Windows Business Continuity Journal

What You Need to Know About Backup for Virtual Machines

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 15:35:00 +0000

Virtualization technology is continuing to be adopted for consolidating data center infrastructure and providing a more flexible platform for moving, provisioning and backing up workloads. This has put an emphasis on backup and recovery; because a single virtual host can contain several virtual machines and is even more important to not only protect the individual virtual machines but the entire virtual host. Virtualization has the same single point of failure as some cluster technologies and services: shared disk. What happens to your virtual infrastructure if you lose connectivity to your primary storage unit? The entire virtual host becomes unavailable and that can put upwards of 8-10 production workloads at risk, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

Before the adoption of virtualization, backups could be configured to backup pieces of an application, data or the operating system of a server and sometimes the entire server that included all of the above. The industry now refers to these as virtual workloads as they contain the operating system, application and usually the associated data as well. When the physical server is converted through the P2V process a virtual disk image (VMDK or VHD) is created which is used to spin up that workload as a virtual machine. So, for each virtual machine there is a corresponding virtual disk image that needs to be protected. However, backing up virtual machines is only one part of the process and the other and just as important is the recovery portion. Virtualization has actually simplified the backup and recovery process as you only need to backup virtual disk image to be able to restore as a whole versus trying to backup and recover bits and pieces of a server. Another advantage is that IT managers can usually restore that disk image to different hardware if necessary or an entirely different virtual host server.

This is where workload portability solutions have developed to easily move virtual workloads between virtual hosts for high availability. Products like VMware® vMotion, Microsoft® Live Migration provide the ability to transfer workloads in real-time between similar virtual platforms and other products like Double-Take® Move provide the ability to move virtual workloads between any virtual platforms. VMware vMotion utilizes the replication functionality of the attached storage to replicate the virtual disk images between devices while Microsoft Live Migration is built upon failover clustering technology that allows shared storage between the virtual hosts. The Double-Take Move product is more hardware and virtual vendor neutral as it allows virtual workloads to be moved in real time across any hardware or virtual platform. All of these solutions are effective backup solutions that can easily transfer the entire virtual disk image to another server and spin up quickly to minimize any interruption to production operations.

But the underlying technology to back those virtual workloads up hasn’t changed much. The processes used to backup virtual machines can be used the same as they were for physical servers and are basically broken down into hardware based replication and host based replication. Tape backup solutions aren’t addressed in this article as they have become more of an archive option and don’t meet RTO or RPO requirements necessary for virtual infrastructure. However, once the virtual disk images have been replicated to a designated backup are, tape is often used to archive those disk images to meet certain industry regulatory compliance.

Hardware-Based Replication – Some virtual solutions utilize the inherent replication of the direct attached storage or SAN to replicate the virtual disk images offsite to another storage device for backup. This usually uses either synchronous replication or a snapshot type technology that periodically sends scheduled updates to the virtual disk image at the target destination. Synchronous replication sends blocks of changed data and waits for a confirmation from the receiving device before sending the next block for replication. This happens pretty quickly but it usually has distance limitations and requires more bandwidth (because it sends data in blocks verses bytes). This differs from the snapshot process that is usually scheduled to send changes to the virtual disk image on a defined size or time period and only available between like devices.

Host-Based Replication – is an asynchronous technology that sits on the virtual host machine and replicates changes to the virtual disks as they occur and then apply on the target servers in the order of the operation they are received. Asynchronous replication is usually transmitted at byte level as well as provide additional compression in order consume less bandwidth than block level synchronous replication. Host-based replication is also more flexible because it is hardware agnostic and isn’t tied into a specific hardware or virtualization vendors, and it can be used for both physical and virtual environments.

Three Tips for Protecting Virtual Infrastructure

Flexible Infrastructure - If you already have a disaster recovery solution in place make sure that it is flexible enough to be used for physical and virtual server platforms. Also, make sure that you aren’t vendor locked into something that is hardware- specific and can only talk to other devices like itself. Data center managers maintain a variety of hardware and require workload flexibility to maintain solutions for every environment. Find a solution that is hardware agnostic and will fit existing design infrastructure.

