Back Up and Recovery in Base Database Service

Backing up your database is critical to ensure the safety of your data. Oracle offers several methods for backing up your database.

The Oracle-managed automatic backups feature is the preferred method for backing up Oracle Cloud databases because you can easily configure backup settings using the Console. The automatic backups feature supports Recovery Service and Object Storage as the backup destination to provide you with a fully automated cloud backup solution with the same cost. You do not need to perform any manual backups or backup storage administration tasks. You can also store backups in local storage. Each backup destination has its advantages and requirements that you should consider, as described below.

Recovery Service (Recommended)

A fully managed service based on the on-premises Oracle’s Zero Data Loss Recovery Appliance technology which offers modern cybersecurity protection for Oracle Databases. Unique, automated capabilities protect Oracle Database changes in real time, validate backups without production database overhead, and enable fast, predictable recovery to any point in time.

If your backups are currently configured with Object Storage, you can seamlessly transition to Recovery Service to achieve advanced capabilities with the same cost.

For more information on Recovery Service, see About Oracle Database Autonomous Recovery Service.

Object Storage

A secure, scalable, on-demand storage solution for databases.

For more information on Object Storage, see Overview of Object Storage.

Local Storage

Currently, Oracle does not provide the ability to attach block storage volumes to a DB system, so you cannot back up to network attached volumes.

For unmanaged backups, you can use RMAN or dbcli, and you must create and manage your own Object Storage buckets for backups.

Note: If you previously used RMAN or dbcli to configure backups and then you switch to using the Console or the API for backups, a new backup configuration is created and associated with your database. This means that you can no longer rely on your previously configured unmanaged backups to work.

For detailed instructions on creating backups, see:

For detailed instructions on recovering from backups, see:

Required IAM Policy

To use Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, you must be granted security access in a policy by an administrator. This access is required whether you’re using the Console or the REST API with an SDK, CLI, or other tool. If you get a message that you don’t have permission or are unauthorized, verify with your administrator what type of access you have and which compartment to work in.

If you’re new to policies, see Getting Started with Policies and Common Policies.

Prerequisites

Review and ensure that the following prerequisites are met for the back up and recovery operation:

Recovery Service

For detailed information about Recovery Service prerequisites, see Configure Recovery Service.

Object Storage

For more information on Object Storage, see Overview of Object Storage.

General Information

Your database and DB system must be in an “Available” state for a backup operation to run successfully. Oracle recommends that you avoid performing actions that could interfere with availability (such as patching and Data Guard operations) while a backup operation is in progress. If an automatic backup operation fails, the Database service retries the operation during the next day’s backup window. If an on-demand full backup fails, you can try the operation again when the DB system and database availability are restored.

In addition to the prerequisites listed, ensure that the following conditions are met to avoid backup failures:

For more information on problems that can result from not following these guidelines, see Troubleshoot Backup Failures.

Managed Backup Features

The following information applies to managed backups configured using the Console or API.

Note: Databases in a security zone compartment must have automatic backups enabled. For a full list of policies that affect Base Database Service resources, see Security Zone Policies.

Currently, the following two types of automatic backups are supported:

To align with the Oracle recommended practice of using SYSBACKUP administrative privileges for backup and recovery operations, cloud automation creates a common administrative user named C##DBLCMUSER with the SYSBACKUP role at the CDB$ROOT container level. Backup and recovery operations are therefore performed with the user having the least required privileges. Credentials for this user are randomly generated and securely managed by cloud automation. If the user is not found or is LOCKED and EXPIRED, then cloud automation will recreate or unlock this user during the backup or recovery operations.

Automatic Incremental and Archived Redo Log Backups

When you enable the Object Storage backup feature for a database, the service creates the following on an on-going basis:

Backup Retention

If you choose to enable automatic backups, you can choose from one of the provided retention periods or a custom policy. The system automatically deletes your incremental backups at the end of your chosen retention period.

The following retention periods are available for Recovery Service. The retention periods (in days) are defined in the Recovery Service protection policy.

The following retention periods are available for Object Storage.

Long-Term Retention Backup with Recovery Service

Long-term retention backup (LTR) allows you to store full backups for periods up to ten years for compliance, regulatory, or other business needs with complete LTR lifecycle management and immutability.

For LTR with Recovery Service, the retention period must be in days (90 - 3650) or years (1 - 10) from when the backup was created.

To create an LTR backup with the required retention period, Recovery Service does not require creating a new full production backup but does so by utilizing already existing operational backups in the system within the defined recovery window in the policy. For detailed steps, see Create an On-Demand Backup of a Database.

You can change the retention period for a specific existing LTR backup within the retention period. For detailed steps, see Change the Retention Period of a Long-Term Retention Backup with Recovery Service.

You can restore an LTR backup to create a new database within the retention period. For detailed steps, see Create a DB System from a Backup Using the Console.

Upon DB system termination, the LTR backups will be deleted as per the ‘Deletion options after database termination’ value.

Note: Oracle recommends choosing the ‘Delete based on policy’ option while terminating a DB system to ensure the LTR backups are retained.

Consider the following additional factors for LTR backups:

Restore Options

The following restore options are available for the database. This is not supported for LTR.

Note: You can determine the SCN number to use either by accessing and querying your database host or by accessing any online or archived logs.

Protection Policies

Recovery Service uses protection policies to control database backup retention in Oracle Cloud.

Protection Policies provide automated retention management for protected databases, satisfying requirements for regulated environments. Each protected database must be associated with one protection policy.

