Unable to make a copy of the database using the following SQL command or through the Azure portal
CREATE DATABASE mydatabase_copy AS COPY OF mydatabase;
Unable to make a copy of the database on Azure SQL Server, no wizard is present
we know there is a way of creating bacpac and restoring it, but this is a complete manual process and take too much time
we need some automated way to achieve this.
CREATE DATABASE ... AS COPY OF is not available in Managed Instance, only in SQL Database. Instead use Point-in-time restore
Use point-in-time restore (PITR) to create a database as a copy of
another database from some time in the past. This article describes
how to do a point-in-time restore of a database in Azure SQL Managed
Instance.
Point-in-time restore is useful in recovery scenarios, such as
incidents caused by errors, incorrectly loaded data, or deletion of
crucial data. You can also use it simply for testing or auditing.
Backup files are kept for 7 to 35 days, depending on your database
settings.
Which you can automate with PowerShell.
Related
Currently I am tasked with researching a solution to easily copying data from one environment to another (QA to DEV for example) as well as having the flexibility of going to different times to compare our data. It is an easy task to do locally with SSMS and I am looking for the best ways to do it using Azure and it's tools.
These are the options that I found so far:
Backup Service and Backup Vault (The MS solution that I am not asking for. They don't generate .bak files)
Azure Function to execute generate and transfer SQL (flexible but the code needs to be maintained + manage authentication)
Powershell process with Azure Automate (Flexible too but needs to be maintained)
Datafactory/SSIS (Still learning and researching)
Anyone got any tools/methods that are worth looking into before I dive deeper with a solution?
For Azure SQL database, SQL Data Sync is one of feature for the data sync between Azure SQL and SQL server(on-premise). Some limits are that Azure SQL database must be hub and each must have a primary key. That may not suit you.
Per my experience, Data Factory is the best one for you. You can copy the data between different environment, in Sink settings, we can using upsert(insert or update) operation to sync the data.
If you only want to schedule the backup automatically for the SQL, the third-part tool also could feed your request: SQL Backup and FTP.
Since you have searched a lot and found almost all the options in Azure, all the ways can achieve that. You need to know your real request, data sync or auto backup create the .bacpac file to storage. That's not a good question to help you find the best way. The way you like, the way is the best.
I went with writing an Azure Automate powershell script. including cmdlts like New-AzureRmSqlDatabaseExport and passing in the parameters was ticky but it finally did the job.
I have a backup file that came from Server A and I copied that .bak files into my local and setup that DB into my Sql Server Management Studio. Now After setting it up I deployed it in Azure Sql Database. But now there were change in the Data in Server A because it's still being used, so I need to get all those changes to the Azure SQL Database that I just deployed. How am I going to do that?
Note: I'm using Azure for my server and I have a local copy of Server A database. So basically in terms of data and structure my local and the previous Server A db is the same. But after a few days Server A data is now updated and my local DB is still the same as when I just backup the db in Server A.
How can I update the DB in Azure to take all the changes in Server A and deploy it in Azure?
You've got a few choices. It's just about migrating data. It's also a question of which data you're going to migrate. Let's say it's a neat, complete replacement. Then, I'd suggest looking at the bacpac mechanism. That's a way to export a database, it's structure and data, then import it into a new location. This is one mechanism of moving to Azure.
If you can't simply replace everything, you need to look at other options. First, there's SSIS. You can build a pipeline to move the data you need. There's also export and import through sqlcmd, which can connect to Azure SQL Database. You can also look to a third party tool like Redgate SQL Data Compare as a way to pick and choose the data that gets moved. There are a whole bunch of other possible Extract/Transform/Load (ETL) tools out there that can help.
Do you want to sync schema changes as well as Data change or just Data? If it is just Data then the best service to be used would be Azure Data Migration Service, where this service can help you copy the delta with respect to Data to Azure incrementally, both is online and offline manner and you can also decide on the schedule.
I want to check how was my data 2 days ago and to do that I though of exporting a back up that Azure take every hour. But I cannot find it.
I've found this page on Microsoft that talks about exporting a DB but it is for the current data.
