If we work with a considerable amount of data, performing a backup can take a long time; during this period, the tables are probably locked. Also, the backup may need a lot of space. To reduce the backup time and the needed space, we can use incremental backups (also called partial backups). An incremental backup is a copy of the changes that were made to the data since a well-known instant (the time of the previous backup).

Of course, we don't want to restore the data by applying all incremental backups that have been performed since the server was started for the first time! Such an operation is theoretically possible, but would be slow, require a lot of space for backups, and be error prone. Thus, regular complete backups are still necessary.

However, a mix of complete and incremental backups is usually a good strategy. For example, we can take a complete backup once a week and an incremental backup each night. To restore the data after a disaster, we will...