deleting backup history in order to allow for restore

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childofthe1980s - 08 Mar 2008 21:48 GMT

Hello:

Is there an automated way of having SQL delete backup jobs? I ran
sp_delete_backuphistory against the msbd database in SQL Server 2000
8.00.2039 and I had to stop it because it was taking forever to run.

I'm surprised that SQL does not automatically delete backup history since
maintenance plans for automatically deleting backups. (Any relief in SQL
2005?)

The major reason that I ask about this is because when we conduct a manual
restore of a database, we cannot do so by right-clicking on that database in
Enterprise Manager. Enterprise Manager freezes when we choose All
Tasks...Restore. So, we end up having to instead run a script in Query
Analyzer to restore the database.

Someone on this message board told me to delete backup history. But, again,
that takes too long. And, when I tried to do a restore in Enterprise Manager
just now, I got the same result (though I did cancel the process).

Any ideas?

Thanks!

childofthe1980s

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Andrew J. Kelly - 09 Mar 2008 04:40 GMT

The first time you delete the history it will take a long time if it has
never been done before. Just let it run until it finishes otherwise you roll
it back and you are no better off than before. But once you clear out the
garbage that was in there it will only take a second or less to delete about
a weeks worth if you do it on a regular basis. So set up a scheduled job
that calls this once a week and pass in a datetime that leaves you the week
or two that you want to keep for history.

DECLARE @Date DATETIME
SET @Date = DATEADD(wk,-1,GETDATE())

EXEC [msdb].[dbo].[sp_delete_backuphistory] @Date

In 2005 they have added a task for the MP to dod this but it does absolutely
nothing more than what I show above and still needs to be done regulary. The
problem is there is data in 3 tables and they are not properly indexed so a
delete on lots of data takes a long time.

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Andrew J. Kelly SQL MVP
Solid Quality Mentors

> Hello:
>
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>
> childofthe1980s

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childofthe1980s - 09 Mar 2008 12:57 GMT

Thanks, Andrew!

childofthe1980s

> The first time you delete the history it will take a long time if it has
> never been done before. Just let it run until it finishes otherwise you roll
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> >
> > childofthe1980s

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