I have used old snapshot files exactly once when I deleted a bunch of server state trying to unwind a tangled cluster.
I keep a few around just for backup purposes. On Wed, Sep 8, 2010 at 12:01 PM, Vishal K <vishalm...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi All, > > Can you please share your experience regarding ZK snapshot retention and > recovery policies? > > We have an application where we never need to rollback (i.e., revert back > to > a previous state by using old snapshots). Given this, I am trying to > understand under what circumstances would we ever need to use old ZK > snapshots. I understand a lot of these decisions depend on the application > and amount of redundancy used at every level (e.g,. RAID level where the > snapshots are stored etc) in the product. To simplify the discussion, I > would like to rule out any application characteristics and focus mainly on > data consistency. > > - Assuming that we have a 3 node cluster I am trying to figure out when > would I really need to use old snapshot files. With 3 nodes we already have > at least 2 servers with consistent database. If I loose files on one of the > servers, I can use files from the other. In fact, ZK server join will take > care of this. I can remove files from a faulty node and reboot that node. > The faulty node will sync with the leader. > > - The old files will be useful if the current snapshot and/or log files are > lost or corrupted on all 3 servers. If the loss is due to a disaster (case > where we loose all 3 servers), one would have to keep the snapshots on some > external storage to recover. However, if the current snapshot file is > corrupted on all 3 servers, then the most likely cause would be a bug in > ZK. > In which case, how can I trust the consistency of the old snapshots? > > - Given a set of snapshots and log files, how can I verify the correctness > of these files? Example, if one of the intermediate snapshot file is > corrupt. > > - The Admin's guide says "Using older log and snapshot files, you can look > at the previous state of ZooKeeper servers and even restore that state. The > LogFormatter class allows an administrator to look at the transactions in a > log." * *Is there a tool that does this for the admin? The LogFormatter > only displays the transactions in the log file. > > - Has anyone ever had to play with the snapshot files in production? > > Thanks in advance. > > Regards, > -Vishal >