A protection policy determines the maximum period (in days) allowed to retain backups created by Recovery Service. Based on your business requirements, you can assign separate policies for each protected database or use a single policy across all protected databases in a VCN.

For more information, see Managing Protection Policies.

Protected Databases

Protected database refers to an Oracle Cloud database that uses Recovery Service for backup operations.

For more information, see Managing Protected Databases.

Real-time Data Protection

Recovery Service offers real-time data protection so that you can recover a database within a few sub-seconds of a database failure.

Real-time protection is the continuous transfer of redo changes from a protected database to Recovery Service. This reduces data loss and provides a recovery point objective (RPO) near 0. This is an extra cost option.

For more information, see Real-time Data Protection.

Backup Deletion Options After Database Termination

When you terminate a database, all of its resources are deleted, along with any automatic backups. Managed backups using the Recovery Service and Object Storage destination will be deleted according to the retention policy options selected.

You can use the following options to retain managed database backups after the database is terminated. These options can also help restore the database from backups in case of accidental or malicious damage to the database.

Backup Scheduling

For Recovery Service backups, the automatic backup process starts at any time or within the assigned window.

For Object Storage backups, the automatic backup process used to create level 0 and level 1 backups can run at any time within the daily backup window (between midnight and 6:00 AM). You can optionally specify a 2-hour scheduling window for your database during which the automatic backup process will begin. There are 12 scheduling windows to choose from, each starting on an even-numbered hour (for example, one window runs from 4:00-6:00 AM, and the next from 6:00-8:00 AM). Backups jobs do not necessarily complete within the scheduling window.

For Object Storage backups, the default backup window of 00:00 to 06:00 in the time zone of the DB system’s region is assigned to your database if you do not specify a window. Note that the default backup scheduling window is six hours long, while the windows you specify are two hours long.

Consider the following factors while scheduling backups.

On-Demand Full Backups

You can create a full backup of your database at any time unless your database is assuming the standby role in a Data Guard association.

Standalone Backups

When you terminate a DB system or a database, all of its resources are deleted, along with any automatic backups. Managed backups using the Recovery Service and Object Storage destination will be deleted according to the retention policy options selected. Full backups remain in Object Storage as standalone backups. You can use a standalone backup to create a new database.

Note:

Cancel a Running Full or Incremental Backup

You can cancel an ongoing backup, allowing you to free up system resources. As part of the Create Database workflow and independently (after the database has been created), you may enable automatic backup and select the desired backup destination. Depending on the backup destination selected, you may have one or more full backups and several incremental backups. Once any of these backups have started, you have the option to cancel them midway. You can cancel any running backup (automatic or standalone) from the Console or the API. You can cancel a manual backup, which is triggered when you click the Create backup button. You can also delete a canceled manual backup.

Backup and Restore from a Standby Database in a Data Guard Association

You can backup and restore from a standby database in a Data Guard association. By using this feature, you can offload backups to the standby database, thereby freeing up resources in the primary database.

Before you begin, note the following:

For detailed steps to configure automatic backups using the Console, see Configure Automatic Backups for a Standby Database.

Cross Region Restore

You can use an existing backup and restore it to create a database (out-of-place restore) across availability domains within the same region or in a different region using a backup created with Object Storage or Autonomous Recovery Service.

You can also restore a backup taken on either a database that was configured using host-based wallets (local wallets) or OCI Vault. For more information on database encryption keys, see Manage Encryption Keys.

The following prerequisites are required for cross region restore (within the same tenancy) for the Oracle Database Autonomous Recovery Service.

  1. VCN peering: Both the VCNs in local and remote regions must be peered across regions.

  2. Add security rules on the source and target VCNs.

    1. Add Ingress rules on the source.

      1. Click Add Ingress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows HTTPS traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the VCN where the database resides.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 8005
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

      2. Click Add Ingress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows SQLNet traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the VCN where the database resides.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 2484
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

      3. Click Add Ingress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows HTTPS traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the target VCN.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 8005
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

      4. Click Add Ingress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows SQLNet traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the target VCN.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 2484
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

    2. Add Egress rules on the target. These are optional if the egress traffic is opened for all IPs and ports.

      1. Click Add Egress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows HTTPS traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the source VCN.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 8005
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

      2. Click Add Egress Rule, and add these details to set up a rule that allows SQLNet traffic from anywhere:

        • Source Type: CIDR
        • Source CIDR: Specify the CIDR of the source VCN.
        • IP Protocol: TCP
        • Source Port Range: All
        • Destination Port Range: 2484
        • Description: Specify an optional description of the ingress rule to help manage the security rules.

      Note: Ensure that the Recovery Service subnet is present in the source region and is attached to the source VCN. For more information, see Creating a Recovery Service Subnet in the Database VCN.

  3. Perform DNS peering between local and remote VCNs.

Audit and Trace File Retention for Databases Using Automatic Backups

Oracle Database writes audit and trace files to your database’s local storage in the /u01 directory. These files are retained for 30 days by default, though you can change this interval. Once a day, audit and trace files older than 30 days (or the user-specified interval, if applicable) are discarded by a Oracle Scheduler job. You can also disable the Scheduler job if you want to retain these files permanently. Use the following dbcli commands to make changes to this Scheduler job.

Use the API

For information about using the API and signing requests, see REST APIs and Security Credentials. For information about SDKs, see Software Development Kits and Command Line Interface.

Use these API operations to manage database backups:

For the complete list of APIs for the Database service, see Database Service API.