Pivotal Software, Inc.

Richa Sharma

Ivan Donald Novick

Swetha Devarayasamudram Nagendran

Abhijit B Subramanya

James Bryan McAtamney

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for providing filtered backups of a distributed database. One of the methods includes receiving a user request to generate an incremental backup to be added to a user specified backup sequence for a distributed database, wherein the user specified backup sequence specifies a subset of one or more database tables to be included in backups in the user specified backup sequence. Dirty partitions of the one or more tables covered by the user specified backup sequence are identified, wherein a dirty partition is a table partition that was created or modified after generation of a most recent backup in the user specified backup sequence. An incremental backup to be added to the user specified backup sequence is generated, the incremental backup comprising contents of the dirty partitions of the tables covered by the user specified backup sequence.

Filtered incremental backups

Techniques to perform an incremental backup of a large-scale distributed database, such as a massively parallel processing (MPP) database, are disclosed. In various embodiments, a set of table partitions each of which satisfies one or more criteria to be included in a current incremental backup is determined at backup time, at least in part by comparing a current table partition meta-information with corresponding meta-information from a prior backup. The table partitions in the set are included in the incremental backup, while other table partitions not in the set are not backed up. In some embodiments, certain tables are designated to be of a type such that existing records are not modified. Tables are partitioned in a manner that isolates changes, e.g., added rows, in a relative few table partitions, leaving others unchanged and therefore able to be omitted from subsequent incremental backups.

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Sunnyvale, CA, United States of America

Richa Sharma