Adam,
Thanks for the quick response. So, now that I understand the caveats, what I would like to know is how this would be done. Patrick -----Original Message----- From: Adam Fuchs <[email protected]> To: user <[email protected]> Sent: Thu, Jul 5, 2012 10:13 am Subject: Re: Recovering Tables from HDFS Hi Patrick, The short answer is yes, but there are a few caveats: 1. As you said, information that is sitting in the in-memory map and in the write-ahead log will not be in those files. You can periodically call flush (Connector.getTableOperations().flush(...)) to guarantee that your data has made it into the RFiles. 2. Old data that has been deleted may reappear. RFiles can span multiple tablets, which happens when tablets split. Often, one of the tablets compacts, getting rid of delete keys. However, the file that holds the original data is still in HDFS because it is referenced by another tablet (or because it has not yet been garbage collected). If you're using Accumulo in an append-only fashion, then this will not be a problem. 3. For the same reasons as #2, if you're doing any aggregation you might run into counts being incorrect. You might also check out the table cloning feature introduced in 1.4 as a means for backing up a table: http://accumulo.apache.org/1.4/user_manual/Table_Configuration.html#Cloning_Tables Cheers, Adam On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 9:52 AM, <[email protected]> wrote: users@accumulo, I need help understanding if one could recover or backup tables by taking their files stored in HDFS and reattaching them to tablet servers, even though this would mean the loss of information from recent mutations and write ahead logs. The documentation on recovery is focused on the failure of a tablet server, but, in the event of a failure of the master or other situation where the tablet servers cannot be utilized, it would be beneficial to know whether the files in HDFS can be used for recovery. Thanks, Patrick Lynch
