0015 Backup database volumes also

Context and Problem Statement

The database setup based on CloudNative PG has a backup integrated which pushed the WAL into S3 and creates regular snapshots.

The restore is not yet smooth and needs always a new target to be defined, which makes using the WAL backup difficult.

Should the database volumes also be included into the regular volume snapshots?

Decision Outcome

For now yes, even though the backup is not adding as much extra value as one might think.

The reason is that after a database restore the volume does not contain the whole WAL anymore, because CNPG does create a new DB. This would then also be reflected in the backups via k8up.

It will require further investigation to find out if a cluster can be restored based on a volume snapshot only instead of using the CNPG mechanisms.