About using volume pools to manage WORM media

You can dedicate volume pools for the WORM media. This method lets a WORM-capable tape drive back up and restore standard and WORM media.

Create a new volume pool and specify WORM (uppercase letters) as the first four characters of the pool name.

NetBackup compares the first four characters of the volume pool name to determine if it is a volume pool that contains WORM media. The first four characters must be WORM.

To disable the volume pool name verification, create the following touch file on the media server of the WORM drive:

install_path\netbackup\db\config\DISABLE_WORM_POOLCHECK

Note the following cases:

If the drive contains WORM media and the media is in a WORM volume pool, NetBackup writes the media as WORM.
If the drive contains WORM media and the media is not in a WORM volume pool, NetBackup freezes the media.
If the drive contains standard media and the media is in a WORM volume pool, NetBackup freezes the media.
If the drive contains Quantum media that has never been used or all of its NetBackup images have expired, NetBackup uses the media.

About using a WORM scratch pool

For all supported WORM-capable drives (except the Quantum drive), the scratch pool must only contain one type of media. Symantec recommends that you add the most commonly used media to the scratch pool. For example, if most NetBackup jobs use standard media, put standard media in the scratch pool.

If the scratch pool contains standard media, ensure that the WORM volume pool does not run out of media to complete backup jobs.

If the WORM volume pool runs out of media, NetBackup performs the following actions:

Moves the standard media from the scratch pool into the WORM pool
Loads the standard media into a WORM-capable drive
Freezes the media

NetBackup repeats this process until all of the standard media in the scratch pool is frozen.

The opposite also is true. If a standard volume pool runs out of media and the scratch pool contains WORM media, standard backups can fail because appropriate media are unavailable.

About WORM media and the Quantum drive

When you use the Quantum drive, only one kind of media can be used as either standard media or WORM media.

If a WORM volume pool runs out of media, media are moved from the scratch volume pool into the WORM pool. NetBackup determines whether the media are configured as standard or WORM media. For a standard media volume, NetBackup reads the tape label and verifies that the media is unused or that all images are expired. NetBackup also verifies that the media is not currently assigned to a server. After verification, NetBackup configures the media as WORM media and continues with the NetBackup job.