Tweet

Finding Peace Of Mind In A Server Recovery Plan

Guest post by: Maureen Davies

Article Overview: Server recovery is a concept really no one wants to deal with by surprise. This is where planning comes in...

Finding Peace Of Mind In A Server Recovery Plan

Server recovery continues to grow as an industry, whether that service includes Exchange servers, RAID arrays or Oracle databases, as high-end server component costs get lower with improving technology. Even as little as five to ten years ago, these technologies were considered high-end, and a part of the technology area solely for the Fortune 500. As costs lessened, however, smaller companies recognized the productivity boosting elements of these technologies. At this point, then, it is never surprising to see smaller small businesses (under 10 employees) with an Exchange server and RAID array for networked tasks. But with these benefits does bring a small disadvantage. Smaller companies , almost as a rule, tend to operate faster, have more accountability and take quicker action than larger ones, which frequently operate by committee. When RAID and other high end servers fail, however, this can be a disadvantage. When a server hard drive failure occurs on a system hosting a mission-critical application, the results can be horrendous - certainly not the best time to consider a "do it yourself strategy". Yet many smaller organizations have great trust in their IT administrators, and this trust, particularly in high-end server recovery, can be unwarranted.

Where Server Recovery Comes Into Play

The "invulnerability factor" with smaller successful organizations can affect the management of IT assets, as evidenced by smaller companies' lack of server recovery planning. Isn't a RAID server naturally "redundant", after all? On the other hand, RAID servers, particularly in situations where more than a single hard drive crashes, can crash severely, leaving a dependent organization unable to function, held hostage by a mission critical app that just isn't working. Creating a server recovery plan is crucial, then, and should include these points:

Gather Critical Resources - One of the easiest ways to be ready for server data recovery is simply to gather key resources like vendor sites, support forums and hard drive recovery shops and have details ready for all IT staff. No one wants to be looking for these crucial resources when the organization is halted because of a crashed RAID server - preparation helps to avoid one of the major data destroyers: panic.

Knowing When To Get Help - By their very nature, IT administrators tend to be the most knowledgeable in their organizations when it comes to computer systems and software. This is obvious, of course, but what it gives birth to is a scenario where many administrators feel an invulnerability, and believe that when it comes to systems, they have the skills for whatever the situation. Hard drive recovery, meanwhile, is a specialized skill that requires specialized equipment. Very rare is the engineer that has real experience with it. But the need to "do it yourself" can infiltrate a catastrophic hard drive failure occurrence, which of course is a horrible concept. Calling a professional is always a good start when dealing with this situation . Know this, and save yourself oceans of trouble.

Backup Backup Backup - Repetition is for effect here, but naturally backing up your servers weekly in the very least, daily or hourly at the most is one of the simplest, and frankly, most powerful thing that an administrator can do. What if your Oracle server database failed one day as the result of a double RAID hard disk drive failure? Now what if you could restore all operations and return to normal within an hour with the use of an extra lower end server? This is what a backup plan can equip you with, and the resource savings can be truly great. Suddenly an "emergency" isn't so tragic, and may appear seamless to even the hardiest of observers. Once in motion, a complete backup plan not only provides you with options, but saves a lot of face during tough times.

In essence, managing through a data or server emergency is all about planning and being prepared. It is the important difference between a well executed server recovery, and a total panic.

Related Articles
  Data Backup and Recovery
  Virtualization: A Small Business Perspective
  Is VPS The Right Choice For Your Business?
  Do You Know Where Your Disaster Recovery Plan Is
  Dedicated Server Web Hosting
  Problems Between MT4 Simulation Results EA and Actual Live Trading Result
  10 Things You Need to Know About Your Website
  Should I ask that my loan application be submitted as a Recovery Act loan?
  Instant Work Life Balance Recovery Strategies for Busy People
  How to Lead with Peace
  Data Retrieval
  The Best Data Recovery Software
  Cheap Web Hosting Services
  Labels for a Frontline Leader
  Web hosting service: an important choice to be assessed
  Choosing The Right Type of Web Hosting
  SBA what is the Transition Phase Alert System?
  Peace for Profits
  What is the SBA Recovery Loan Queue?
  SBA Guarantee Fee Coming Back…

Article Tags: raid data recovery, raid recovery, server recovery



Related Forum Posts
Contingency Planning and Disaster Recovery: A Small Business - Contingency Planning and Disaster Recovery: A Small Business Guide Donna R. Childs, Stefan Dietrich 2002 "Among the countless tragic lessons of 9/11, an overlooked but important discovery was the lack of preparedness among small and midsized businesses for responding to disaster. While most of the media attention was naturally devoted to...., the very existence of thousands of small businesses was determined by whether or not they had adequate insurance, sufficient technological support, and viable disaster contingency plans." (People who live in hurricane prone areas need this as well...and who knows when a fire might not strike...) Table of Contents 1. Preparation 2. Response 3. Recovery 4. SAmple IT Solutions Basic safety practices Okay, the TOC isn't [i:2fu76idt]too [/i:2fu76idt]helpful, but there's lots of valuable info in this book, as to ensure that [i:2fu76idt]your [/i:2fu76idt]losses won't be catastrophic. How people cope with suddenly seeing their homes and all their possessions gone, what kinds of insurance to get, etc. etc.
Business Innovation - Hi Simon If you can finish off the Business Plan and think about your strategic direction or how you are going to use your product to convince people it's a great idea, it will set the foundation for your programming project. You see, when you are looking for funding you will need a Business Plan and Strategic Plan that will convince companies to invest into your new idea. Has anyone achieved this idea before using another industry besides health and fitness that you know of? You should also design some mockups as a "preview" for your programming project. This will also help reduce your programming costs as everyone will know exactly what you want if you have detailed mockups already completed including any functionality you require. Starting mockups for websites and software applications on paper is the best way if you're not a guru in graphic editing software.
Re: Hello - Welcome to the forum, suggestion do all the networking you can you have a little of everything. Peace
Why A Project Fails? - Hello Everyone As the size and complexity of ones business grows, so does their need to effectively manage projects. I have been thinking about the major reasons why a project can go wrong and my limited experience comes up with the following. 1 Leadership: A project manager with leadership skills and not just management skills. 2 Failure to (Foresee and) Plan 3 Failure to Manage: Ineffective change management control methods. Unclear decision making guidelines. 4 Talent: Finding, allocating and developing people 5 Scope: Setting an overly ambitious or amibigious project scope 6 Alignment: When projects are not prioritized in alignment with the business strategy, or project members personal objectives are not in tandem with that of the project / company 7 Lack of Candor: Communication Breakdowns I would be interested in knowing everyone's thoughts on this, especially on ways to overcome the above mentioned obstacles. Cheers!
Re: New Google Tool Makes Websites Twice as Fast - Hey Mal, Thanks for taking the initiative and posting an update here. Glad to hear they have been looking into it and have made it available for those with a VPS or Dedicated Server. I imagine at some point it will be available to those with shared hosting, and I'm willing to wait. Or, at some point I may just need to upgrade to a VPS myself, so only time will tell I guess... lol.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Log On

Are You Reaching Out?

Angel Investors Where Are You?

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.