Offsite Storage - Most companies already have a co-location facility in place or, at the very least, a satellite office that can be used to receive data offsite for disaster recovery. Whether it is a duplicate virtual infrastructure in the same data center, across the street or another country, having an up-to-date virtual workload backup provides the option for recovery when needed.

WAN Infrastructure - How the data is transmitted will be important when protecting your virtual infrastructure. Some synchronous hardware solutions are block-based replication and require more bandwidth and can have distance limitations. Some of the virtual products on the market use a snapshot-based technology that sends data in periodic chunks (verses only changes made to specific files) and can also saturate existing bandwidth during the transfer process. WAN accelerators from companies such as Riverbed and Silver Peak can improve bandwidth limitations.

In summary, no matter which virtualization product you select, make sure you think about protecting those servers on top of just converting to a virtual environment. Selecting a flexible data backup and recovery solution will not only help provide high availability but it can also help data center managers better maintain these systems by having the ability to provision, convert and move the systems near or far. This provides more options for deploying virtual environments, managing them on a daily basis and enabling a better backup and recovery strategy.

The Unlikely Disaster

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 16:04:00 +0000

Recently a small earthquake rattled the Virginia, DC, Maryland area. While there was no serious damage, the quake brought to light the fact that disaster can strike in the most unlikely way. Those who live in California know of the danger and destruction an earthquake can bring, but folks in DC don’t share this understanding because earthquakes in the area a few and far between. The moral of this event is that we must always be ready for the unlikely disaster.

Without a doubt, each geographic location has it’s own idea of what natures disaster may occur. Earthquakes in the West, blizzards in the Midwest, Tornados in the plains, and hurricanes in the East. But the reality is that Mother Nature is women with the prerogative to change her mind at will, and being prepared for one type of disaster may not leave you prepared for another. Even small natural disasters can impact large regional areas.

Business Continuity follows the same precept in that planning for a certain type of outage does not guarantee that you are protected for other types of outages as well. Power, cellular, telecom, and internet outages can wreak havoc on your business. So while you may have the ability to move your business to a CoLo facility, if they are down as well you BC plan is of no value.

Unfortunately, many BC & DR solutions on the market today don’t meat customer needs. Instead, they lure customers into a false sense of security that their business is protected. So while working on your BC plan, be sure to look at the big picture and think about the small, medium, and large disasters as well as the unlikely ones that can destroy your business.

Good planning!

Business Continuity for the iPad and iPhone

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 15:39:00 +0000

With the releases of the iPad and iPhone 4 businesses are being put in an interesting position when it comes to Business Continuity. For the past few years the iPhone has been the up and coming player for Enterprise email. While it has not surpassed the Blackberry, it’s adoption rate is very high. Now the iPad enters the fight and adds a new dynamic to your BC planning.

Exchange is the Linchpin

For most “I” users, access to email is the single most important feature for their device of choice. Because most organizations use Exchange, supporting “I” devices is relatively easy with Active Sync. But as more users become dependant on remote email access, providing BC for Exchange becomes even more critical. With users in the office it is easy to see the effect of an Exchange outage. But mobile users are unseen and unknown, accessing their inboxes 24 x 7 x 365. Installing Windows updates at 3:00am on a Sunday could easily result in calls to the helpdesk wondering when Exchange will be back online. Having published maintenance windows and SLA’s is critical to ensure everyone in your company has a clear understanding of what to expect with regards to your servers.

Intranet and Application Access

With the iPad, accessing your companies intranet and applications is much easier than ever before and as such uptime for these services becomes a new or updated headache. Providing proven and consistent availability for your servers is crucial to keeping the business productive and users happy.

24 x 7 x 365!

While remote access is not a new technology, both the iPad and the iPhone 4 make it much simpler for a whole new groups of users to access a variety of services. Gone are the days of the required VPN. Users can easily access files and data from anywhere in the world at any time. Providing Business Continuity has just become much more complex. Time to update your BC plan!

