3.2 Guidelines for Availability of File Versions

After your system meets the Section 3.1, Prerequisites for Retrieving File Versions, there are several reasons that previous versions of a current, renamed, or deleted file might not exist in the archive database.

File Versions Are No Longer Supported for Your Files

If your file is in a volume or directory that is no longer configured for versioning, file versions might not be available. For information, contact your system administrator.

File’s Lifetime Does Not Span the End of an Epoch

A file is versioned only if its lifetime spans the end of an epoch. If you create a file after an epoch begins, and delete it before the end of the epoch, the file cannot be versioned. A file’s version might not be available if its scheduled versioning processes is paused or delayed for a period of time that exceeded the lifetime of the file. Although the frequency of the epoch usually is less than the typical lifetime of your files, there might be occasions when the versioning time is extended. For example, if the time it takes to save versions of all the files eligible for versioning exceeds the schedule epoch time interval, some scheduled epochs might be skipped until the current process ends and the next scheduled start time occurs.

File Is Open During the Versioning Process

If a file is open during the versioning process, a copy of the file cannot be saved to the archive database. In OES 11 SP3, your administrator has the option of using NSS pool snapshot technology during the versioning process to save point-in-time copies of both closed and open files. If snapshot technology is not used, the files that are eligible for versioning are copied directly from the source volume. In this case, exclusively open files cannot be versioned.

File Is Deleted before A Version Is Saved

If your file exists at the end of an epoch, but you delete it before it can be copied to the archive database, that file version is not saved to the archive database.

File Version Exceeded Retention Thresholds

Typically, the file’s archived versions are deleted automatically from the archive database as they exceed the maximum time to keep versions or the maximum number of versions permitted, as configured by the administrator.

Filenames and Case Sensitivity

For OES 11 SP3, filenames are case sensitive. If you use the Rename command to modify the case of any letters in a filename, its file versions are saved under different name.