Your administrator determines how many backup versions Tivoli® Storage Manager maintains for each file on your workstation. Having multiple versions of a file permits you to restore older versions if the most recent backup is damaged.
The most recent backup version is the active version. Any other backup version is an inactive version. Every time Tivoli Storage Manager backs up your files, it marks the new backup version as the active backup, and the last active backup becomes an inactive backup. When the maximum number of inactive versions is reached, Tivoli Storage Manager deletes the oldest inactive version.
To restore a backup version that is inactive, you must display both active and inactive versions by clicking on the View menu → Display active/inactive files item. To display only the active versions (the default), click on the View menu → Display active files only item. If you try to restore both an active and inactive version of a file at the same time, only the active version is restored.
On the Tivoli Storage Manager command line, use the inactive option to display both active and inactive objects.