Hyper-V R2 – It’s Not Just for Servers!

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 17:02:00 +0000

For the past 15 years I have found interesting ways to test and demo different software and operating systems. In my early engineer days I had a spare hard drive that I would swap into my computer and boot from that served as my test platform. As technology progressed I had to a spare computer for testing that I would wipe out and reinstall on a regular basis. With the advent of virtualization I started to run a hybrid of both physical and virtual machines to meet my needs. But in the past 5 years, virtual technology has completely dominated my demos and tests.

Virtual Server 2005

When Microsoft released Virtual Server 2005, most technology pundits dismissed it as a futile attempt to go after the VMware production virtual market. But some of us embraced the technology for what it was: a simple, easy, light-weight, demo and test platform. Instead of having to install a heavy application that stole precious resources from Windows XP and Vista, Virtual Server was a simple web based app that took advantage of integration with the host OS. Although it didn’t have all the features of VMware Workstation, it was very stable and effective for giving product demos on a laptop.

Hyper-V RTM

When Hyper-V was released for Windows Server 2008, it became apparent that Microsoft was taking Enterprise virtualization seriously. Despite it’s limited feature set, Hyper-V was another good solution for product demos. It’s biggest flaw for this type of use was getting Server 2008 installed on a laptop. Driver incompatibility and non-existent drivers plagued many laptop owners who wanted to walk the razors edge. Although it wasn’t impossible to run Hyper-V on a laptop, it was definitely a daunting task.

Windows 7 & Hyper-V R2

Today Microsoft has a veritable panacea available to engineers for test and demo: Windows 7 & Server 2008 R2. If you own a laptop from a major manufacturer that runs Windows 7 x64 then the chances are good that you can download Windows 7 drivers that are WHQL. Most of theses drivers will work in Server 2008 R2, and if your processor supports virtualization then you can also run Hyper-V R2. While running a server OS on a laptop is not a common occurrence for most folks, it is has become an increasing trend in the “engineer” space.

Robust Demo and Test Built-in

With Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 sharing a common architecture and kernel, running 2008 R2 as my main laptop OS is a true pleasure. Dual cores and 4GB of RAM provide plenty of horsepower to run all my applications, as well as supporting 3 VM’s concurrently. With virtualization built right into the OS, demo’s are again simple and convenient.

Yes, there are trade-offs that must be taken into consideration when running Server 2008 as your primary OS. Cost, hardware and application compatibility, backup, and support are just a few. But for some of us, these trade-offs are well worth having robust, built-in virtualization.

Running Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V on your laptop may be a worthwhile venture if you find yourself doing lots of product demos or tests. Hyper-V R2 – It’s Not Just for Servers!

Business Continuity for Windows VM’s

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 16:44:00 +0000

While working the Double-Take booth at TechEd this week I had a customer ask me about Business Continuity for her virtual machines. It seems that her IT staff was split between using Microsoft’s Hyper-V and VMware ESXi, so finding a solid, affordable DR tool was proving to be difficult.

“One Tool” Application Availability and Recovery Capabilities

Over the next ten minutes or so I explained to her that Double-Take for Virtual Systems provides real-time, byte level replication for Windows and Linux VM’s regardless of the Hyper-Visor that is being used. In fact, it is one of the only tools on the market that allows you to protect Hyper-V VM’s to VMware VM’s, and visa versa.

We also discussed one of the greatest advantages of using Double-Take in your BC plans is that it is not platform centric. Double-Take is a true X to X technology that spans all applications, hardware, and virtualization. Having the flexibility to protect a physical server to a VM is great, but having the flexibility to protect any server to any server is very powerful. And with Double-Take’s unified management console you can have a since place from which to configure, protect, and monitor you environment.

As we finished our conversation, she thanked me for the information and gave me her card and I promised to have her local engineer get in touch with her.

