We HIGHLY recommend using Minion.BackupMaster for all of your backup operations, even when backing up a single database.  To explore the “why”, let’s look at each of the two procedures briefly.
 
  • The Minion.BackupDB stored procedure creates and runs the actual backup statement for a single database, using the settings stored in the Minion.BackupSettings table.
  • The Minion.BackupMaster procedure makes all the decisions on which databases to back up, and what order they should be in. It calls Minion.BackupDB to perform a backup per database, within a single backup batch.
 
So why run Minion.BackupMaster?
 
  • It unifies your code, and therefore minimizes your effort.  By calling the same procedure every time you reduce your learning curve and cut down on mistakes. 
  • Future functionality may move to the Minion.BackupMaster procedure; if you get used to using Minion.Backup Master now, then things will always work as intended.
  • Minion.BackupMaster takes advantage of rich include and exclude functionality, including regular expressions, like expressions, and comma-delimited lists. Even better, when run without parameters, it takes advantage of rich table-based scheduling and all the benefits associated.
  • The master SP performs extensive logging, and it enables Live Insight via the status monitor job (which updates each backup percentage complete as it runs).
  • Minion.BackupMaster runs configured pre- and postcode, determines AG backup location, performs file actions (such as copy and move), and runs the Data Waiter feature to synchronize log and settings data across instances.
 
In short, Minion.BackupMaster decides on, runs, or causes to run every feature in Minion Backup.  Don’t shortcut your features list by running Minion.BackupDB. Use Minion.BackupMaster!