This process applies to Plugin Backups (Exchange, Hyper-V, VMware, SQL) performed to a Cloud Storage Server when restoring to an alternate location.

This process may also apply to Plugin Backups that were performed using a "Legacy" configuration.

Scenario

Restoring Plugin Backups to an alternate location generates unexpected files, creating a folder structure with the name of the plugin being restored, a couple of subfolders such as dba and list, and several other files.

This structure contains two files dba\*.VDF and dba\*.DBI for each item you desire to restore.

You were expecting files to be in their native file format:

Resolution

At this point you have already restored your backup to an alternate location, we will use C:\Restore as the location you restored to in our example.

Our example will use a Hyper-V "plugin" backup created on the Backup tab of the software, so some file names will be different, but the process is the same for all plugin backups that need to extract information from a *.VDF file.

Example (Hyper-V)

1. Select a Hyper-V virtual machine you wish to restore to alternate location, for example C:\Restore
   
2. Once the Restore is done, confirm the contents of the restored information.
   
3. Open a command prompt and change to the directory of the restored Plugin data.
   • For example:

   • cd C:\Restore\Hyper-V\Windows Vista

     
4. Look into dba subdirectory and open the .dbi file using notepad. You will see one long comma-delimited line:

   • VSSDBA,08.04.01,AG-HYPERV,SYSTEM,ST,full,694759EE-BD7D-4B91-A5F2-703F24C4D29E,Microsoft Hyper-V VSS Writer,AC00-1310076213.xml,WC01-1310076213.xml,DBA:C:\ProgramData\NovaStor\NovaStor NovaBACKUP\Vdata\Hyper-V\Windows Vista\dba\WindowsVista.dba,1,0,0,00:00:09,0,1310076213,Thu Jul 07 15:03:33 2011

   • You need the number, in this case 10 digits, located just before the readable date
   • In this example: 1310076213
5. Also, in your dba sub directory, take note of the full filename of the *.vdf file. This is your dumpfile containing the bundled data that needs to be extracted.
   
6. Copy the file “vssnbk.exe” that can be found under C:\ProgramData\NovaStor\NovaStor NovaBACKUP\Vdata\Hyper-V Processing to the root of your Hyper-V restore file location.
   • For example:

   • C:\Restore\Hyper-V\Windows Vista

     
7. Decide on a location you want the extracted files to be placed and make sure the directory exists.
   
   • For example C:\temp
8. You will now use the Command Prompt to extract the information from the VDF files using vssnbk.exe to the location you specify. This needs to be a local destination.

   • The command syntax is:

     vssnbk.exe restore --stamp <'from in .dbi file'> --extract *.* --dumpfile <'Path to Alternate Restore Location'>\dba\<'FILENAME.VDF'> --tempdir <'dir location'>

     This command reads as " Use vssnbk.exe to restore from "stamp (ID)" extracting all data from this dump file (.VDF) located "here" and store it to "there" "

     NOTE: Replace <'someTextHere'> with the appropriate values, watch your spaces since you are in a command prompt. REMOVE the less than / greater than symbols.

   • For example:
     
   • Allow the program run for a few minutes to finish extracting the data to the specified location, in this case C:\temp
     
9. Once the program is done extracting the plugin files, you may use the native file that is restored to retrieve the data from it. This process will differ for each plugin type.
   
   • In our Hyper-V example, the data extracted is a .VHD file