What's cold backup.?

  • Hi All,

    Wot's COLD BACKUP.? wot are the other types of backups.?

    Thanks.

  • Hi,

    Thanks for the quick response.

    Yes..I had searched in google as well.

    Thought someone will brief it here so that I can easily understand.

    Thanks.

  • I'm pretty sure cold backup is an older term no longer in use for backups. Our Oracle DBA's were performing these things up until last year (don't ask). In them, they take the database offline, and copy the data out to files. When that's done, they bring the database back online.

    You don't need to do that. You can run a BACKUP command while users are attached to the system.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • Yeah... That was wot my doubt. I had heard abt cold backups long back. But in SQL server 2005 I have never come across it anywhere. Asked in an interview.

  • probably in sql server, you detach the database and back it up to another device and this should be equivalent of cold backup in oracle.



    Pradeep Singh

  • Ok. By the way, why do we need to detach the DB for taking abckup.? What's the advantage.?

  • I would say there's no advantage. The normal backup process is very light-handed. It's transactionally aware, so you get good, clean backups, all without interrupting user access. Why on earth would you want to disconnect your database, kick off all the users, detach the database, make a copy, attach the database, renable data access.... Seems highly problematic in order to arrive at a backup.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • I used to manage a mixed shop (DB2/Oracle/SQL Server), and the DB2/Oracle guys would always take cold backups on a regular basis.

    A cold backup is one where the server is not running (meaning the db software). so you shut down the service (or process in *Nix) so that Oracle/DB2/SQL Server is not running, and then you copy the files to some location.

    I've never run one of these in SQL Server unless we were moving to a new server. The warm backups work fine, taken while the server is running and servicing clients. I know Oracle has a process for this, and I'm not sure why my DBAs were so nervous about it.

  • It's an older process. Essentially, a retronym. Warm backups are more technically complicated at the engine and OS level, and thus arrived on the scene later.

    I've never had to do a cold backup on a database. Didn't start as a DBA till after warm backups were available. I have had to do them on other types of files, back in the DOS days.

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  • Thank you all. Doubt is cleared.

    Thank you very much.

  • Thank you all. Doubt is cleared.

    Thank you very much.

  • Thank you all. Doubt is cleared.

    Thank you very much.

  • San (8/19/2009)


    Asked in an interview.

    So, what did you answer in the interview?

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • San (8/19/2009)


    Ok. By the way, why do we need to detach the DB for taking abckup.? What's the advantage.?

    There is only one... how many people can change data during a cold backup and why might it be important that they can't? Think about it.

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

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