General Limitations and Known Problems with CDP v6.3.x / IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations v6.3.x, v7.1.x

Resolving The Problem

Tip: Beginning with Version 7.1.3, Tivoli Storage Manager FastBack for Workstations is now IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations. Some applications such as the software fulfillment systems and IBM License Metric Tool use the new product name. However, the software and its product documentation continue to use the Tivoli Storage Manager product name. To learn more about the rebranding transition, see http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21963634.

Limitations

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations client Help will not display properly in Google Chrome.

For the 7.1 IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations client: operating systems in Japanese, Traditional Chinese, or Simplified Chinese locales are not supported on Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 operating systems.

On Windows 7 or later OS's when running the application as a service, the FB4WKSTNSSrv or CDPforFilesSrv properties need to be configured in the Log On tab to "Log on as:" a user that is part of the Administrator group.

Sub-file copy function not supported on Tivoli Storage Manager servers, WebDAV IIS, and Apache servers.

These functions will not work correctly if you are using Tivoli Storage Manager, WebDAV IIS, or Apache servers as your remote backup location. Only the original file will get backed up correctly. Subsequent versions will not be backed up correctly. Ensure the sub-file copy feature is disabled.

Items added to the Exclude list will be excluded from the Vault function.

If a file or directory is excluded, it is excluded from vault protection, as well as from continuous and scheduled protection. Exclusion takes priority over all include lists and the files selected for vaulting. If an excluded file or directory is added to the list of vaulted files, Continuous Data Protection for Files will not display a message warning the user that the file or directory is not vaulted. If a file or folder is not explicitly excluded, it can be vaulted by adding it to the list of vaulted files.

File names and directories may be truncated in the Files to Restore list.

If a file name is very long, it can appear truncated in the Files to Restore list. To see the full file name, hold the mouse over the file name, and the full path and file name will display in a fly-over box. In some cases, if the full path name is very long, it may appear truncated in the fly-over box. This is a limitation of the fly-over utility.

E-mail data-level changes are not supported on WebDAV, IIS, and Tivoli Storage Manager servers.

E-mail backups are completed successfully to these servers, however the complete files are backed up each time. IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files does not create delta files to back up data-level changes.

Compression and encryption are not supported on WebDAV servers.

The compression and encryption features cannot be used when backing up to WebDAV servers.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files does not back up mount points
(junctions).

If you have a volume mounted to a mount point, for example E:\mnt1, this volume cannot be protected.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files cannot back up files which it previously encrypted.

If you back up with encryption to a remote server, IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files cannot backup the encrypted files from the remote server to another location. If you choose to back up your backup storage locations, do not enable encryption for the primary backups to the remote server.

Backup fails for files with path names with more than 230 characters.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files does not back up files with path names that have more than 230 characters. If you attempt to back up a file which has a name with more than 230 characters, an error in the log file and a pop-up error message is displayed.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files will not backup zero length files that were never written to.

Initial backup scanning process will stop when it encounters a file that has XML expanders in its name.

If a file name has XML expanders (for example, & &gt), synchronization processing will stop. IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files will save some Web pages in the Favorites directory. To avoid these problems, do one of the following:
Before you click the Back Up Now button, rename files with xml expanders using temporary names without xml expanders. After synchronization, rename the files with their original names.
Exclude the directory containing the Web pages. For example, exclude *\Favorites\*.

The GUI will not display if spyware applications are running.

Some spyware applications (for example, Adware) change browser behavior. If you are running this type of spyware application, the IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files GUI will not display. To use the GUI, uninstall spyware applications.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files function is limited in a clustered environment.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files cannot run on a cluster. However IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files can connect to and back up to a clustered environment that is operating as a fileserver.

Function is impaired when RealTimeBackup directory is deleted.

If you delete the contents of your RealTimeBackup directory while IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations /Continuous Data Protection for Files is installed, it will not function correctly. To correct this situation, you must uninstall IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files, delete the application data folder that includes the back up database and parameter files, then re-install IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files.

Some versions of files are not backed up when files are renamed too quickly.

When files or directories are rapidly renamed (for example, when using a script to rename files), not all versions of the files and directories will be backed up. This was found in a test situation and has not been encountered by customers.

A file (file1.doc) is moved from directory A to directory B. This causes a backup entry to be queued. But before CDP gets a chance to backup the file in directory B, directory B is renamed to a new location, directory C, so the backup of file1.doc from directory B to the backup target doesn't take place because the file is no longer at the original location (B\file1.doc) for FB4W / CDP to copy. But when FB4W / CDP goes to process the move of directory B to directory C, it does this by renaming directory B in the backup target to directory C.

Minor performance problems exist with sub-file backup in some cases.

There is a minimal performance issue with the subfile backup feature when a small text string is appended to a large file. The backup takes longer than expected for a small change.

Some pop-up messages are not displayed when using remote access.

When viewing IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files on a remote machine using Remote Desktop or VNC, it is possible that the pop-up messages from IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files (originating from the system tray icon) will not be seen.

The Activity Report window must be manually refreshed.

The Activity Report page does not refresh by itself. In order to see updated information the user must force a refresh by either closing and re-opening the window, or using the browser refresh control.

Known Issues

The help version will show 7.1.2 for both the Central Administration Console and Client installs for 7.1.3 and 7.1.4

When using Mozilla Thunderbird *.bitmap.msf needs to be added to the exclude list.

Tivoli Continuous Data Protection for Files and IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations does not purge email files to make room for other backups.

Email backups are not constrained by the remote storage limit, but may purge older non-email backups to make room for the e-mail files.

Users should set the remote pool size to account for the number and size of the email files they expect to back up plus space required to backup all non-email type files.

Moving a file to an excluded directory will not remove the original file from the backup location.

If you move a file from a directory that is included to a directory which is excluded, the backup copy of the file will remain in your storage location. The file will not be deleted from the storage location.

Changing remote protection location does not reset the reported number of protected files.

Switching from one remote location to a different remote location will not cause the product to reset the number of files which have been protected on the remote server back to 0. For example, if you have protected 115 files on a server, and then switch locations and run the “Back up with new settings” process, you can see double the number (230) displayed in the Protected field. Actually, only half that amount exists on the new remote location (and half exists on the former remote location).

Plugging USB drives in and out may cause IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files not to recognize the drive

It is possible to have IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files use a USB device (such as a USB key) for the remote storage target. If you remove the device and plug it again, it may pick a different drive letter and IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files will not recognize it. Windows allows you to assign a mount point to a USB device and that mount point is guaranteed to be the same each time you plug the USB device in. So the best way to use a USB device as a remote target is to define a mount point for the device and use the mount point when configuring storage areas.

IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations /Continuous Data Protection for Files compression can sometimes result in a larger file size.

Some small files, and some files created by some Microsoft Office applications (especially Microsoft Word) become larger when IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files compresses the files. In such cases, the file size of the backup copy is larger than the original file.

Temporary files sometimes get backed up.

Sometimes IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files backs up temporary files created by the operating system when creating files. For example, when using a Right-click>New>MS Word document, the file is temporarily named “New Microsoft Word Document.doc” and this is backed up before the user has renamed or saved the file.

Push install can result in an empty list on the Search dialog of the Restore wizard.

After doing a push install, if you use the Search function in the Restore wizard before you have entered the Configuration Wizard or Settings panels, the list will appear blank.
To prevent this problem, navigate to the installation directory and double-click on the extinfo.exe application. Then refresh the IBM Spectrum Protect for Workstations / Continuous Data Protection for Files browser window when the application finishes. Alternatively, the user can enter the Settings panels and the application will run automatically in the background.