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Avoid Disaster Downtime
Take the necessary steps to prepare for the next minor hardware/software failure, or major disaster.
by Todd Walker
For this solution: NET Framework
A surprising number of businesses today lack good backup and recovery planning. Worse, many struck by a disaster simply don't survive. What would happen if a hurricane, flood, tornado, or an earthquake destroyed your business' data center? Or what if a simple hardware or software failure caused one of your vital databases to become corrupt? If you don't have a backup and recovery plan, you need to start implementing one today. If you do have a plan, it's a good time to review it and make sure you're doing everything possible to protect your company's valuable data.
In this article, I'll discuss some best practices for creating a backup and recovery plan to ensure your business can get back up and running quickly. In the new .NET world, the traditional guidelines still apply; however, there are a few things that you should pay particular attention to and I'll address those as well.
Creating and implementing a backup and recovery plan can be complex and time consuming. As a first step, consider putting together a team to tackle this task. The team should include management, the IT staff, and, possibly, third-party vendors. Management can provide the business-analysis and decision-making expertise, while the IT staff can offer the technical expertise and can inform management about what is and what isn't possible to implement. Third-party vendors have both technical and business case information with regard to their products and services. They might also impart a valuable external point of view.
It's often helpful to create a plan for each individual application when outlining backup and recovery strategies. When they're complete, you can combine them into an overall plan for your business. At this time, it's wise to consider any application interdependencies that might affect backup and recovery procedures.
First, determine every application, and its associated data, you need to back up. Simply make out a big list, and collaborate with your team to make sure nothing is overlooked. Include any services your application relies on, such as the Domain Name System (DNS), directory, and certificate services (see the sidebar, "Create a Backup Checklist"). The ability to restore an application itself isn't useful if it doesn't function because a required service it depends on is unavailable. If you plan to back up any databases, be sure to include any transaction logs as well.
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