Restoring objects to an alternate cluster

You can use the restore task to copy objects from one database to another. You might do this to "promote" tables from a development environment to a production environment, for example. All restrictions described in Restoring individual objects apply when restoring to an alternate cluster.

To restore to an alternate database, you must make changes to a copy of the configuration file that was used to create the backup. The changes are in the [Mapping] and [NodeMapping] sections. Essentially, you create a configuration file for the restore operation that looks to vbr like a backup of the target database, but it actually describes the backup from the source database. See Restore object from backup to an alternate cluster for an example configuration file.

The following example uses two databases, named source and target. The source database contains a table named sales. The following source_snapshot.ini configuration file is used to back up the source database:

[Misc]
snapshotName = source_snapshot
restorePointLimit = 2
objectRestoreMode = createOrReplace

[Database]
dbName = source
dbUser = dbadmin
dbPromptForPassword = True

[Transmission]

[Mapping]
v_source_node0001 = 192.168.50.168:/home/dbadmin/backups/

The target_snapshot.ini file starts as a copy of source_snapshot.ini. Because the [Mapping] section describes the database that vbr operates on, we must change the node names to point to the target nodes. We must also add the [NodeMapping] section and change the database name:

[Misc]
snapshotName = source_snapshot
restorePointLimit = 2
objectRestoreMode = createOrReplace

[Database]
dbName = target
dbUser = dbadmin
dbPromptForPassword = True

[Transmission]

[Mapping]
v_target_node0001 = 192.168.50.151:/home/dbadmin/backups/
[NodeMapping]
v_source_node0001 = v_target_node0001

As far as vbr is concerned, we are restoring objects from a backup of the target database. In reality, we are restoring from the source database.

The following command restores the sales table from the source backup into the target database:

$ vbr --task restore --config-file target_snapshot.ini --restore-objects sales
Starting object restore of database target.
Participating nodes: v_target_node0001.
Objects to restore: sales.
Enter vertica password:
Restoring from restore point: source_snapshot_20160204_191920
Loading snapshot catalog from backup.
Extracting objects from catalog.
Syncing data from backup to cluster nodes.
[==================================================] 100%
Finalizing restore.
Restore complete!