T-SQL Restore Script Generator

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T-SQL Restore Script Generator

Paul Brewer

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January 23, 2013 at 10:27 pm

#287940

Comments posted to this topic are about the item T-SQL Restore Script Generator

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Hugo Kornelis SSC Guru Points: 64790 More actions · Answer 1

Thanks for sharing your script, Paul!

I do have a question, though. In SSMS, when I bring up the restore dialog, I can select a point in time and then have SSMS generate the restore statements for me. What are the benefits of using your script over using SSMS to generate them?

Hugo Kornelis, SQL Server/Data Platform MVP (2006-2016)
Visit my SQL Server blog: https://sqlserverfast.com/blog/
SQL Server Execution Plan Reference: https://sqlserverfast.com/epr/

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 2

The restore dialogue in SSMS has a GUI front end and works for one database at a time. sp_RestoreScriptGenie can build a restore script for all databases in an instance (handy if you have 50 or 60) and can be scheduled as a SQL agent job to, for example, automate development environment refreshes, reinstate log shipping, mirroring, alwayson availability groups and so on.

The functionality available in the ssms restore dialogue and sp_RestoreScriptGenie and very similar (I hope to make it identical by adding file group and page restores) but the circumstances you might use each in are different.

Thanks for the question and best wishes

Paul

Hugo Kornelis SSC Guru Points: 64790 More actions · Answer 3

Thanks for the quick and enlightening reply, Paul!

Hugo Kornelis, SQL Server/Data Platform MVP (2006-2016)
Visit my SQL Server blog: https://sqlserverfast.com/blog/
SQL Server Execution Plan Reference: https://sqlserverfast.com/epr/

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 4

Paul Brewer

SSCrazy

Points: 2955

January 24, 2013 at 2:40 am

#1580431

Thanks for a great question.

Nadrek SSC-Insane Points: 20039 More actions · Answer 5

Very interesting - though I would have to note that this has the very common limitation that it won't function when trying to restore specific databases to Server B after Server A is completely unavailable (and other similar situations), since there won't be an msdb with valid history.

Likewise, I would be concerned about cases (SQL2005, primarily) where msdb has incorrect path information, i.e. http://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/feedback/details/306604/physical-device-name-not-captured-correctly-in-msdb-dbo-backupmediafamily.

Question: did you test it with empty transaction log backups (i.e. LastLSN = FirstLSN) - for instance, a server set to do very frequent T-log backups that, for whatever reason, had no activity during that time. I usually generate those test cases with once-a-minute T-log backups on a development server with absolutely 0 activity.

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 6

At work here we use the Ola Hallengran scripts to run out backups to a dedicated backup server. I have added a final step to the user database and log backup jobs to run sp_RestoreScriptGenie and, basically, save the T-SQL RESTORE script in the same directory as the backups. If disaster strikes we have the recovery scripts saved in the same directory as the backup files.

Regarding LSN's, the checks were added later after I saw the '31 days of disaster recover' series by SQLSoldier. They are basically his checks appended to the procedure. It hasn't been a problem for me during many executions and (I think) worst case scenario is you would need to comment out one of the transaction log restores if it were a problem. It has been tested with empty log file backups though and they are not a problem.

Regarding the incorrect paths, you can override data/log/backup file locations and in the restore commands it builds and it shouldn't matter. I wasn't aware of the SQL Server 2005 connect item to be honest although the procedure has been tested with SQL Server 2005 <-> SQL Server 2012.

Thanks and best wishes

signal runner SSC Eights! Points: 847 More actions · Answer 7

Hi - thanks for the script, it's great.

I have one (probably rookie) question: It appears to only select from msdb.dbo.backupmediafamily where device_type = 2. We have some backups where the device type = 102 (still disc) Was there any reason for that?

Thanks,

Tim

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 8

Hi Tim,

The WHERE [Device_Type] = 2

could probably be

WHERE [Device_Type] <> 7

All our backups at work are device type 2, same at home in my virtual lab at home. The idea was to ignore Symatec backups or anything that uses volume shadow copy. (I was surprised these even show up in the backup history but they do). I'll take your comments onboard in any new versions of the script.

Many thanks for the feedback and best wishes, pleased you like it.

Paul

signal runner SSC Eights! Points: 847 More actions · Answer 9

signal runner

SSC Eights!

Points: 847

January 28, 2013 at 12:04 pm

#1581763

understood - thanks.

jgkiran 79879 SSC Rookie Points: 29 More actions · Answer 10

HI Paul, this is Awesome , thanks for sharing your knowledge with SQL community much appreciated .

is your second version on this topic ready ? if so can you please provide a link.

Thanks,

Kiran

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 11

Thanks Kiran,

This is the latest version of the procedure - https://paulbrewer.wordpress.com/sp_restoregene/

It includes support for backup forking and various other mod's.

Best wishes

Paul

jgkiran 79879 SSC Rookie Points: 29 More actions · Answer 12

jgkiran 79879

SSC Rookie

Points: 29

October 5, 2015 at 4:47 am

#1831323

Thanks Paul, this is great Stuff 🙂

Darryl Wilson Mr or Mrs. 500 Points: 526 More actions · Answer 13

Hi,

I realise this post is very old but it could be just what ive spent the last 5 days trying to write.

I think my issue is, on my TESTSERVER, I created a database TestRestoredDatabase. I want to be able to restore a backup from our data domain eg: \\ddomain1\score\full\score_17022020.bak ; \\ddomain1\score\Logs\score_17022020_trn , move the files to M:\SQLData\2016 and the Logs to L:\SQLLogs\2016

AND restore to a point in time. I don't want to overwrite any existing databases

Darryl Wilson
darrylw99@hotmail.com

Paul Brewer SSCrazy Points: 2955 More actions · Answer 14

Hi Darryl,

The latest version of the script is here - sp_RestoreGene – Paul Brewer (wordpress.com)

You should be able to achieve this restore objective using the @TargetDatabase parameter (to avoid overwriting), @WithMoveDataFiles and @WithMoveLogFile and @StopAt parameters.

Best regards

Paul