Every time a customer tries what is suggested, and then does a recovery
test, they find objects that are missing. Sometimes critical ones. Once it
was the item master, in that case it rarely changed. It was lost when the
assumption that it was on other tapes was made and the base tape was
scratched.
The point is any plan is a good one until you test it and find out it isn't.
What's on each tape, and when it got backed up is critical to know and
becomes harder and harder if the time between full saves gets longer.
Without a backup and tape management system it's nearly impossible to really
know what's where. That's why I prefaced my comments with if you use BRMS
go for it, BRMS will ensure a complete recovery if you set the base backup
correctly.
I've only seen one recovery test work the first time, and that was because
the test had been conducted several times the year before. Ordinarily it
takes at least three tries with adjustments to the backup procedures each
time to get to a clean recovery. I do about 10 recovery tests a year, it
always starts out with strong confidence that it will work, followed by
dismay when it doesn't, then a determination to get it right.
--
Jim Oberholtzer
Chief Technical Architect
Agile Technology Architects
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Briggs, Trevor
(TBriggs2)
Sent: Thursday, April 24, 2014 3:23 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: RE: comfort level in not performing TAPE backups...
<SNIP> If your nightly saves are change only then dropping the weekly is
going to cause you to keep quite a few more tapes around for recovery and
I'm doubtful that a recovery test would be successful.<SNIP>
I don't follow this logic. Change-only saves are cumulative, they save
everything that's changed since the last full backup, so you only ever need
the latest one, surely? The downside is that the longer you go between full
saves the longer the change-only saves will take.
Trevor Briggs
Analyst/Programmer
Lincare, Inc.
(727) 431-1246
TBriggs2@xxxxxxxxxxx
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jim Oberholtzer
Sent: Thursday, April 24, 2014 4:16 PM
To: 'Midrange Systems Technical Discussion'
Subject: RE: comfort level in not performing TAPE backups...
If you use BRMS, no problem you'll still be able to recover since BRMS will
manage the expiration of tapes etc.
If your nightly saves are change only then dropping the weekly is going to
cause you to keep quite a few more tapes around for recovery and I'm
doubtful that a recovery test would be successful. At some point during the
week you'll need a full save, which can still be save while active, but a
full as opposed to an incremental.
The restricted state save, meaning including IBM i LIC and OS is only really
needed after applying PTF groups/cumulative. I would argue that an *IBM
save should be done at least once a month, and always after an individual
PTF or groups are applied, but I've seen customers where the frequency needs
to be shorter since they change parameters on various LPPs during the month.
Bottom line is design your recovery process, then build the back up to
support it.
--
Jim Oberholtzer
Chief Technical Architect
Agile Technology Architects
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Gqcy
Sent: Thursday, April 24, 2014 2:15 PM
To: midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: comfort level in not performing TAPE backups...
I have re-composed this email several times now...
it kept winding up as a pro - con list...
Our IT shop (mostly windows servers, with a small IBM i) has been working
away from tape for some time.
3 years ago we stopped our nightly IBM i backups to physical tape, and went
to a product that exported save files to SAN. we did physical tape spins on
the weekend...
we are now in a full HA/DR protection scenario, and are progressing to
performing our nightly backups on the DR box, NOT the source box...
I am ok with this...
Now, I am being tasked to stop the weekend tape spins now as well, except
for a "month end" full system save tape to be done on Source system.
I need to ask....
Am I going too far down the trail getting away from tape on the IBM i?
--
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