Confidential: ALLION and Distributors Only Doc.: CDH-200110-02

Technical Reference – Using The FISC CDH for Data Archive Application Document Structure Start

What you need to take here?

Prepare your "file partition" for keeping data

1. A "file volume" in "Device Manager" 2. Share this space in "Share Manager" 3. Store files using File Explorer

What you need to take here?

Prepare your "image (mirror) drive" for keeping virtual images

1. A "image drive" in "Device Manager" 2. Share an image in "Share Manager" 3. Query using File Explorer

How to define a data archive task?

Define your "data archive" task -- Build a virutal image

1. Source "file" volume 2. Filter conditions 3. Source data handling after archived 4. Schedule

How to burn an archived data image?

Advance archive Burn virtual images to CD/DVD burner

1. CD or DVD recordable device 2. Split a data image into several 3. Schedule 4. Remove a burned image

End

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General The internal flow for building source data from the FISC CDH’s “file volume” to “image (mirror) drive” is:

Source data

network

All files/folders stored in the specific file volume

internally

Build a corresponding ISO image onto the image drive

internally

Burn an image to a CD/DVD burner

Before you can take the advantages of “data archive” feature provided by the FISC CDH, you have to know the nature and constraints coming up from this feature: • • • • •

• • • • •

You can define up to 10 data archive profiles using the web administration page of the FISC CDH. If you have defined multiple data archive tasks in CDH, the tasks will be activated one by one. It means one task is running, the other tasks will be queued till the previous one completes “building” (without “burn” request) or “splitting” (with “burn” request). The archive image stored in image drive or burned to CD/DVD media will be in ISO9660 format. You have to select source file data by “file volume”; it does not allow you to select individual files/folders sit under that file volume. The files/folders can be removed from the source file volume automatically after an ISO image is built to the image drive. But no comparable feature is available for deleting a built image from an image drive after it is burned to CD/DVD burner. You have to delete the burned ISO image from the image drive manually. Data archive process is a memory and I/O consuming task; not to perform a data archive task during the rush hours would be a better idea. A list file will be natively created and built to the archived and split images; the full path name and date/time of the source files archived will be included in this list file. This is a shortcut to know which or how many files are archived to this ISO image. When you burn an archive image to CD/DVD writer, a large image will be split into several small ones automatically before being burned. After these small images are burned, these temporary images will be removed from the image drive automatically after being burned. You can’t “delete” or “modify” a pre-defined data archive task when it is now in the following states: “pending”, “building”, “splitting”, and “burning”. Only the pre-defined task stays in “waiting” state can be modified or deleted. An attempt to archive source data as an ISO image would possibly fail due to the following reasons: 1. Some of the source files are marked as “in used” 2. The variation of file size, content, time/date of source files/folders are changed during archiving 3. Not enough free space left in the destination image drive

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Prepare a File Volume (Partition) The data, which will be archived to the image drive, have to be stored in the file volume of the FISC CDH. “Check” or “Create” a file volume

To have a file drive to store files/folders. Click the link “hd04” to check the availability of file volume.

Yes, an available file volume is here.

Once a file volume is available, you have to set appropriate permission onto this file volume for users to store their files here from network.

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Then, you can see the file volume “dvd26g” shown in Windows Explorer and store files/folders to this location through network.

Prepare an Image (Mirror) Drive

You must have at least one “mirror drive” and be careful about the “free space” to hold the archive

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Define a Task for Data Archive – File(s) Æ ISO Image

Click here to add a new data archive task

•

Source volume: the “volume name” of the source “file” or “image” volume.

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Confidential: ALLION and Distributors Only Doc.: CDH-200110-02 •

Schedule: time to start the archive task : every day at 6:00am;

: every Sunday at 2:00am

: 8th day of month, 8:00am;

: special date or immediately

•

Attribute: the filter options assigned toward this task

•

Status: the state of the archive task : task is waiting for start;

: building an archive image from file volume

: splitting a large image into several small ones for burning : the image is ready to burn; •

: task is queued due to the another on-going task

Delete: remove a “waiting” task from the task list

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Create an archive task

Select source data from: •

Source image volume – all the existing images (except VCD and Audio CD) will be shown here for choosing; this is mostly for burning an previous archive image (splitting if required) to CD/DVD writer. The format of the burned CD or DVD title will be ISO9660. Virtual images stored in image drives; select one of them as source data for CD/DVD burning. “xxxMB” means the size of the image.

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Source file volume – all the existing file volumes will be shown here for choosing; this is mostly for building source files/folders from file volume to image drive. The built image (in image drive) will be in ISO9660 format. File volumes retrieved from file drives; select one of them as source data.

