System News for Sun Users

Data storage and backup? Fuggedaboutit!

2013-05-06T16:00:00+01:00

"Many storage shops are fighting a losing battle when it comes to data storage and backup protection, with too much data and not enough time. Maybe it's time to rethink the process.

It's 2013 and we're still doing backup. I know things tend to toddle along kind of slowly in IT, but the way we protect our data has barely changed at all in my lifetime, and I'm hardly a kid. Backup keeps getting better, of course, with techs like data deduplication and bigger, faster storage targets to send all that backup data to. But today's data storage and backup process requires essentially the same oversight and administration it did 10, 20 or 30 years ago..."

How to Build A Bulletproof Cloud Backup System Without Spending A Dime

2013-04-30T16:00:00+01:00

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who have lost critical data, and those who will. In other words, if you use technology long enough and neglect to back up your data, you're guaranteed to have at least one extremely bad day. Whether it�'s theft, loss, fire, flood, corruption, or some form of malware, a single incident can destroy the lion�'s share of your family photos, personal documents, address books, years-in-the-making music library, and more.

The solution, of course, is to back up everything. You probably know how to purchase an external hard drive and plug it in to your computer to make regular full-system backups, but that can be an inconvenient, time-consuming task. What's more, that drive is vulnerable in the face of fire or burglary..."

IT Gambling With Backups

2013-04-29T16:00:00+01:00

"IT is playing dice with backups, according to InformationWeek�'s latest storage survey. From failing to back up remote offices to haphazard tests of data restoration, too many IT pros take backup risks...

While most companies (60%) use at least two backup applications, many are still ignoring key issues, such as data restoration. To wit, just 44% said they perform annual test restores for most of their applications, meaning 56% do so sporadically..."

Secure Backups Require More Than Just Encrypting Data

2013-04-29T16:00:00+01:00

"When it comes to secure backups, your thoughts might automatically turn to various forms of backup encryption. Although encryption can go a long way toward securing your backups, there is a lot more to backup security than just encrypting data.

Some backup software products use a service account, which is a user account that is used to provide the security context under which a backup is run. Administrators should take steps to keep service accounts from becoming a potential security hole, because service accounts typically have access to the same data that the backup software is backing up..."

Analyzing Recent Developments in the Backup Software Market

2013-04-22T16:00:00+01:00

"Cloud backup and disaster recovery continue to gain steam, with many solutions dodging early concerns about restore times by taking a hybrid on-premises/cloud backup approach, and others allowing users to fail over to backup instances of virtual machines in the cloud. Backup app vendors made a variety of cloud moves over the past year..."

Why VMware Disk Backup Is Broken

2013-04-22T16:00:00+01:00

"Backup, the protection of virtual machines (VMs) in a virtualized environment like VMware or any hypervisor, is often an afterthought. The initial focus is on migrating physical systems to the virtual environment and creating new VMs to host new applications. Initial backups tend to leverage the existing backup methodology, typically a backup agent is installed in the guest OS. Over time though, most virtualized environments gravitate to a virtualization specific backup application and these applications all count on disk as the primary target for backup and that is where the problems begin...."

Cancer, Big Data and Storage

2013-04-22T16:00:00+01:00

"A few weeks ago, I was traveling and for some reason The Wall Street Journal was delivered to my hotel room door. When thumbing through it, an article on Big data and Cancer (subscription required) caught my eye. I also found another article on the topic at SmartPlanet, which does not require a subscription.

I was very intrigued with the concept. The SmartPlanet article links to the original research, which says, �'Patients are increasingly presenting with 'rare cancers,' more narrowly defined by their molecular characteristics, sometimes making the best course of treatment unclear. Today more than ever, oncologists need real-time decision support to help them provide the most effective treatments tailored to their patients' unique biology and tumors."

The Value of Real Time Backup Health Assessment

2013-04-22T16:00:00+01:00

"Change is good...or is it? The sheer volume and velocity of changes taking place in IT environments today is staggering. While change may be good for business needs, if left unchecked, improperly managed changes within the backup environment could deal a deadly blow to a business if disaster strikes. Organizations may benefit from a real time monitoring reporting tool which exposes vulnerabilities within the backup infrastructure and enables proactive administration of the environment before problems occur..."

What Cloud? U.K. University Tries Tape For Backup

2013-03-18T16:00:00+01:00

"Harvey Ditchfield and his boss, Graeme Cappi, spent years hemming and hawing about whether they should buy an archive for all that data growing bigger and bigger in the corner. Finally, they gave in -- and say it was one of the best decisions they've ever made..."