Double-Take is a fantastic tool for providing Business Continuity for any application or server, physical or virtual.

What to Do When Disaster Strikes? 10 Tips That Can Help

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 15:23:00 +0000

Step One: Evaluate the Disaster

The first step of any disaster recovery plan is to stay calm and evaluate the disaster before enacting your business continuity plan. The type and severity of disaster you encounter will determine which actions you must take. For example, if the disaster is a danger to the building then you must first evacuate employees to safe meeting zones. However, if there is a weather or environmental related event then evacuating the building may not be a good idea.

If the event is not a risk to any employees and the business impact is acceptable, the priority would be to resolve the issue to resume business operations. But for disasters that are threat to your data center here are a few tips to consider.

Step Two: What to do when disaster strikes

Follow your company evacuation plans to make sure everyone is out of the facility and safe.

Once at the designated evacuation meeting points, perform a head count of your employees and verify no one is left behind.

Inform local officials of your employee head count and status of the building.

If the disaster is likely to cause significant damage to the data center begin implementing IT failover and recovery plans.

Contact recovery vendors. If you don’t have a hot site then you may need to have archived tape delivered which could take 24 hours.

Head to the co-location, disaster recovery, or hot site to begin restoration of business critical applications.

Communicate. Notify executives and employees of the plans and length of time it may take to recover.

Begin restoration of those services that are required to resume business operations to a functional level.

Return to the corporate office to evaluate data center damage once backup systems are operational and emergency officials have deemed it is safe and acceptable to do so.

Verify your insurance coverage, determine what damaged hardware, software and or infrastructure that may need to be replaced and compile a full list. The insurance company will want to see this as well as the replacement cost.

No one wants to encounter a disaster, but being prepared will make the recovery significantly easier.

The “Joys” of a Workcation?

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Wed, 26 May 2010 21:03:00 +0000

I just got back from a family trip to Disney World where we baked in the hot Florida sun. After a hard day of waiting in lines, riding rides, and eating terrible food, I tried to relax by reading my email and catching up on the day’s events outside the Magic Kingdom. That's when it hit me that most of us never really take a true vacation!

When is the last time you went somewhere not work related, but still took work with you? Blackberry, iPhone, iPad, Laptop? It’s all the same. Even when your not working your still working. You setup your “Out of Office” email, but still check your email regularly and reply anyway. I would venture to guess that you even check your voicemail while away. You (we) do all this because you’re worried about your servers, network, applications, users or a million other things that can go wrong in the Windows IT world. Nobody wants to come back to a disaster that you didn’t even know happened.

It is important to know that your Business Continuity plan is not only insurance for your company, but should server as a piece of mind for you. It is designed to provide a basic level of redundancy in administration in the event of a disaster. BC plans are designed as a pseudo “play book” that a designated backup person should be able to follow in the event that you are on vacation or are unavailable.

So while you may still check your email and voicemail for other reasons, building a good Business Continuity plan can help you relax while on vacation and enjoy the time off.

Work hard on a good BC plan and play hard on vacation without the worry! Enjoy………

Windows 7 “God Mode”

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 10 May 2010 16:22:00 +0000

Windows 7 has a unique feature that some refer to as “God Mode”. It is a Control Panel like window with sections for Action Center, Administrative Tools, AutoPlay, etc.

Here's how you enable it:

Create a new folder (right-click and click on “New Folder”).
Right-click on the folder and click on rename, copy and paste the following:
GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}
Hit Enter and your good to go!

There are some very interesting tweaks, but use at your own risk.

Enjoy!

Disaster Recovery to the Cloud

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Thu, 06 May 2010 14:53:00 +0000

Double-Take Cloud

Traditional data recovery requires businesses to set up and manage a second data center, complete with recovery servers standing by as a backup in case of an outage. Many businesses can’t justify the investment in expertise, equiptment, time and ongoing operations. With Double-Take Cloud, you get all the benefits of enterprise-class real-time data protection, with no up front investment.