“7279/10240MB” means “free space/capacity of file volume”. The file volume size of “dvd26g” is 10GB and it still has 7279MB free.

Select image drive (destination) to keep new built image: • •

Auto – system will determine the destination image drive for you. Manual – all the image drives will be shown here for choosing. All image drives are here for manual selection

Assign “volume label” for new built image: • • •

A volume label of an archive image is limited to 32 characters; 20 of 32 characters are configurable in archive task The image creation date can be appended as the suffix of the volume label The beginning 12 characters will be assigned as the “volume name” of the image after built.

“Date” information is appended as the suffix of the volume label when “Date” option is enabled. Volume name will be truncated to 12 characters.

Volume label will be identical to what you assigned in “add a task” page. This is the case when “None” option is enabled.

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Filter the source file(s) by file modified time for archive In this case, only the file(s) whose modified time are later than 01/01/1999 (including 01/01/1999) will be archived to image drive.

One of the folders (“1996-11-18”) is located in the source file volume; the modified file time of files are earlier than 01/01/1999. These files will not be archived to the image.

No files are found in the same folder (“1996-11-18”) after source files are archived.

No files are shown here because they are filtered by pre-defined archive condition.

Select the files with modified time earlier than 01/01/97 (including 01/01/1997).

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This is the case for the files exist in between 01/01/1996 ~ 01/01/2000 (including “01/01/1996” & “01/01/2000”)

Depend on the “archive bit” of the source files for archive “Archive bit set” means this file has been modified since the latest file close operation. Only the files, which have been modified, will be archived to image.

There are two folders located in the source file volume; one with “archive bit” cleared and another one with “archive bit” set.

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The differences between the source file volume and the archived image

Source file volume

Archived image volume

The way to handle the source file volume after the image is built • •

The “archive bit” of the source files will be cleared after they are successfully archived to the image. This option is dependent on the settings of “…..the files with archive bits set”. The source files, which has been successfully archived to the image, will be removed permanently from the source file volume.

The successive operation toward the newly built image You can determine whether the newly built image will be burned to CD/DVD writer. Once you decide to burn CD/DVD after the archived image is built, you also have to choose a CD/DVD writer to burn.

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Define the schedule to start your archive task The settings here will determine when to start the data archive task. • •

Do it immediately – the data archive task will be engaged immediately after you submit the request to the FISC CDH. Once the task is finished, the task information will be removed from server. This is a one-time task. Do it at – the data archive task will be started at the time you define here. Once the task is finished, the task will be still kept in server and wait to start again. This is a periodical task.

Archive the source file volume while the free space is low The free space of source file volume can also be a factor to determine whether the data archive task should start or not.

If “When free space is less than” option is “disabled”, the flow to determine when the task should start will be:

Time is up to start data archive?

yes

Archive files which meet the "filter" options

no

It just purely depends on the schedule set and won’t check the free space of the source file volume.

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If “when free space is less than” option is “enabled”, one more step will be checked before starting the archive task: no

Time is up to start data archive?

yes

Free space is less than "low water" limit

yes

Archive files which meet the "filter" options

no

If you set “schedule” to “immediately” along with the low water limit of the source file volume enabled, CDH will launch a process to check the free space of the source file volume. If it meets the criteria, source files will be archived to the image drive immediately. If it does not meet the criteria, the archive task will be cancelled and task will be purged permanently.

If you set a “schedule” along with the low water limit of the source file volume enabled, the archive task will be engaged in only when the following conditions are both “true”: • •

The time reaches the pre-defined schedule and The free space reaches the low water limit

If one of the two conditions is “false”, the archive task won’t be engaged, and it will wait for starting till the next attempt.

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Burn a large archived image to CD/DVD writer Before you burn archive image to CD/DVD writer, CDH will split (if the image size is larger than physical recordable media) it into several small ones depending on the size specified in the corresponding option in data archive configuration page. For CD recordable media like CD-R/RW, the splitting size is limited to 650MB; and for DVD recordable media like DVD-R/RW, the size is limited to 4.7GB. It means the image data won’t exceed 650MB and 4.7GB in a single disc; and the actual data size would vary in every archive operations according to the source data structure. No matter the archive image size is larger than physical media or not, one or several images will be created in the image drive temporarily before CD or DVD is burned. Once the CD or DVD is successfully burned, those temporary image(s) will be removed from CDH’s image drive automatically; but source archive image will still be available in the image drive. So, you have to be sure to prepare enough space in your image drive before you decide to burn archive image(s) to CD/DVD writer.

