Recycle Status

Each Volume inherits the Recycle status (yes or no) from the Pool resource record when the Media record is created (normally when the Volume is labeled). This Recycle status is stored in the Media record of the Catalog. Using the Console program, you may subsequently change the Recycle status for each Volume. For example in the following output from list volumes:

VolumeNa	Media	VolSta	VolByte	LastWritte	VolRet	Rec
File0001	File	Full	4190055	2002-05-25	14400	1
File0002	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0003	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0004	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0005	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0006	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0007	File	Purged	1896466	2002-05-26	14400	1

all the volumes are marked as recyclable, and the last Volume, File0007 has been purged, so it may be immediately recycled. The other volumes are all marked recyclable and when their Volume Retention period (14400 seconds or four hours) expires, they will be eligible for pruning, and possibly recycling. Even though Volume File0007 has been purged, all the data on the Volume is still recoverable. A purged Volume simply means that there are no entries in the Catalog. Even if the Volume Status is changed to , the data on the Volume will be recoverable. The data is lost only when the Volume is re-labeled and re-written.

To modify Volume File0001 so that it cannot be recycled, you use the update volume pool=File command in the console program, or simply update and Bacula will prompt you for the information.

VolumeNa	Media	VolSta	VolByte	LastWritte	VolRet	Rec
File0001	File	Full	4190055	2002-05-25	14400	0
File0002	File	Full	1897236	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0003	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0004	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0005	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0006	File	Full	1896460	2002-05-26	14400	1
File0007	File	Purged	1896466	2002-05-26	14400	1

In this case, File0001 will never be automatically recycled. The same effect can be achieved by setting the Volume Status to Read-Only.

As you have noted, the Volume Status (VolStatus) column in the catalog database contains the current status of the Volume, which is normally maintained automatically by Bacula. To give you an idea of some of the values it can take during the life cycle of a Volume, here is a picture of the process.

A typical volume life cycle is like this:
                because job count or size limit exceeded
    Append ------------------------------------> Used/Full

        | First Job writes to      Retention time passed |
        | the volume                 and recycling takes |
        |                                          place |
        |                                                v
        Recycled <-------------------------------------- Purged
                   Volume is selected for reuse