already running.

Workaround

Use this workaround if you are experiencing the problem reported in this SAS Note.

Step 1: Locate all copies of the SAS Deployment Backup and Recovery tool backup.journal file.

In this step, you locate all copies of the backup.journal file, which is used by the SAS Deployment Backup and Recovery tool. This backup.journal file is not to be confused with the SAS Metadata Server backup.journal file.

The SAS Deployment Backup and Recovery tool backup.journal file can be found here: configuration-directory\Levn\Backup\backup.journal

Step 2: Rename all copies of the SAS Deployment Backup and Recover tool backup.journal file to old.backup.journal.

Example: rename configuration-directory\Levn\Backup\backup.journal to configuration-directory\Levn\Backup\old.backup.journal

Step 3: Perform an ad hoc (unscheduled) backup now.

This step is required to re-create the backup.journal file.

To perform an ad hoc backup, run the sas-backup batch command per the instructions in the "Using the Deployment Backup and Recovery Tool" section of the SAS^® 9.4 Intelligence Platform: System Administration Guide.

Step 4: Verify that the ad hoc backup returns a status of "completed."

When you run an ad hoc backup, the output to the console shows the backup status as "completed." In the example shown here, only the portion of the output that shows the overall status for the backup is displayed.

You should also see that a new configuration-directory\Levn\Backup\backup.journal file was created.

Operating System and Release Information