For example, you want to burn a 1GB size archive image to a CD-R/RW drive; the whole process will be: • • • • •

Split this 1GB image into two with appropriate size (the accurate size will vary according to the directory/file structure in the archive image). These two split images will be kept temporarily also in the image drive. In the mean time, your image drive has to have enough free space to hold those two temporary split images. A serial number (“01-”, “02-”, “03-”) will be automatically appended as the prefix of the volume label in each split image. The split images will be burned to CD/DVD writer one after another. Once the split image is successfully burned, the corresponding image temporarily kept in image drive will also be removed to free space up. If one of discs burning fails, the succeeding burning tasks will be aborted and the not-yet-burned split images will be still left in the image drive. In this case, you can burn them manually using “CD record” in “Device Manager”.

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A Task to Burn Previous Archive Image: ISO Image Æ CD/DVD Writer In certain circumstance, you don’t want to burn the archive image to CD/DVD writer immediately after this image is just built from the source file volume. You can also find a route to burn the previous archive image to CD/DVD writer at the timing that you really want to do. Select an archive image from image drive All available images will be shown here except “video CD” and “audio CD”.

Decide when to burn this image to CD/DVD writer

Select a CD/DVD writer to burn; split it before burning if required CDH will forcibly change the operating mode of the designate CD/DVD writer to “CD Record” mode before burning process starts; it is no matter the previous operating mode this drive was in.

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Status of Performing Data Archive Job

Source data

copying

File drive (File volume)

building

Image drive

splitting

CD/DVD writer

burning

Media

You can define a task to perform data archive job in one of the either ways: •

Select a source file volume Æ build an archive image Æ split an archive image into several (if required) Æ burn image(s) to writer Æ remove split (temporary) images from image drives (if the archive image is split)

•

Select an archive image from image drive Æ split an archive image into several (if required) Æ burn image(s) to writer Æ remove split (temporary) images from image drives (if the archive image is split)

Or

Archive status in different stages CDH is now building an image from source file volume to image drive. It is now building an ISO image from the selected source file volume to image drive.

After the image is built, you will see the event logs (“device” & “mirror” logs) say:

Archive image from source file volume.

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And an archive image is also found in the image drive.

Before the image is burned to CD writer, it will be split into two. A big ISO image is built; it is now splitting the big image into several small ones before burned. The small ISO images will be temporarily kept in the image drive.

After an archive image is successfully split, information can be found in Event Logs. Send the first split image to CD writer

In addition to the original archive image, two split (temporary) images are created for burning.

Two temporary images are shown in Device Manager – HD Settings

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CDH is now burning two splitting images to the CD writer one by one. The big image or one of the small images is now burned to CD/DVD writer.

You can visit “Device Manager – CD Settings - ” to view the writing progress.

After the images are successfully burned, the relative information can be found in Event Logs.

Once the images are burned to CD writer successfully, the split images will be removed from the image drive automatically.

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The two temporary split images will be removed from the image drive after they are successfully burned.

Only the original archive image is left after the images are burned.

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Archive Image Identification – Volume Label & List File The archive image built from the source file volume • • • •

It will sit under CDH’s system share “MIRROR”. The default volume name will be the beginning 12 characters of “volume label” defined in the archive task. The last three characters of the volume name will be replaced with “00x” (such as “001”) if the name conflict situation of existing volumes occurs. Volume label format: total 29 digits,

Volume label & volume name

The archive image split and burned to CD/DVD •

Volume label: total 32 digits, Split extension of volume label of burned images, “01“, “02-“.

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List file of the original (intact) archive image A file, which contains the list of archived files/folder inside this image, is also included in the archive image. It is very useful for users to understand how many and which files/folders have been put inside this archive image. •

File name of archive file list: “000_ALST.TXT”

List file of the split discs A list file will be included in each burned disc, which is the list of files archived in this disc. •

File List file of this split disc: file name is fixed to “000_SLST.TXT”

Content inside the list file Task information header

File size Date/time of files

Full path name

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Multiple Data Archive Tasks When you have defined several tasks to archive your data from source file volume(s), CDH will handle the simultaneous tasks as follows: • • • •

There will be only one task currently in “building” or “splitting” state. When one task is now in “building” or “splitting” state, the other tasks, which are already activated by schedule, will be kept in “pending” state. When an engaging task already left from “building” to “waiting” (without burn request) or “splitting” to “burning” (with burn request) state, one of the pending tasks will be launched immediately. A new submitted “immediate task” will have higher execution priority than the pending tasks.

Scenario Task01: schedule, build Æ split Æ burn Task02: schedule, build Task03: immediately, build

Tasks are launching. Time is up; two tasks are launching at the same time; one is up and another is in pending state.

“Immediate” task is added.

