Copying a Subscription

The Duplicate command allows you to make a copy of a selected subscription. You must give the duplicate subscription a different name, and it must use the same logical source as the original subscription. To use a different source, create a new subscription rather than duplicating an existing one.

A duplicate snapshot subscription is created with the same replication settings as the original. Before you duplicate a subscription, review the Destination Option settings in the original subscription. You may need to edit the original subscription to avoid inadvertent loss of data when the duplicate subscription is created, such as if the original subscription is set to create a table when the subscription is saved. The duplicate subscription also inherits the same schedule, so be sure the original subscription will not run until you can change the duplicate subscription schedule and destination settings.

Duplicating a subscription that performs incremental replication creates a copy of the subscription that performs snapshot replication. (You cannot have two incremental subscriptions updating the same destination table.) The Destination Option settings of the snapshot subscription depend on whether the Use Existing Table option was enabled for the incremental subscription. If the Use Existing Table option is enabled for the incremental subscription, the snapshot subscription will be configured to use the existing table and delete the existing data before replication. If the Use Existing Table option is disabled for the incremental subscription, the snapshot subscription created from it will be configured to re-create the destination object with each replication.

After you duplicate the subscription, you can change the properties for the duplicate subscription, and then, if necessary, change the original subscription back to its original settings. See Duplicate Subscription dialog for more discussion of these issues.