Azure SQL Database automatically creates database backups and writes them to read-access geo-redundant storage (RA-GRS) for geo-redundancy. Frequency depends on what kind of load the service is dealing with, duration backups are kept depends on the tier you've purchased.
To recover to a point in time using the Azure portal, open the page for your database and click Restore on the toolbar.
You cannot overwrite an existing database during restore, so you need to create a new instance for the point-in-time restore, and you'll pay for that. You can also do the restores programmatically using PowerShell.
Further details here.
I suggest to execute a restore, with a specific time, on a temporary DB then export it to a bacpac file. You can use Azure CLI for that:
az sql db restore with -time option for restoring
az sql db export for exporting
az sql db delete for deleting the temporary database
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/cli/azure/sql/db
The same can be also achieved using Azure Portal.
Azure SQL has built in backups. If the SQL database and server are deleted from within the Portal these backups are lost.
What is best practice for backing up Azure SQL that will withstand deletion of the server from the portal.
I have manually exported the database to a storage location, however Azure says that this should not be used as a backup. Why should it not be used and what should I be doing instead?
If you want a direct control over your backups, then the best mechanism is fairly straight forward.
Create a copy of your database. This ensures no active transactions because it's a copy.
Use the BACPAC process to export the copy of the database. BACPAC doesn't respect transactions, this is why we created a copy.
Store this where ever you want.
Drop the copy of the database because you're paying for that while it exists.
You can use the BACPAC to import into a new Azure database, or you can import it into a VM in Azure, AWS, or locally.
Azure SQL has built in backups. If the SQL database and server are
deleted from within the Portal these backups are lost.
Yes,If you delete the Azure SQL server that hosts SQL Databases, all databases that belong to the server are also deleted and cannot be recovered. You cannot restore a deleted server.
What is best practice for backing up Azure SQL that will withstand
deletion of the server from the portal.
If your Azure SQL Server has been deleted, you need to create a support ticket to restore the databases.
When you really need to delete a SQL sever and then try to back up it, You can configure the Azure Recovery Services vault to store Azure SQL database backups and then recover a database using backups retained in the vault using the Azure portal or PowerShell.
Why should it not be used and what should I be doing instead?
I think you can export your database to your local storage , but it's complex to restore it to Azure. Also, it may change some information of your SQL database and may need migration to Azure.
Well, there is no real answer to this, you can use any backup method you like. Its mostly a personal preference.
But the easiest way (probably) is using Azure Backup Vault to do long term backups (which is a native way for Azure). Its pretty easy to configure (next\next\next) and it is not connected to the Azure SQL Server, so when you delete the server the backups are there.
I am trying to upgrade an Azure DB in a continuous release scenario. The DB lives in SQL Azure and its size keeps growing. Now it's about > 50G. In my previous on-premise experience, I usually backup the old DB in a compressed format and save it to an on-premise file sever. In case the upgrade fail, I can restore it safely.
But with SQL Azure, I am not sure if it's OK to download such a big DB from SQL Azure. And is there any best practice for the SQL Azure DB upgrade scenario?
ADD
I found this link regarding different SQL Azure backup strategies. But it'll be great if someone can share some field experiences.
Azure now has automatic exports (aka full backups) to blob storage that you can schedule. The .bacpac files are complete compressed copies of your database and blob storage is pretty cheap. To give you an idea of size we have a 20GB database that is backed up to only 500 MB. We typically keep 14 days of backups but how long to retain them is up to your needs.
It's kind of like the Ron Popeil Rotisserie. You just set it, and forget it.
Obviously after you take a backup you want to restore it somewhere else to verify it worked. It's also a good idea to periodically restore your backups to make sure they working over time. You can do all of this in the Azure Portal. Just create a new database based on a .bacpac file that you created from the automated export.
You actually don't have to download the DB on premise unless you want another copy locally. Because if you are using geo-redundant blob storage its already copied to another region and you have 6 copies in total. But again its up to you.
When you log into the management portal navigate to the Sql Database tab. Click on your DB and then click configure. There you can set up automated backups for your db to blob storage.
The path on the management portal looks like this:
https://manage.windowsazure.com/mycompany.com#Workspaces/SqlAzureExtension/SqlServer/coolazuredb/Database/5.coolazuredb/Config
Here is a screenshot of the automated export section: