Abstract: Described is a system that leverages object storage provided access controls to secure backup data stored on a third-party cloud-based object storage. More particularly, the system may implement a mechanism that ensures that a backup system acts as a gateway for accessing the backup data stored on the object storage. For example, the system may prevent object storage administrative accounts that are authorized to access data directly on the storage from maliciously or inadvertently jeopardizing the integrity of the backup data. Moreover, the backup system may encrypt the backup data to prevent such administrative accounts from performing various backup related operations such as data recovery. Accordingly, to perform backup operations and decrypt the backup data, an account must be authorized by the backup system acting as an exclusive gateway to the backup data stored on a third-party storage.

Abstract: Embodiments described herein relate to a technique for performing an enhanced backup and restore for a computing device. The method may include: receiving, at a backup management device, a request to perform an enhanced backup operation; creating, by the backup management device, an enhanced recovery asset including computing device data items and stored on a backup storage device; performing a backup operation of a volume of the computing device to obtain a first backup container; performing a backup operation of system state information associated with the computing device to obtain a second backup container; associating the first backup container and the second backup container with the enhanced recovery asset; receiving, by the backup management device, a second request to perform a recovery operation; and performing, based on the second request, the recovery operation using at least a portion of the enhanced recovery asset.

Abstract: Described is a system for intelligent re-tiering of backup data stored on a cloud-based object storage. More specifically, the system may re-tier objects such that the system retains the ability to efficiently perform a full restore of backup data even when incremental backups are performed to a cloud-based object storage. To provide such a capability, the system may maintain a specialized metadata database that stores information indicating the backup time for each backup, and a list of objects required to perform a full restore to each of the backup times. Accordingly, when using a threshold time (e.g. expiry) to select object candidates for re-tiering, the system may leverage the metadata database to ensure that objects that may still need to be referenced are not unnecessarily moved to a lower storage tier.

Abstract: Described is a system for rule-based re-tiering of backup data stored on a cloud-based object storage. More specifically, the system may re-tier objects based on one or more storage rules such that the system retains the ability to efficiently perform a full restore of backup data even when incremental backups are performed to a cloud-based object storage. To provide such a capability, the system may maintain a specialized metadata database that stores information indicating the backup time for each backup, and a list of objects required to perform a full restore to each of the backup times. Accordingly, when initiating a re-tiering based on one or more storage rules, the system may intelligently select candidate objects for re-tiering by leveraging the metadata database to ensure that objects that may still need to be referenced are not unnecessarily moved to a lower storage tier.

Abstract: Described is a system (and method) for managing specialized metadata that may be used to manage and search incremental backup data stored on a cloud-based object storage. The system may create and store such metadata as part of a specialized metadata database that includes a data catalog and a backup catalog. The system may leverage the metadata database to initiate operations to efficiently manage incremental backup data stored on the object storage. For example, the metadata may be relied upon to efficiently reconstruct (e.g. synthetically) the client data to a point-in-time of any incremental backup. In addition, the metadata may include properties of the backed-up data, which are maintained separately from the backup data stored as objects. Accordingly, these properties may be searched to identify and locate backup data without having to retrieve the stored objects.

Abstract: Backup operations may save a full backup and subsequent checkpoints. Systems and methods for handling backup and restore operations when checkpoints are deleted. Checkpoints can be merged during a restore operation to account for deleted checkpoints. Also, the backup can continue to leverage existing backups even though checkpoints have been deleted.

Abstract: Described is a system for managing backup data stored on a cloud-based object storage irrespective of the storage provider. The system may include a server (or gateway) that provides a backup service, and acts as an intermediary between a client device and object storage. To provide such capabilities, the system may manage an application programming interface (API) that provides a uniform set of methods to a client device irrespective of the destination object storage provider. A function library may include provider-specific functions that invoke corresponding storage-layer operations provided by the destination object storage. The server may also manage an operation pool to schedule operations and saturate bandwidth to the object storage. The server may also implement a specialized metadata database to provide further storage efficiencies by storing certain backup data exclusively within the metadata database.

Abstract: A method for verifying data includes obtaining, by a backup agent, a backup verification trigger for a backup stored in a backup storage system, in response to the backup verification trigger, obtaining backup metadata associated with the backup, performing a hierarchical structure data mapping based on the backup metadata to obtain a hierarchical structure associated with the backup, performing, using the hierarchical structure, a backup verification to generate a backup health state of the backup, after the backup verification is generated: making a determination, based on the backup verification, that the backup health state is not in a healthy state, and in response to the determination, performing a remediation of the backup policies.

Abstract: Described is a system (and method) for specialized data management when performing incremental backups to a cloud-based object storage. When backing up client data, the server may utilize incremental backups to conserve the amount of storage space required on the object storage. However, the server may implement a configuration that enables full reconstruction of the client data at the time of recovery. To provide such capabilities, the server may leverage a specialized metadata database. The metadata database may be an embedded database maintained by the server. The server may leverage the metadata database to provide further storage efficiencies by storing certain incremental backup data exclusively within the metadata database. Accordingly, the server may implement a data management configuration as part of a backup service that conserves storage usage, and as a result, storage costs when using on a third-party cloud-based object storage.

Abstract: Techniques described herein relate to a methods and systems for asset classification, which may include: identifying, in a backup domain, a first asset and a second asset; performing a first analysis of the first asset to determine a set of first asset characteristics; performing a second analysis of the second asset to determine a set of second asset characteristics; creating a first asset group based on the first analysis and the second analysis, the first asset group comprising the first asset and the second asset; and assigning a first backup policy to the first asset group.

Abstract: Described is a system (and method) for efficient object storage management when backing up data to a cloud-based object storage. The system may be implemented as part of a server (or gateway) that provides a backup service to a client device by acting as an intermediary when backing up data from the client device to a third-party cloud-based object storage. The system may implement various specialized procedures to efficiently store backup data as objects within the object storage. The procedures may include packing client data into objects of a consistent size to improve storage performance. The system may also improve storage performance and conserve storage by analyzing the data stored within an object and reallocating the data as necessary. More particularly, the system may efficiently reallocate data to new objects when the amount of live data within an object falls below a predetermined threshold.

Abstract: Systems and methods for performing differential and full data protection operations. Parameters that define minimum, interval, and maximum values are provided to an agent. These values relate to changes in the data or in a database. The agent monitors the database and backups are triggered in accordance with these values. A differential backup is not performed until the minimum value is reached and differential backups are performed only after subsequent intervals are reached. A full backup is performed once the maximum value is reached.

Abstract: Described is a system for cloud-based processing of backup data for storage onto various types of object storage systems. A specialized cloud-based component (e.g. proxy server) may act as an intermediary when backing up data from a client system to an object storage. For example, the cloud-based component may be provided as part of backup service that operates in conjunction with a client system. Accordingly, the system may allow different clients of a backup service to efficiently and seamlessly interact with the different third-party object storage providers via a single cloud-based component. To provide such object-storage-agnostic functionality, the cloud-based component may include a function library that includes object-storage-specific functions. For example, the cloud-based component may invoke a specific set of operations that interact with a storage API provided by a particular object storage provider.

Abstract: Described is a system (and method) for providing multiple types of granular delete operations for a cloud-based object storage. The system may include a server that acts as an intermediary between a client device and an object storage that stores client data. The server may allow a client to perform a hard delete (or permanent) delete and a soft delete. The server may perform a specialized processing to synthetically create the soft delete feature using a permanent object delete operation provided by the object storage. The specialized processing may include manipulating retention periods associated with objects depending on whether the object is subject to a hard delete or a soft delete. As a result, the server may provide the ability for clients to perform a soft delete at an object level using existing storage level APIs that do not directly support such a feature.

Abstract: Backup operations may save a full backup and subsequent checkpoints. Systems and methods for handling backup and restore operations when checkpoints are deleted. Checkpoints can be merged during a restore operation to account for deleted checkpoints. Also, the backup can continue to leverage existing backups even though checkpoints have been deleted.

Abstract: A method for managing a persistent storage system includes obtaining, by a first node in a node cluster, a write request, wherein the node cluster comprises the first node and a second node, processing the write request, storing data associated with the write request in a persistent storage system, updating a block-based change list based on the storing, making a first determination that a synchronization schedule is triggered, and in response to the first determination: initiating a block-based change list synchronization to the second node.

Abstract: A backup manager for providing backup services includes storage and a backup orchestrator. The storage stores manager associations. The backup orchestrator obtains a request to provide the backup services for a deployment; in response to the request: identifies types of managers of the deployment; makes a determination, based on the types of the managers of the deployment, that the managers of the deployment require a hybrid backup using the manager associations; and schedules a hybrid backup for the deployment based on the determination.

Abstract: A method and system for backup processes that includes identifying a target volume and identifying a number of available threads to back up the target volume. The elements in the target volume are distributed among the available threads based on a currently pending size of data in the threads. The elements are stored from each thread into a backup container, and merged from each of the backup containers into a backup volume.

Abstract: A method and system for hybrid incremental file-based backup that includes receiving a list of desired elements for incremental backup and determining the elements on the list of desired elements that have changed since a previous backup, and storing the elements on the list of desired elements that have changed since the previous backup in a backup container. The method and system determines a list of unchanged elements from the previous backup and storing the unchanged elements on the list of unchanged elements in the backup container to obtain an updated backup.

Abstract: Disclosed herein are methods, systems, and processes to provide flexible associativity for multitenant applications operating in clustered computing environments. One such method involves updating a configuration file to produce an updated configuration file by generating new relationship information based on associations between a dependent application represented by a parent object and a dependee application represented by a child object. In certain embodiments, the new relationship information is stored in a metadata object.