Double-Take Software has partnered with Amazon to create a real-time, dynamically scalable, virtualized recovery platform that can be used directly through Double-Take Backup Agent. Now businesses of any size can create a highly efficient and effective disaster recovery plan by leveraging Amazon’s extensive capacity on an as-needed basis through the Cloud, eliminating the need for costly dedicated DR data centers and the associated hardware, software, real estate, power, cooling and management overhead. When needed, you can recover to Amazon’s servers, paying only for the space and capacity used, and only for the time you use them.

Key Benefits
• Simpler and less expensive disaster recovery solution that makes high-quality disaster recovery available to businesses of all sizes.
• Opportunity to access of the proven advantages of Double-Take Software’s recovery products (real-time protection, full server failover) in an even more cost-effective way.
• Decreased cost of ownership since companies can “rent” servers and potential for more efficiency since businesses don’t need to have countless extra servers on standby in the event of a disaster or failover.
• Allows you to move from weak or no recovery capability to world-class rapid recovery.

How it Works

Double-Take Cloud is powered by the Double-Take Backup Agent which enables continuous server backup, hardware-independent on-demand restoration and any-point-in-time recovery for important systems and critical data. When it’s time to recover, the Double-Take Backup Agent allows you to configure right to the cloud, right away.

Want to know more?

Get More Information

1-888-674-9495 or 1-317-598-0185

The Pains of Business Continuity

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 16:34:00 +0000

Let’s face it. Establishing a Business Continuity plan can be a pain as there is a lot of thankless work that needs to be done for it to be successful.

The first, and likely most difficult, task is the Business Impact Analysis.

The Business Impact Analysis is an arduous process in which you have to determine which applications and services are critical, establish RPO’s and RTO’s, and present the financial impact of an outage. Putting all this information together requires discussions with the various groups within your business. It is generally a given that everyone in your company will need access to email in an outage, but some groups may be more dependant on other applications such as IIS, SQL, or even BizTalk. To have an accurate BIA, you must meet with the various groups to determine what their needs will be during an outage or disaster and set appropriate RTO’s to meet these needs. Hence, creating a accurate BIA means lots of meetings and coordination.

There are numerous sample BIA resources on the web that you can modify to meet your needs. Some are very simple spreadsheets, while others are 100+ pages templates that are very detailed. Regardless of which example, sample, or template you choose it is important to know that the success of your Business continuity plan is directly related to the effort put forth in your BIA.

The BIA is a valuable tool for IT, as it helps management understand the need for your BC plan. It is also much easier to get budget approval for your plan when they have a clear definition of the financial impact of an outage. I have worked with numerous IT groups that have had to fight for budget approval to provide HA or DR for business critical applications because the reasons for the expenditures were not clearly communicated to management.

The BIA also helps to ensure reasonable expectations in the event of an outage because RPO’s and RTO’s are clearly defined. If everyone understands that mobile messaging cannot function without email and that email is dependant on directory authentication, there can be no misunderstanding why someone’s Blackberry isn’t working.

As you work on your Business Continuity plan remember that the best starting point is with the Business Impact Analysis.

A good BIA book can be found at Amazon.com:

Building A Business Impact Analysis (BIA) Process: A Hands-On Blueprint

Good Planning.

Business Continuity for the Home?

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 15:43:00 +0000

Business Continuity by definition is for a business, but at the same time these principles apply to your home life as well. Have you ever had a hard drive just give up the ghost and take all your data with it? Or had a motherboard just outright die? I would guarantee that everyone who owns a computer has lost some data at some point. From hardware failures to viruses or root kits to accidental data deletion, there is always the potential for some data loss.

What data are you ok with losing? 5 years of ripped MP3’s? What about all your family photos or your son’s History report that you spent 2 weeks on? Nobody “wants” to loose anything, but the harsh reality is that it could happen to you, or me!

