Configuring and Backing Up Oracle Databases Using RMAN - OCP: Oracle Database 12c Administrator Certified Professional - page 133

Snapshot Control-File Location
As we mentioned earlier, Oracle places the snapshot control file in the ORACLE_HOME/dbs
directory. As a part of the setup of RMAN, you should change the location of the snapshot
control file by using the CONFIGURE command, as shown here:
configure snapshot controlfile name to '/oracle01/backup/sncf/sncforcl.ora';
Note that there needs to be only one snapshot control file at any time. That is why the
name of the snapshot control file does not contain any modifier like %U .
Backup Tags
When you create backups, you can optionally tag them. If you do not tag a backup, RMAN
will tag it for you. A tag is a name that you assign to the backup, such as, for example, Gold
Copy (perhaps you recreate your database every day with the backup tagged Gold Copy). You
can easily restore and recover the database using the tag as the key for the recovery. We will
discuss using tags to recover your database in Chapter 5. Here is an example of performing a
backup with a tag included:
RMAN> backup database tag 'DPrestwich' plus archivelog
tag='ARCH_GOLD' delete input;
You might have noticed that I defined two tags for this backup. That is because this
backup is actually two backups in one. The first is the backup of the database, and the
second is the backup of the archived redo logs. By default, the tags of both backups will
be the same, but you can choose to tag each backup differently.
Duplexing Backups
You may want to create duplicate copies of backup sets when they are created. This is
called duplexing . Duplexing of backup sets can be configured as a default setting by using
the CONFIGURE command, as shown here:
RMAN> configure datafile backup copies for device type disk to 2;
You can also configure duplexing for archive log backups, as shown here:
RMAN> configure archivelog backup copies for device type disk to 2;
Duplexing backups has some consequences. Obviously you are doing two backups at the
same time, which has system resource implications. Also, duplexing will require more disk
space to complete the backup.
Note that you can duplex across similar devices only. So you can duplex across tape
devices or across disk devices but not both.