Forever Forward Incremental

Forever Forward Incremental (FFI) is a specific backup schedule that significantly reduces backup size on storage by keeping only one full backup copy.

With the Forever Forward Incremental schedule, backup data is continuously uploaded and only changes relative to the previous data are kept. The number of available Restore Points in backup depends on backup execution frequency and is defined by retention policy settings.

The Forever Forward Incremental schedule is not suppored for plans in the legacy backup format.

Supported Cloud Storage

Forever Forward Incremental schedule is available for the following storage providers:

• Amazon S3 (except long-term storage classes)
• Microsoft Azure (except long-term tiers)
• Wasabi
• Backblaze B2
• S3 compatible (except storage providers without in-cloud object copying support) Forever Forward Incremental schedule should be supplemented by Intelligent Retention for the storages with early deletion policy.

Cloud Storages with Early Deletion Policies

Cloud storages with early deletion fees can be used for Forever Forward Incremental schedule, but it is recommended to turn Intelligent Retention on for them to avoid the fees. Below you can see the list of such storages with early deletion fees periods applicable for them:

• AWS S3 Standard-IA (30 days)
• AWS S3 Onezone-IA (30 days)
• AWS S3 Glacier-IR (90 days)
• Wasabi (90 days)
• MSP360 storage powered by Wasabi (30 days)
• Microsoft Azure Cool (30 days)

Intelligent Retention helps to avoid early deletion fees by changing retention policy settings specified by user according to the early deletion policy terms. Consider, the process of updating restore points includes deletion operations. Therefore, if Intelligent Retention is enabled, the number of incremental backups can be increased for these storages by the number of incremental backups performed on schedule until the early deletion period for the previous restore point expires. When this period expires, the restore point will be updated using all incremental backups that should be included in it, and the number of incremental backups returns to the value prescribed by retention policy. For example, in case of you make the decision to keep backups for 7 days, and the early deletion period for the selected storage is 30 days, then the maximal number of daily incremental backups can be temporarily increased up to 7 + 30 = 37. Restore point date cannot match the restore point creation date in this case. Restore point date depends on backup data included in it, and the restore point creation date depends on the moment, when early deletion fee period expires for the previous restore point. refer to the Intelligent Retention chapter for more information.

Restrictions

Forever Forward Incremental schedule is not compatible with GFS retention policy and Immutability. Thus, if you change the schedule in the existing backup plan to the Forever Forward Incremental one and it contains any GFS retention policy settings enabled, a new separate full backup for Forever Forward Incremental purposes will be created. At the same time, all previous backups under the GFS retention policy/Immutabtility will be kept on backup storage until their keeping periods and regular retention policy expire.

Upgrading to Version 7.8

If you have already configured the backup strategy created in previous versions and now upgrade to version 7.8, all existing backup plan settings remain intact. Apply the Forever Forward Incremental schedule manually.

Apply Forever Forward Incremental Schedule

Set the Forever Forward Incremental schedule on the Schedule step of the backup plan. You can create a new plan for Forever Forward schedule purposes or edit an existing plan depending on your backup requirements. To create a separate plan with the settings of an existing plan, clone it.

New Backup Plan

1. Create a new plan. Follow the instructions for your backup plan type:

• File backup
• Image-based backup
• VMware backup
• Hyper-V backup

2. Follow the backup wizard to the Schedule step.
3. Select the Forever Forward Incremental option, then specify the required backup schedule.

4. Click Next.
5. Specify the retention settings.

6. Configure the Intelligent Retention. To avoid extra expenses in storage bills, it is recommended to keep the Intelligent retention enabled always.
7. Click Next.
8. Follow the backup wizard to the end to save the backup plan configuration.

Edit Existing Backup Plan

To apply the Forever Forward Incremental schedule for existing plans, proceed as follows:

1. In the Backup Plans tab, find the required plan and click Edit to open the backup wizard or edit the backup plan schedule without passing a backup wizard. To do this, click the pen icon in the Schedule (if the plan has the schedule already) or Enable (if the plan is not scheduled).

2. Select the Forever Forward Incremental option, then specify the required schedule settings. Click Next or OK.

3. Click *OK.
4. Specify the retention settings.

5. Configure the Intelligent Retention. To avoid extra expenses in storage bills, it is recommended to keep the Intelligent retention enabled always.

6. Click OK.

Set Forever Forward Incremental Schedule in CLI

To set the Forever Forward Incremental schedule in CLI, use the -ffi parameter. This parameter configures a Forever Forward incremental schedule. This parameter is not compatible with the GFS retention policy. The parameter must be used with schedule settings and combined with the -purge parameter.

Possible values:

• yes
• no (default)

Command example:

addbackupplan -n "mynewplan" -a "myaccount" -d "c:\backup\" -ffi yes -every month -day 15 -at 12:30 -purge "1m"