So for most of us with a few computers in the home a good reliable backup solution is the answer. I personally use Windows Home Server to backup all my family pc’s daily. With Home Server I can recover individual files or an entire machine should something go awry and I also store all of our music, photos, movies, and software on the Home Server for easy access by all. Although I don’t have a literal RPO & RTO for our pc’s I know that recovery of lost data is a reality instead of a just a few minutes instead of a few hours. It doesn’t get much better than this.

But being a computer engineer, my Home Server is actually running as a virtual machine in Windows Hyper-V. Hyper-V is a great solution for me as it allows me to build & demo work VM’s for my customers utilizing just one piece of hardware. The problem that I was facing last weekend was how to move my VM’s from an old machine running Hyper-V to a new piece of hardware without a lot of downtime. Most kids aren’t happy when you take away their music and videos and with six in our house I could see the potential for a riot. I decided to use Double-Take Availability for Hyper-V to replicate the VM’s in real-time and then start them on the new machine with just a few minutes of down-time. Problem solved and riot averted.

For most folks running Windows Home Server it is unlikely that you will need to move to new hardware, but my adventure highlighted the fact that “Business Continuity” does in fact apply to our home environments as well as work, and that having a good plan can be the difference between a few lost files and riot at home.

Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and You!

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 20:47:00 +0000

In one of my previous posts I talked about Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) and how that equates to lost data. Today I would like to cover the other side of the Business Continuity coin, that being Recovery Time Objective (RTO).

A Recovery Time Objective (RTO) is the amount of time, after a disaster or disruption, within which a service or business process should be restored.

Again, this sound pretty simple. If a server goes down it is the amount of time it takes to get the server back up and running. But getting the server running is just 1/2 the equation because the RTO is dependant on the RPO that has been set as well. If you have to recover data for the server then that needs to be included in the RTO.

Here’s an example: A motherboard blows out on a server and it takes 4 hours for the server parts delivery and then 1 hour to install the parts and ensure the OS is good to go. While waiting for the parts you order your backup tapes from storage but they arrive 1 hour after you have the server running. Now you spend the next 2 hours recovering the lost data to meet your RPO. All in all you have spent 8 hours to present your server to your users. RTO = 8 hours.

Now let’s say in the above example that you don’t need to recover the OS or any data. You still have an RTO of 5 hours!

Every minute that a server or business process is offline is a minute of lost revenue because that server or business process cannot be utilized by your users and therefore are wasting resources waiting. When it takes 5 to 8 hours to recover a server the time in which users could not use the server is “lost” as well as the time it takes to recreate any lost data that could not recovered.

These examples start to paint the unpleasant picture of Windows Business Continuity in that your RPO + RTO = lost revenue.

So as you start down the path to Windows Business Continuity it is imperative that both management and IT understand the financial impact of downtime and set realistic RPO’s & RTO’s for all servers and business processes.

Next up I will be explaining the essentials of the Business Impact Analysis and how it can help get management and IT working together in building a great Windows Business Continuity plan.

Have a great week!

Travel, Quarter End, and DT Cloud Promotion

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 17:12:00 +0000

I have been traveling a bit over the last 2 weeks and now I’m working on finishing up quarter end business. Needless to say my posts on RTO’s and SLA’s had to be pushed to the back burner. Please stayed tuned as next week I will have my next update hot off the press.

In the meantime, be sure to read the latest Double-Take Cloud promotion “First Month Free” at the Double-Take website.

Also, don’t forget to sign up for our free live seminar on True CDP and Virtual Provisioning on March 24th (invite below).

Cha deoch-slàint, i gun a tràghadh. (It’s no health if the glass is not emptied.) Have a happy and safe St. Patrick’s Day!

Double-Take® Cloud: On-demand, scalable and affordable data protection in the Cloud

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 22:48:00 +0000

For those looking into Cloud recovery, you need to read up on the latest Double-Take offering Double-Take Cloud

Live Seminar: True CDP and Virtual Provisioning for Fast, Flexible Recovery.

