I have a problem in a server that has several dozen snapshots of a ZFS fileset. Back in November we received files that turned out to be for another organization. The content of the files is very sensitive, so the files were deleted. However, by the time we deleted the files, some 42 snapshots had been created of the fileset that contain data or references to those files.
The problem now is that we have to remove that data from the snapshots but we do not want to lose the rest of the contents of the snapshots. Everything I have read so far about ZFS snapshots is that they are all-or-nothing entities. You can create them and destroy them but not modify them to partially remove contents.
Is that indeed the case, or does anyone know of a solution for this?
You won't be able to remove the data from the snapshots without altering the other snapshots in size.
Maybe it makes sense to remove the unnecessary snapshots. You CAN modify snapshot data, but I'm not sure what your specific concern is. Is it space? Will these snapshots age-out after some period of time?