Backup

Backup Information Page

We all probably know how important backups are. If you don't, they are as important as having a spare tire on the trunk of your car when going on a long trip! Or a better analogy is to be insured. We have created this backup page in order to provide our clients and friends the best way to perform this operation.

The most important backup is a full backup. Make sure you have a complete system backup of all your work stations. Refresh this copy of all your workstations at a minimum of every quarter or when a major system upgrade has been performed.

Our recommendations for data backups is to start of by making sure all of your data files reside in a default \data directory. Create the appropriate directories inside of your \data directory. For example, your Word Processing files should reside in something like c:\data\wp\clients\wilson. Your Database and Accounting files in c:\data, and so on. This way, all we have to do is tag the c:\data directory on your back up program, making it easier to tag all of your important files, and not forgetting any. Also, we need confidence in our backups. Make sure your backup software has full read-back verification. and try restoring a few files yourself, just in case. Our preferred procedure for backing up is as follows:

One tape per day. We should have a total of eight tapes. Five for the weekdays, one for any weekend activity, and the last two for your off-site backups.

Make sure your backup software has been programmed to backup all of your \data directory (plus any other desired files) on a daily basis, preferably in the evening hours when there is no activity in the office. Also, do "NOT" do an incremental backup. Make sure you are doing a complete backup of the desired tagged files. If we do an incremental or a modified backup, it will only backup the files since your last back up. For example. If yesterday we did a full \data directory backup, and today we modify only ten letters, your modified/incremental backup will only backup those ten letters ignoring all the other files since our last backup. This method makes sense, however, in practicality is not recommended by us. If we practice the modified method of backing up, we will only be backing up the modified files since the last backup. The day that we have to restore, we would have a nightmare as far as restoring all the volumes on the tapes. It is much easier and efficient to do a daily full data backup. Once your system has been automated, the only responsibility for the user is to change tapes on a daily basis. Below are the several options of backing up

Online Internet Backup
This service is extremely new. In my opinion, this procedure is basically the same as the Remote backup I talk about a couple of paragraphs below. Basically, this service allows you to backup your data to a local Internet Service Provider. The data will reside in their server (privacy concerns me here). They usually charge nothing (free) a month for a dial up account and up to 100 mb of data storage.

Full System Backup
The most important backup is a full backup. Make sure you have a complete system backup of all your work stations. Refresh this copy of all your workstations at a minimum of every quarter or when a major system upgrade has been performed. The purpose of this backup is because in the event of a complete system crash, we can restore them with a full system backup!

Daily / Weekday tapes:
On the Daily / Weekday tapes, backup the entire \data directory, making sure your setup file is "NOT" set up for modified, or incremental. Once your system has been automated, the only responsibility for the user is to change tapes on a daily basis.
Weekend tapes

The weekend tape is if your office environment works on Saturdays, or there is occasional weekend activity. If so, make sure we change the Friday tape (on Saturday), to the weekend tape. This way, it will automatically backup Saturday's work, and Sunday's work.

Off site Tapes
Probably the most important of all! You never know when a fire, flood, theft, Sabotage or a Hurricane can damage or disappear your data cartridges. One idea: create a backup set on a weekly basis and send the previous week's backup to a secure off site location. During the week, choose a desired day to make an additional backup during business hours. Lunch time works great. Another alternative is Fridays at 4:00. This extra tape, once backed up should be taken off site. Preferably, the owner of the company should take responsibility for this. Just as he takes the backup tape off site, he needs to obviously bring it in once a week to refresh the backup.

Live Data Backup
If you have a network environment, we can backup the \data directory to a workstation. This is what I call my secondary backup procedure. This method is very fast, reliable, and convenient. IF by any chance, you loose a file on your main \data directory, we can instantaneously retrieve it from the other workstation. This should probably be done also on a daily basis. Also, if you are working with Quicken, QuickBooks, Timeslips, or any other software that will allow you to do a backup within the program, backit up to that workstation.
Remember, this is what i call my "secondary backup". Most important are the daily tape backups. If all the tapes fail, we have the workstation backup.

Remote Backup
If you have a computer at home, and have high speed DSL, you can do remote backups. There are two ways to this.

1. Connect using pcAnywhere, remote Desktop, GoToMyPC or Laplink to your office computer. Transfer your c:\data directory from your office to your home. Please note that this procedure can take anywhere from 20 minutes to 4 hours, depending on the amount of data you have.

2. Connect using pcAnywhere or Laplink to your office computer. Once logged in to your office computer, start the backup from your home. you may want to do this procedure, when you have done some heavy updating on your office computer, and your automated backup has happened already.