This document introduces MongoDB Backup Service (MMS Backup), which provides automated, managed backups of MongoDB deployments. MMS Backup takes snapshots of data every 6 hours and stores the oplog for 24 hours, enabling point-in-time restores within the last day. Restores can be done via a download link or pushing restored data directly to servers. MMS Backup is easy to set up and use, handles backups of sharded clusters consistently, and allows unlimited test restores without impacting production.

1. Senior Solution Architect, MongoDB
Sam Weaver
#MongoDBMangementService
MongoDB Backup
Overview

2. Agenda
• Recap the need for backup
• Cover methods for backing up MongoDB
• Introduce MMS Backup
• Walkthrough

3. Disasters do happen

4. and sometimes they are our fault

5. • Risks
– Storage failure
– Power outage
– Programmer error
– Hardware failure
– Data centre failure
– Cyber attack
• Storage level options
• MongoDB Backup Service
Availability and Durability

6. • Relative to any particular risk
– How much data can you afford to lose? (RPO)
– How long can you afford to be offline? (RTO)
– What price are you willing to pay to remove the risk?
• Solutions
– Replication
– Application engineering?
– Backup
Addressing Risks

7. Replication
• Built into MongoDB, only ops and
infrastructure cost
• Very little to zero data loss in failure
• Down for a very short interval
• BUT… programmer errors will replicate
almost instantly

8. Application Engineering
• Flexible
• Expensive, time and money
• Good use of engineer?

9. Backup
• Slower to restore
• Can suffer from being out of date
• Fairly cheap
• Isolated
• Covers most risks

10. • Mongodump/mongorestore
• Storage level options
• MongoDB Backup Service
Backup Approaches

11. • Can be run online or offline
• Oplog aware for point in time restores
• Filter in, filter out
• Considerations
– Data size
– Sharding
Mongodump/MongoRestore

12. • Copy files in your data directory (e.g.
/data/db)
• File system or block storage snapshots
• Fastest way to backup/restore
• Considerations
– Journal
– Consistency
– Backup granularity (whole file system back up?)
– Ops expertise
– Storage of snapshots or data file backups
Storage-level Backups

13. Using the MongoDB Management Service
(MMS) for Backup

14. How it Works

15. Overview

16. • From the initial sync, we rebuild your data in
our datacenters and take a snapshot
• We take snapshots every 6 hours
• Oplog is stored for 48 hours to enable 24 hour
Point-in-time restores
Under the Hood

17. Once your agents are up...

18. Once your agents are up...
• Choose which replica sets to enable backup
on
• Choose which collections/namespaces to
include/exclude
• An initial sync is taken of your data
• Edit snapshot policy

19. potential choices (select the snapshot you’d like to restore to)
Snapshot screens

20. Click the “restore this snapshot” ,
select the delivery method, and
complete these fields
Notes: one time link means one
time link and no it will never work
again and no you cannot email it
round and it will work for someone
else etc

21. confirm your 2FA
fun!
get your restore ID

22. if you check the status on the job, there will now be a http link available.. This will
download a tar.gz file to your computer.

23. • Create a dbpath for the MongoDB data files
• Create a symbolic link pointing to the data files or
create the database path and migrate the data files
ln -s <hash-snapshot-name> /data/db
• Start a mongod using your new data directory as the
dbpath
mongod --dbpath /location/of/data
Download the data files

24. Restoring Sharded Clusters
• Balancer paused every 6 hours
• A no-op token is inserted across all shards and
config servers
• Oplog applied to replica sets until point in which
token was inserted
• Provides a consistent state of database across
shards

25. Click your cluster (in blue font)

26. You can select a snapshot to restore from OR you can take the way more fun route to restore from
a checkpoint. Click “restore!”

27. here is a list of all the restore
cluster checkpoints for your
sharded cluster. You can select
one of these points in time.
This is the slower option, since
MMS will then rebuild a snapshot
up until the time you’ve entered.
Depending on retention settings
the window of time available to
select from will be limited.

28. • You will receive one data file to download for
each shard
• And one for the config server(s)
• Same process as before for moving the data
files to the server
Restoring Sharded Clusters

30. Mongodump File system MMS Backup
Initial complexity Medium High Low
Confidence in Backups Medium Medium High
Point in time recovery
of replica set
Sort of ☺ No Yes
System Overhead High Can be low Low
Scalable No With work Yes
Consistent Snapshot of
Sharded System
Difficult Difficult Yes
Recovery Approaches

31. Key Benefits

32. Point in Time
• Oplog stored for 48 hours
• Restore your replica set to any point-in-time in
the last 24 hours by creating a custom snapshot
• Configurable!

33. Snapshot Policy
• Every 6 hours for 48 hours
• Every day for 1 week
• Every week for for a month
• Every month for a year
• Configurable!

34. Easy to Restore
• Pull from custom URL via HTTPS
– One time link that expires when used
• Push via SCP
– Just enter the hostname and auth method
(password or key file)
– The directory to push the data to

35. Unlimited Restores
• Confidence in your restore process
• Build development, QA, analytics environments
without impacting production

36. Fully Managed
• Created by the engineers that build MongoDB
• No need to write or maintain custom backup
scripts

37. Getting Started

38. Getting Started
1. Create an account at mms.mongodb.com
2. Install MMS Monitoring on your deployment
3. Register at mms.mongodb.com/backup
4. Install MMS Backup on your deployment
5. Start initial sync
6. Rest easy!

39. Restore from a point in time snapshot documentation
https://mms.mongodb.com/help/tutorial/restore-from-point-in-time-snapshot/
Restore from a stored snapshot https://mms.mongodb.com/help/tutorial/restore-from-snapshot/
Configure your backup data delivery method https://mms.mongodb.com/help/tutorial/restore-
select-delivery-format/
All documentation available:
http://mms.mongodb.com/help/
Getting Started

40. mms-sales@mongodb.com for one
month free!

41. Questions?

42. Senior Solution Architect, MongoDB
Sam Weaver
#MongoDBMagementService
Thank You