A page that lists the selected MS SQL Server database is shown. SQL Server databases are classified into the following models:

1. Full Recovery Model
2. Simple Recovery Model
3. Bulk-Logged Recovery Model

When you select a particular Recovery Model, the databases of that Recovery Model type will be selected from the database list for backup.

Select All Databases for this schedule

If you select this option, ‘all’ the databases present in the SQL Server will be selected. If a new database is added after this, it will be automatically detected and added to the SQL Server. It will be further added to this schedule also.

Select All Full Recovery Model databases

“Select All Full Recovery Model databases” will include all the databases with the Full Recovery model from the SQL Server to the backup schedule. If a new Full Recovery model database is later added to SQL Server, it will be automatically identified and included in this schedule.

1. Full Recovery Model

The Full Recovery Model provides extensive backup and restores capabilities. The full Recovery Model does not require any log backups and can be recovered only to a certain extent. Full, differential, and Transaction Log backup of the databases are supported. If you want to restore a Full Recovery Model database, a full backup has to be restored first. On top of the full backup, Differential and/or Transaction Log backups could be restored to recover the database to the latest backup state.

Select All Simple Recovery Model databases

“Select All Simple Recovery Model databases” will include all the databases of the Simple Recovery Model from the SQL Server. If a new Simple Recovery model database is added to the SQL Server instance after this then it will be automatically detected and included in the backup schedule.

2. Simple Recovery Model

The Simple Recovery Model offers one of the simplest forms of backup and restore. Full or differential backup of the databases could be done. Transaction Log Backups are not available for databases belonging to this model. For recovering a Simple Recovery Model database, a full backup has to be first restored. On top of the full backup, Differential Backups could be restored to recover the database to the latest backup state.

Select All Bulk-Logged Recovery Model databases

The “Select All Bulk-Logged Recovery Model databases” option will include all the databases of the Bulk-Logged Recovery Model type from the SQL Server. If a new Bulk-Logged recovery model database is added to SQL Server post this, it will be automatically detected and included in the backup schedule.

3. Bulk Logged Model

Similar to the Full Recovery Model database, Bulk-Logged Model databases provide extensive backup and restore capabilities. Full, Differential, and Transaction Log backup of the databases is supported. However, when compared to the Full Recovery Model that logs all transactions, this model minimally logs bulk operations. Recovery is possible only up to the end of a Transaction Log Backup.

Like the Full Recovery Model database, to restore a Bulk-Logged Model database, a full backup has to be first restored. On top of the full backup, Differential, and/or Transaction Log Backups could be restored to recover the database to the latest backup state.

Let me manually choose databases :

This option allows you to select the databases you wish to backup irrespective of the recovery model. If a database does not support Differential/Transaction Log backups, then that Differential/Transaction Log backup will be skipped for that database and the error message will be reported in the backup report.

Select any database and proceed further by selecting Next.

Select the appropriate option required for database selection. If you are selecting a database in a backup schedule, that database cannot be included in another backup schedule as the data might get inconsistent when backed up in two different schedules. Once done, click Next.

Note: The database ‘tempdb’ need not be configured as part of any of the above mentioned schedules. However, if it was configured for a backup, it will be skipped internally when the backup is scheduled. ‘tempdb’ is used internally by SQL Server just for saving temporary data.