Home > Storage > ObjectScale and ECS > Product Documentation > Dell ECS with Commvault: Configuration and Best Practices > ECS retention extension
Before Object Lock was introduced, ECS supported retention through an extension to its REST API. Commvault supports the ECS retention extension to enable the storage of objects using a WORM model. With retention policies, objects are prevented from being deleted or overwritten for a fixed amount of time or indefinitely. Retention enables you to meet regulatory requirements that require a layer of protection against object changes and deletion.
To learn more about retention in ECS, see the ECS Administration Guide. Authentication to Dell Support is required to view this document.
Note: Commvault 11 SP14 and later supports retention for the ECS S3, Atmos, and OpenStack object services.
Note: Commvault supports native deduplication with the ECS retention extension if the Enable WORM Storage workflow is used in SP26 and later. Otherwise, deduplication is not supported.
The ECS bucket being used for retention must have retention set to an equal or lower period than the retention value set in Commvault. Otherwise, application errors might occur.
Set the retention rule on the storage policy higher than or equal to the ECS bucket-level retention.
The process for enabling WORM on the storage library depends on the Service Pack that is being used.
Release | Location | Property |
SP25 and earlier | General tab | Mark Archive files as Read-Only: Configure the library to create archive/backup files as read-only to achieve WORM functionality on cloud storage. This configuration enables the corresponding read-only lock mechanism on the cloud storage and saves the archive/backup files as read-only files. The expiration date for the read-only lock is set to match the data retention time (backup or archiver retention days, whichever is higher) established in the storage policy copies. Deduplication is not supported. |
SP26 and later | Workflow | Use the Enable WORM workflow to enable WORM on the storage pool and policy. Hardware WORM status on the General tab of the cloud storage library will be displayed as Enabled. |
Enable ECS retention in the MediaAgent Advanced Settings section. The nCloudDellECSRetention property enables Commvault to use the ECS retention extension. ECS retention is enabled by default.
Values:
0 – Disables retention
1 – Enables retention
2 – The current implementation is keying off a specific server response from ECS and uses an ECS extension that is not available in the standard S3 API. If a customer decides to override the server response by using a load balancer or another method, this value can be used to send the ECS retention extension regardless of the server response.
Verify the retention period on an object written to the ECS bucket after successfully running a backup.
You can verify the x-emc-retention-period header by using an S3 client utility such as S3 Browser.