Rocky Smolin at Beach Access Software
rockysmolin at bchacc.com
Thu Mar 22 11:54:43 CDT 2007
Every time I work on a program I drag and drop it to three different places. Monthly I Ghost the entire hard drive to an external HD. Occasionally I FTP encrypted zips up to my web site. But I'm still weak on off-site backup. My 10 y.o. just learned the hard way. His hard drive failed. Now I've him D&Ding to a USB drive shortcut on his desktop. It'll take him hours to re-create his progress on Myst. :o) Rocky -----Original Message----- From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Jim Lawrence Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 7:01 PM To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving' Subject: Re: [AccessD] OT: But only Partly According the Instructor and 15 years DBA who is teaching the course I am currently taking...One backup system is not enough. Many big installations have as many as 4 backup and recovery processes implemented. Jim -----Original Message----- From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Gary Kjos Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 7:37 AM To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving Subject: Re: [AccessD] OT: But only Partly Ouch. We used to do Disaster Recovery Firedrills back in my early mainframe days when I was a computer operator. We had an arrangement with another local company that had a similar hardware configuration to ours that we were backup sites for each other. In those days, disks on mainframes were removable from the drives themselves which were about the size of a washing machine. The disk packs were about the diameter of a LP record and the ones we used were about 8 inches tall. We would take our disks or maybe it was just backup tapes over to this other company and they would let us use their system over night and we would attempt to run our orders and print the picking documents. Since the hardware configuration was slightly different we had different execution job control that referenced the hardware they had there. I was mostly just along to carry stuff in the early days but later on I was called on to run the stuff too. When fixed hard drives and online terminals came along in about 1980 that ceased to be an option anymore as we would have had to actually overwrite their files on the disk or they would have needed enough empty space for us to load our stuff on and as disk was failrly expensive in those days that wasn't a viable option. So instead we concentrated on getting better covereage from our hardware maintenance group. And we used our backup tapes pretty often when stuff got corrupted and had daily, weekly and monthly full backups for an entire year of generations, so we were really quite secure and fully tested backup wise. Noplace I have worked since has had anywhere near that level of backup. But hardware failed a lot more then than it does now too, so we get lulled into a sense of security that drives don't fail. But in this case it wasn't even a drive failure that caused it, it was a human mistake. We had an occurance of the "can't read the backups" here a while back. It was a very bad thing. There had been a change to the backup software itself and maybe the hardware too. I don't remember exactly what the end result was as far as data loss - don't think we lost anything - but we were down for an entire day - no sales entered. Order takers had to write orders down on paper to be entered later. I think our website still took orders as it's seperate but there were no confirmations etc. It wasn't a total loss as some of that business came to us in the following days, but some of those orders went to other sellers instead of us and perhaps some of those customers went away disgruntled too. GK On 3/21/07, Rocky Smolin at Beach Access Software <rockysmolin at bchacc.com> wrote: > Are you backed up? Are you SURE? > > > > http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/tech/20070320-0509-lostdata.html > > JUNEAU, Alaska - Perhaps you know that sinking feeling when a single > keystroke accidentally destroys hours of work. Now imagine wiping out > a disk > drive containing an account worth $38 billion. > > That's what happened to a computer technician reformatting a disk > drive at the Alaska Department of Revenue. While doing routine > maintenance work, the > technician accidentally deleted applicant information for an > oil-funded account - one of Alaska residents' biggest perks - and > mistakenly reformatted the backup drive, as well. > > There was still hope, until the department discovered its third line > of defense, backup tapes, were unreadable. > > "Nobody panicked, but we instantly went into planning for the > worst-case scenario," said Permanent Fund Dividend Division Director > Amy Skow. The computer foul-up last July would end up costing the > department more than $200,000. > > Over the next few days, as the department, the division and > consultants from > Microsoft Corp. and Dell Inc. labored to retrieve the data, it became > obvious the worst-case scenario was at hand. > > Nine months worth of information concerning the yearly payout from the > Alaska Permanent Fund was gone: some 800,000 electronic images that > had been > painstakingly scanned into the system months earlier, the 2006 paper > applications that people had either mailed in or filed over the > counter, and > supporting documentation such as birth certificates and proof of residence. > > And the only backup was the paperwork itself - stored in more than 300 > cardboard boxes. > > "We had to bring that paper back to the scanning room, and send it > through again, and quality control it, and then you have to have a way > to link that > paper to that person's file," Skow said. > > Half a dozen seasonal workers came back to assist the regular division > staff, and about 70 people working overtime and weekends re-entered > all the > lost data by the end of August. > > "They were just ready, willing and able to chip in and, in fact, we > needed all of them to chip in to get all the paperwork rescanned in a > timely manner > so that we could meet our obligations to the public," Skow said. > > Last October and November, the department met its obligation to the public. > A majority of the estimated 600,000 payments for last year's $1,106.96 > individual dividends went out on schedule, including those for 28,000 > applicants who were still under review when the computer disaster struck. > > Former Revenue Commissioner Bill Corbus said no one was ever blamed > for the > incident. > > "Everybody felt very bad about it and we all learned a lesson. There > was no > witch hunt," Corbus said. > > According to department staff, they now have a proven and regularly > tested backup and restore procedure. > > The department is asking lawmakers to approve a supplemental budget request > for $220,700 to cover the excess costs incurred during the six-week recovery > effort, including about $128,400 in overtime and $71,800 for computer > consultants. > > The money would come from the permanent fund earnings, the money > earmarked for the dividends. That means recipients could find their > next check docked > by about 37 cents. > > > Rocky > > -- > AccessD mailing list > AccessD at databaseadvisors.com > http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd > Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com > -- Gary Kjos garykjos at gmail.com -- AccessD mailing list AccessD at databaseadvisors.com http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com -- AccessD mailing list AccessD at databaseadvisors.com http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 268.18.16/729 - Release Date: 3/21/2007 7:52 AM