Insert an immediate task(03); the executing sequence will be changed to “01” -> “03” -> “02”

The first priority pending task is launching now. When the on-going task is out of “building” or “splitting” state, one of the pending tasks will take over immediately. Task03 will be launched instead of Task02.

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All tasks complete.

Event log – Mirror log

You can see the task starting sequence here.

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Error Handle From File Volume to Image Drive – Building Source files are in use, modified, or can not be opened by some reasons One of the following results will happen in this case: • •

CDH will not archive these files to the image; and they will be still in the source file volume without being changed or modified (such as “archive bit”, …etc.). CDH will also archive these files but with the old content

No additional message will be logged to CDH’s Event Log in this case.

Source files are varied or deleted after TOC of the ISO image was created When the TOC (table of content) of the archive image is created, the candidate source files cannot be varied. If it still happens (files are varied), the whole archive task will fail and CDH will retry the whole task again. The retry count of archive task is internally set to “5”. No additional message will be logged to CDH’s Event Log to indicate the retry count if the building task finally completes.

If the building task still fails after it has been retried 5 times, the certain error message will be logged to CDH’s event log.

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Source file volume is not available If the source file volume is not available (such as “not yet mounted”) at the meantime of launching a predefined archive task, the archive process will be cancelled and no archive image will be built. You will see error message shown in Event Log.

The name of source files violate the naming rule of building ISO image If the names of source files violate the rule defined for building an ISO9660 image, the archive task will fail and no archive image will be created in the mirror (image) drive. You will see an error message shown in Event Log.

No source files meet the “filter” criteria defined in the archive task or source file volume is empty If no file should be archived or the source file volume is not in a ready state, the archive task will be cancelled. And you will see the following message shown in Event Log:

Designate image drive is not available or has not enough space to hold archive image

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The free space of the source file volume is larger than “when free space is less than”

Splitting Image The image splitting process fails in half-way Before CDH burns an archive image to CD/DVD writer, one or several temporary images will be created and stored in the image drive. This is the process called “image splitting”. If one of the temporary images can not be split successfully, the whole image splitting process will be terminated; and the already built temporary images will be deleted from the image drive as well. The “splitting fail” is mostly caused by the following reasons: •

Source archive image is accidentally deleted while performing image splitting.

•

The single size in source archive image is larger than the image splitting size.

The designate image drive doesn’t have enough space to hold split images before they are burned All those temporary split images will be deleted after the task fails.

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Burn Archive (Split) Image(s) to CD/DVD Writer One of the split images fails to be burned • •

The already-burned split image will be removed from the image drive. The not-yet-burned split image will be still kept in the image drive. Two split images are built and mounted before they are burned to writer. And the original archive image “task01” is also there.

The first split image (01-Task01) is successfully burned, but the second one (02-Task01) fails. No error message will be shown in “mirror log” if one of the burning processes fails. The respective error message will be shown in “device log”.

Once the split image is burned, this split image will be also deleted. Two split images are built and mounted before being burned.

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Because the second split image fails to be burned, it will be still left in the image drive. The successive “burn” requests will keep going. For example, #2 fails to be burned, and CDH will ignore #2 and start burning #3.

Non-recordable disc is used or close drive door without disc inserted In “device log”, it will simply tell you “record failed”; no additional message will be reported.

Archive (split) image is not available or is deleted accidentally during burning

One of the split images are deleted accidentally during it is burned to writer.

The size of burning image is larger than recordable disc inserted This is the case you want to burn an image which size is too large for a physical recordable disc to hold (a CD-R to hold an 1GB image).

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System Rebooting vs. Active Archive Task When the task is in “Waiting” state: •

If that is a “scheduled” task, it will be still in “waiting” state after rebooting.

•

If that is an “immediately” task, it will be possibly removed from the task list after rebooting. And there will be no message logged in the event log.

When the task is in “Building”, “Splitting”, or “Burning” state:

If that is a “scheduled” task, one of the two phenomena may happen which depends on the time of restarting CDH: •

If time of rebooting CDH and archive schedule is less than 5 minutes (ex. Scheduled at 6:00 and restart CDH at 6:02), CDH will launch the scheduled archive task again (starting from “building”).

After CDH is rebooting: CDH will start archive task again after rebooted.

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In this case, the event log will show: Difference of Restart and schedule time is within 5 minutes. Task is terminated due to “reboot” but start again after “reboot”.

Incomplete archive image is deleted.

•

If the rebooting time of CDH passes 5 minutes after archive schedule time, the task will be cancelled immediately. And it will not start until the next schedule arrives.

Before CDH is rebooting:

After CDH is rebooting: The task will fall into “waiting” state again if it passes 5 minutes.

And event log will show: Task won’t be started because it already exceeds 5 minutes.

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