Cloud Backup: MSPs Must Demand Choice - Amazon, Google & More

2013-03-18T16:00:00+01:00

"When it comes to backup and disaster recovery (BDR) services, many MSPs are locking their customer data in proprietary clouds managed by small vendors. But what happens if that small vendor changes its channel strategy? Or worse yet: What if the small proprietary cloud provider goes out of business? The wiser path, I believe, allows MSPs to link their backup and recovery services to proven public clouds like Amazon Web Services, Google Storage, Rackspace, Windows Azure and more. Here's how to get started..."

Cloud Backup and Recovery Guide

2013-03-11T16:00:00+01:00

"Like It or Not, You Will Be Backing Up to the Cloud Soon

Many organizations are still resisting cloud backups for one main reason: trust. Businesses don't trust third parties with their sensitive data. They don't trust that data will be available when they need it, and they don't necessarily trust that they'll be able to move their data from one vendor's cloud to another.

All valid points. And, frankly, all of them are beside the point..."

Cloud Backup Requires Intelligent Recovery

2013-03-07T17:00:00+01:00

"Using the cloud as a destination for backups has evolved from a consumer solution into a viable option for many small businesses and larger enterprises. Today production applications and even entire virtualized environments are leveraging the cloud to augment their existing backup processes.

Thanks to technologies like changed block tracking, deduplication and compression the movement of data to the cloud across a relatively low bandwidth internet connection is very viable. Most solutions even leverage a local backup device in some form to assist in completing the initial backup quickly and to provide recovery for the most immediate information. .."

Designing Disk for VMware and Hyper-V Backups

2013-02-25T17:00:00+01:00

"One of the key advantages of a virtualized environment is how well it can be protected. VMware and Hyper-V specific applications like Veeam provide efficient changed block and deduplicated backups, as well as flexible in place recoveries. A challenge remains, however, in selecting the backup storage for these environments. Designing the right backup target is critical to realizing the maximum benefit from VM specific backup applications..."

MSPs - Are You Looking for a Better Backup Offering?

2013-02-25T17:00:00+01:00

"Backup is something that every business needs to do, however, few are adept at ensuring consistent backups are done properly. As a result users are looking for a little help. Outsourcing backup is a popular service offering of Managed Service Providers (MSP) and it is one of the first cloud service solutions that businesses will consume.

The quality of the experience for the end customer, therefore, should be of critical importance to the MSP. In addition to being liable for protecting an organization�'s critical data assets, the MSP wants to ensure the quality of this initial experience since it may well determine if the customer opts to subscribe to any of the other MSP cloud service offerings..."

Boost Enterprise Backups

2013-02-25T17:00:00+01:00

"If there is a necessary evil that exists within enterprise data centers, it�'s the data backup process. IT and data center managers may not enthusiastically embrace having to perpetually deal with the ins and outs of backing up the company�'s data, but failing to do so can ultimately prove to be a far greater pain in their necks. The good news is that there are numerous steps that managers can implement to make backup duties less painful. These include relatively quick and simple approaches that can prove extremely effective..."

Data Protection Services -- Make Sure You Get What You Pay For

2013-02-17T17:00:00+01:00

"For those readers growing up in the 1970s, you are probably familiar with the commercials for Fram oil filters. For those who don�'t know, they featured a grease covered mechanic talking about how changing your oil filter for a few dollars would prevent far more costly car repairs later on. The tag line was a very convincing: 'You can pay me now, or pay me later.'..."

Backup Databases: The Data Security Achilles' Heel

2013-02-05T17:00:00+01:00

"The same sensitive information on production databases resides on backups -- protect them accordingly"

"If production databases contain regulated information or valuable intellectual property, then it follows that backup copies of those data stores carry the same risky information. And yet, while many organizations spend the time and investment in hardening live databases, they frequently fail to adequately protect their backup databases..."

Managing the Multi-Vendor Backup

2012-12-03T17:00:00+01:00

"In recent columns I have covered the challenges of consolidating to a single backup application for the enterprise. In short, no single application can do it all, and the capabilities of application-specific backups are still too compelling. I've also discussed consolidating to the backup appliance, but this leaves gaps in monitoring and managing the mixed environment. There is software available to provide this management overview. In this column I'll discuss what to expect -- and what not to expect -- from these products."

