NetBackup exclude lists have been seen to behave incorrectly by missing not excluding all defined exclude paths but processing others. This occurs when comments (using the # symbol) are added to the exclude_list file and also where white spaces are appended to the end of exclude path lines.  

A client bpbkar log created in /usr/openv/netbackup/logs/bpbkar with the /usr/openv/netbackup/BPBKAR_PATH_TR touch file in place shows exactly which paths have been excluded from a backup and can be used to verify that the exclude list is working correctly. The following message is recorded in the bpbkar log for each exclude_list path during correct exclude list operation:

12:07:58.592 [19664] <4> bpbkar: INF - Excluded /test by exclude_list entry /test

This line should appear in the bpbkar log for each entry in /usr/openv/netbackup/exclude_list. If it does not,  this indicates the exclude list may contain comments or white spaces that are causing NetBackup to not exclude all defined paths correctly. The following examples show correct and incorrect exclude lists (where ___ = white spaces):

BAD EXCLUDE_LIST
# this is a bad exclude_list example
# created to show how not to configure
# exclude_list in NetBackup

/etc/test___
/etc/test2
/etc/test3

GOOD EXCLUDE_LIST
/etc/test
/etc/test2
/etc/test3

The client exclude_list file should not contain any comments or white spaces...