Glossary

Term	Definition
Backup Agent	An instance of Online Backup which is linked to a Managed Backup solution
Backup Chain	A backup chain is a configured plan execution sequence, in which the completion of a backup plan can be used as a trigger for starting the specified backup or restore plan. Refer to Backup Chains Explained for details
Backup Plan	A backup plan determines objects in a local storage must be monitored and uploaded to the backup (cloud or local) storage. These objects (basically, files and folders) can be referred to as a backup source. Online Backup allows uploading multiple versions of each file to backup storage, it is supported in both backup formats: current and new backup format. Online Backup uses timestamps to identify which files have been modified and your backups include only files/folders that were modified since the previous backup date. The file version control is maintained by providing a synchronization layer between backup and local storages. After a backup plan is scheduled, the backup service will automatically execute it in the background at the specified time. To learn more, refer to the Backup Plans chapter
Backup Prefix	A single bucket (or container in terms of a different cloud provider) can store backups from different computers and the backup prefix is used to identify different backups within the same bucket. It is used to name a folder where the backups from the specific computer are stored in the backup storage destination. To learn more, refer to the Backup Prefix Explained
Backup Service	Online Backup does not need to be constantly running in the background. To be able to process backups on a schedule, the installation registers a Windows service in the operating system that automatically performs the required tasks in the background. You can make the backup service automatically restart scheduled backup/restore tasks when a computer starts up if the backup processing was previously interrupted for any reason. To learn more, refer to the Backup Service In Windows article at kb.msp360.com
Backup Service Account	The service account is a user account under which Online Backup is running on specific computer. The privileges granted to this account may forbid the processing of certain files (such as system and protected files). The application is running under the Local System account by default, which can prevent the backup service from accessing certain files and folders. You can also consider making the service account under which Online Backup is running a member of the Backup Operators group to ensure that files are backed up regardless of any security permissions assigned to them. To learn more, refer to the Manage Computers chapter
Backup Source	A backup's configuration determines which files in your local storage the backup service should monitor and upload to the destination storage. These files can be referred to as backup source and Online Backup can upload multiple versions of each file to your destination storage. Online Backup maintains the file version control by providing a synchronization layer between your cloud and local storages
Block-Level Backup	As opposed to a full backup which uploads a complete copy of each file to storage, a block-level backup uploads the full copy of your data only during the first execution of the backup plan and when explicitly forced to do this. In other cases, the backup service uploads only blocks (parts of a file) that were modified since the last backup date, which can significantly decrease the processing time required for completing your backup routine, as well as reduce the required storage space. Instead of uploading complete copies of modified files, which is the case with an incremental backup, a block-level backup operates with modified file blocks. To learn more, refer to the Full, Incremental and Block-Level Backup chapter
Bucket / Container	A bucket (or container in terms of a different cloud provider) is used to store your data in the cloud. You can use buckets to organize your data and control access to it, but unlike directories and folders, you cannot nest buckets. The implementation of buckets may differ among various cloud providers. Consult your cloud provider's documentation to learn more about using buckets/containers. When a bucket stores backups uploaded from different computers, the backup prefix is used to identify different backups within the same bucket
Bunch	Bunch is a notion of a backup plan in the main database. Bunch is linked to a directory in the database which in turn is linked to a destination. A destination can be modified. Bunch is always unique within the cloud folder and the plan type. This approach enables comfort data deletion on cloud storage since all backup content is stored in one directory
CLI	Backup for Windows provides a command line interface to manage your backup routines. Be informed about the differences in CLI implementation between various Online Backup license types (formerly product editions) (Windows, Linux, and Mac). To learn more, refer to the CLI section
Cloud	An abstract cloud storage for backups
Data Seeding	When you need to back up data on a computer that has a slow Internet connection, it makes sense to perform a full backup from another computer that has a faster network connection and then let the first computer perform subsequent block-level backups for which the bandwidth throughput is not as important. This process is known as data seeding. To learn more, refer to the Data Seeding article
Deep Sync	When you need to restore data that was backed up using the new backup format, the process begins with repository synchronization. This step involves listing the files and folders included in the selected backup generation. Following this, the backup service will automatically initiate the download of backup metadata, a process formerly referred to as "deep sync".This procedure, known as deep syn, is designed to retrieve metadata for all objects within the specified backup generation. considered that this process may take some time, particularly for long-term storage systems, where it can take up to 12 hours. To learn more, refer to the Backup Metadata Downloading article
Differential Backup	Backing up Microsoft SQL Server data is performed by using the native differential backup functionality of SQL Server
File-Level Backup	As opposed to an image-based backup that can store a complete disk image as a single object, a file-level backup can contain data stored in individual files and/or folders. To learn more, refer to the File Backup section
