Setting automatic consolidation
Automatic consolidation of a backup archive is enabled by setting the overall limitations for the archive. These limitations include:
a maximum number of backups
a maximum storage period for the archive files
a maximum archive size
By default there are no limits set and automatic consolidation is not performed. To enable automatic consolidation, you must select at least one of the limits and either leave its default value or change it according to your needs.
If limits are set, then after creating a backup the program checks the archive for quota violations, such as exceeding a pre-set maximum number of gigabytes set aside for backups and, if any limitation is exceeded, consolidates the oldest backups. For example, if you've pre-set your archive to store 50GB of backup files and your backups reach 55GB, you have exceeded a quota and the system will respond automatically based on rules that you've already set. This operation creates a temporary file and thus requires disk space. Consider also that the quota must be violated so that the program can detect the violation. Therefore, to be able to consolidate the files, the program needs some space on the disk in excess of the archive quota. The extra amount of space can be estimated as the size of the largest backup in the archive.
In case of setting a limit on the number of backups, the actual number of backups can exceed the maximum number of backups by one. This enables the program to detect quota violation and start consolidation. Similarly, if you pre-set a backups storage period, for example, 30 days, the program will start consolidation when the oldest backup is stored for 31 days.