Snapshots :
Snapshots aren’t really a backup, but a convenient way to rollback in time. All snapshots are on the same storage as their original disk: if you lose the original disk or storage, you’ll lose all your snapshots. Also, they are not mutually exclusive with backups.
We strongly advise that you do NOT rely only on snapshots!
This feature is similar to Backups, but it creates a snapshot when planned to do so. It also handles the retention (removing the oldest snapshot). This feature is very convenient to rollback to a previous state.
Examples
- Schedule a nightly snapshot for a group of VMs, let’s say at 4:30 in the morning. With a max snapshot of 7, you’ll have a week of revert possibility
- Schedule a snapshot every week, but precisely Sunday at 11 PM, with 4 snapshots max. This will give you a month max of revert
Full Backups
You can schedule full backups of your VMs, by exporting them to the storage servery to an NFS or SMB share. The “retention” parameter allows you to modify how many backups are retained (by removing the oldest one).
Full backups are space consuming! But they allow a very simple restoration without anything to think of (the file will contain all the VM disks and information).