Forever Forward Incremental Backup	Forever Forward Incremental (FFI) is a specific backup method that minimizes required backup storage space by keeping only one full copy of the data alongside incremental restore points. The full backup at the beginning of the chain is periodically rebuilt to include stale incremental recovery points according to the selected retention policy. To learn more, refer to the Forever Forward Incremental Backup section
Full Backup	In general, creating any backup starts with uploading a full copy of your data to the storage. However, it is unreasonable to create and upload a full copy of every file each time when you need to apply any changes made to your locally stored data to the backup stored in the cloud. How a full (or incremental) backup processes your data depends on the kind of data that you back up. To learn more, refer to the Full, Incremental and Block-Level Backup chapter
Generation	A sequence of a full backup and subsequent incremental backups. To learn more refer to Backup Plan Explained
GFS	Grandfather-Father-Son retention policy is a feature that provides custom purge delays for some full backups to comply with archive storage requirements and optimize storage costs. Refer to the About GFS chapter to learn more
Hybrid Backup	A backup type that provides uploads to local and cloud destinations. Learn more about hybrid backups in the Hybrid backup chapter
Intelligent Retention	Intelligent Retention is a special kind of retention policy that is applied exclusively in combination with a Forever Forward Incremental backup to avoid early deletion fees for cloud storage accounts. Learn more about this retention policy in the Intelligent Retention chapter
Image-Based Backup	An image-based backup stores the system state at a specific point of time, to which you can roll back in case of a system failure. An image stores information about files and folders, as well as system, application, and software configuration. You can restore an image-based backup to different destinations: to a virtual machine in the cloud (such as Amazon EC2), to dissimilar hardware, to a Hyper-V or VMware instance. You can even create a recovery USB drive (or ISO disk image), as well as restore individual files from an image-based backup. Similar to a basic file-level backup, you can store multiple versions of an image, which allows you to restore to a specific point in time. Without versions, you would end up having just one last copy of a system image that could become damaged or outdated
Incremental Backup	An incremental backup is a type of backup that works in conjunction with a full backup. An incremental backup uses a full backup as a basis. This type backs up only files/folders that were changed since the previous backup was created. One full backup can be accompanied by one or more incremental backups according to the backup plan schedule. A full backup in combination with incremental ones forms a generation
Keeping period (GFS)	Keeping period is a notion related to the GFS retention policy that determines the period for keeping backup in the GFS lifecycle. Keeping periods can be weekly, monthly, and yearly. Refer to the GFS chapter to learn more
Object Lock (Immutability)	Object Lock (Immutability) is a feature that locks backup datasets for a period specified by GFS retention policy. Within this period, backup data is kept unmodified. Refer to the Object Lock (Immutability) chapter to learn more
Real-Time Backup	Applies to legacy format only. With Online Backup, you can enable the backup service to continuously scan your source files in the background and update the backup storage on detecting any changes made to these files in real-time, without compromising the overall performance of your computer. Note that the real-time backup is not available for the image-based backup type. To enable the real-time backup, refer to the Schedule step in File Backup Plan step of the backup wizard
Real-Time Backup	Applies to legacy format only. With Online Backup, you can enable the backup service to continuously scan your source files in the background and update the backup storage on detecting any changes made to these files in real-time, without compromising the overall performance of your computer. Note that the real-time backup is not available for the image-based backup type. To enable the real-time backup, refer to the Schedule step in File Backup Plan step of the backup wizard
Repository	Online Backup uses a service SQLite database to keep track of the backed up data and ensure that the backup services will not repeatedly upload files that already reside in the cloud. This reduces the number of requests sent to the cloud and lowers your storage bills. You can do one of the following to ensure that your local repository is up to date perform a consistency check to detect any discrepancies between the repository and the backup storage and take appropriate action on finding any mismatch or to synchronize your repository to delete the current repository and update it according to the current backup storage contents from scratch
Restore Plan	Similar to backup plans, you can save your restore configurations to be able to run them at a later time. You can manage restore plans using the Restore Wizard or command line interface (CLI)
Restore Point	Restore point is a completed backup plan run. A restore point can be empty or contain some files or folders. The restore point is considered successful, if the following conditions are met: - the backup plan is completed successfully without any warnings or errors - both the TOC and part files are uploaded properly
Storage Account	To be able to upload your backups to a cloud or local storage, you need to grant Online Backup access to your cloud service provider by creating a storage account. This account stores the credentials (or other settings, such as access keys required by some cloud service providers) that the application uses to access the corresponding storage to upload or restore your backups. The storage associated with a created account becomes a destination or target storage for your backups
Synthetic Full Backup	Synthetic Full Backup is a combination of an incremental backup and in-cloud copying which results in a real full backup on backup storage. Read more about Synthetic Full backup in Synthetic backup chapter
TOC file	Table of contents. In terms of backup, the TOC file is an auxiliary file that contains object descriptions of contents of different data parts. TOC does not apply for legacy backup format