Backup and restore in a distributed database utilizing consistent database snapshots

A system configured to store a database and a plurality of database snapshots in durable storage, the system comprising:

• a network interface circuit configured to communicatively couple to a communication network, the communication network comprising a plurality of database nodes forming a distributed database;
• a memory for storing a plurality of data structures in the distributed database, each data structure in the plurality of data structures including a current version of a corresponding database object and at least one past version of the corresponding database object;
• a processor communicatively coupled to the memory and configured to commit a database transaction manipulating a database object in a data structure in the plurality of data structures;
• and
• a snapshot manager module configured to:
• in response to the database transaction being committed, declare a snapshot representing a point-in-time state of the distributed database, the point-in-time state providing a view of the database object prior to committing a subsequent database transaction manipulating the database object,
• receive a destructive replication message via the communication network, the destructive replication message identifying a past version of the database object to remove from the data structure,
• in response to receiving the destructive replication message, create a frozen read-only copy of the data structure prior to applying the destructive replication message, the frozen read-only copy of the data structure including the past version of the database object,
• after creating the frozen read-only copy of the data structure, apply the destructive replication message to remove the past version of the database object from the data structure,
• associate the frozen read-only copy of the data structure with the snapshot of the distributed database, the frozen read-only copy of the data structure logically replacing a copy of the data structure in the snapshot of the distributed database, and
• perform a point-in-time query against the snapshot, the point-in-time query returning the past version of the database object from the frozen read-only copy of the data structure.