Troubleshoot Backup Problems

2012-12-03T17:00:00+01:00

"The first step in protecting an enterprise�'s data is to consistently back it up. The next step is realizing that at some point, something will go wrong with those backups, and you�'re going to need to troubleshoot the snafu.

"If you don�'t have a good backup and recovery procedure in place, along with the right technology to support it, the likelihood is strong that one day, you will experience data loss and downtime," says Florin Dejeu, director of product management for Sepaton.

You need the right backup systems and troubleshooting tools, processes, and policies."

How to Protect Your Data with Reliable BDR Storage Alternatives

2012-11-14T17:00:00+01:00

"Do you have a back-up system that you can count on? How recently did you verify that you can actually recover data from it? How quickly could you get your system up and running again after a failure? Since your business depends on having a functioning system and access to data, planning for emergencies is critical. Even more important, in some ways, is how quickly you can get your business up and running again after a disaster since down time can rack up significant costs..."

Hurricane Sandy Shows Why Businesses Need Reliable Backup Power

2012-11-12T17:00:00+01:00

"Sometimes the lines stretch for miles. People come from far away to get the one precious commodity that they need to make life livable�'gasoline. People carry containers for their home generators and they arrive with empty tanks in their cars. On the way, they pass dozens of darkened service stations that have plenty of fuel to sell, but they lack one essential thing�'electricity..."

TLC NAND Could Penetrate Biz with Flash-To-Flash Backup

2012-10-15T16:00:00+01:00

"Violin co-founder and CTO Jon Bennett identified a potential enterprise role for three-level cell (TLC) flash at VMworld Barcelona today: flash-to-flash backup. TLC is currently seen as pure consumer technology.

The first TLC NAND SSD has been announced by Samsung. But TLC NAND has a short working life, with 500 - 750 phase/erase cycles, rendering it unfit for enterprise flash storage which is reckoned to need program-erase cycles of 2,500 and up at least. Bennett suggested that TLC flash could be used for backup..."

Understanding Your Options for Virtual Tape Library Solutions

2012-10-03T16:00:00+01:00

"Shopping for a virtual tape library can be overwhelming: The sheer number of choices available can make it difficult to make a purchasing decision.

One of the best ways to narrow down the purchasing decision is to start..."

Dissatisfaction With The Current State Of Backup

2012-09-26T16:00:00+01:00

"ExaGrid Systems announced the results of a survey of 1,200 IT managers which shows widespread dissatisfaction with the capabilities of many existing backup systems to keep up with requirements for faster backups with permanently short backup windows as data grows, disaster recovery, virtual server backup and recovery, and backup system costs."

Backup, Disaster Recovery System Cost Justification: 10 Convincing Tips

2012-07-02T16:00:00+01:00

"Data and files have to be counted among any organization's critical assets along with products, cash, securities, raw materials and intellectual property. That makes disaster recovery (DR) and continuity of operation (COOP) systems the insurance policies that protect data assets from loss. Corporate and government executives understand this. Yet all too often, they are still unwilling to allocate adequate budgets to their IT departments to protect their data..."

Who's Afraid of Cloud Backup and Disaster Recovery?

2012-06-25T16:00:00+01:00

"Even with advancements in cloud- and virtualization-based BDR solutions, companies are prone to choose traditional BDR approaches...

Last year was full of tragic natural disasters and widespread political turmoil that directly affected millions of people around the world. Everything from the destructive flooding in Australia, Brazil and Thailand, to the deadly earthquakes in New Zealand and Turkey, and the devastating tsunami in Japan all shocked businesses into the understanding that it could happen to them. Despite this realization, research shows a lag in businesses' backup and disaster recovery plans and procedures, especially within the U.S. financial services sector..."

Don't Fall Victim to Data Loss, Backup Your Data

2012-05-01T16:00:00+01:00

"Keeping valuables data safe and secure, tucked inside a bank vault or some other lock-down location is commonplace, say the Personal Technology Experts at Support.com, Inc.

Yet when it comes to keeping data safe and secure, well, common sense seems to go out the window. .."

The Dangers of Uncoordinated Backup Practices

2012-04-02T16:00:00+01:00

"One-third of SMBs allow employees to select their own method of backup for their data at work �- essentially passing the buck when it comes to data protection, according to Mozy. This is concerning because companies that don't provide formal policies instead rely on uncoordinated backup practices that can leave business owners susceptible to significant risks in the event of data loss.

World Backup Day is an excellent opportunity for SMBs to reevaluate their company backup policies ..."