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:08:00 +0000

LIVE Webinar on March 24, 2010 at 11am ET / 4.00pm London Time / 5.00pm Paris/Berlin/Stockholm Time / 7.00pm Dubai Time

Fast recovery of key business information is a critical requirement for both corporate headquarters and branch offices, and true continuous data protection can have a large impact on your ability to exceed service levels and minimize data loss.
Join this live webinar to learn how Double-Take Backup can improve disaster preparedness, lower recovery time, and save money by minimizing data loss through true continuous data protection to disk and leveraging your virtual infrastructure for fast automated recovery of entire servers.
Learn the key benefits of implementing this disk-to-disk backup and recovery solution, which include:

Continuous data protection, even for full servers.
Any-point-in-time recovery
Bandwidth efficient remote/branch office protection
Integrated virtual server recovery to leading virtualization platforms

RPO’s and Lost Data

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:24:00 +0000

A Recovery Point Objective (RPO) is the acceptable amount of data loss in a disaster situation as defined by the company or organization. As an example, if an RPO of two hours is established for your Exchange Server, then the company expects that in the event of a failure no more than two hours worth of email will be lost.

Sounds pretty simple, right? Actually it is pretty simple if you know what needs to be considered when you establish an RPO for your server. Let’s take a closer look at the Exchange example from above.

If Exchange data was static, you could simply back up the server once a day and thus meet a two hour RPO with relative ease. Book closed, management happy!

But, as we all know, email is a dynamic animal that changes constantly. One hour you may receive over a million emails and the next maybe five thousand or more. So when you look at how much “data” could be lost with an RPO of two hours, it is hard to quantify such a loss with a number.

If I were to take a backup of my server at midnight, and the server fails at 10:00am I am looking at a potential RPO of 10 hours and an undetermined amount of lost email. If I were to take snapshots of my server every two hours and my server fails I may have an RPO of two hours, but I still have an undetermined amount of lost email.

Email has become the “lifeblood” of business as over 79% of companies accept email as confirmation of orders, approval, etc.(Osterman Research). Who wants to be the person explaining to management that although the established RPO of 2 hours was met, all the orders and confirmations from 8:00am to 9:59 were lost?

While a web server may have fairly static content, the data collected by that same server could be very dynamic and so a tighter RPO must be established to protect the business. The same holds true for email, file, database, communication, and all the other servers in your environment.

When establishing an RPO for any given Windows server it is imperative to determine the dynamic nature of the data to be protected and discuss with management the financial impact of its potential “acceptable” loss.

Coming up next in my next post I’ll be covering RTO’s and the potential data loss associated with them.

Until then, good planning!

Upcoming Double-Take Seminar in Charlotte, NC

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 19:32:00 +0000

What:	How to Achieve a Cost-Effective Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Plan using Double-Take Software Businesses are becoming increasingly dependent on continuous access to critical data, and as the number of mission-critical servers and storage resources grow, so does the importance of protecting against service interruptions. For most companies, it is crucial that systems operations are available at all times as this may threaten an organization's ability to provide access to key data. However, companies don't have to rely on a costly, risky and complex approach to data protection. There are proven technologies that make it possible to reliably develop a cost effective strong business continuity plan, providing uptime and stability. Join Double-Take Software for an educational seminar to discover some of these challenges that organizations face today. Attendees will learn how to build a business continuity plan, including Double-Take Software’s proven technologies to create a plan that is strong, cost-effective and reliable. You will also learn how to get a return on their investment from their business continuity plan and why they do not have to rely on expensive solutions to do so. This seminar is free of charge. Feel free to pass this invitation along to your colleagues.
When:	Thursday, March 4, 2010 9:30 AM to 1:00 PM
Where:	Morton's Steakhouse 227 W. Trade Street Charlotte, NC 28202 USA

What is Windows Business Continuity and Where Do I Start?

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 19:07:00 +0000

The Wikipedia definition of Business Continuity (BC) is:

The activity performed by an organization to ensure that critical business functions will be available to customers, suppliers, regulators, and other entities that must have access to those functions. These activities include many daily chores such as project management, system backups, change control, and help desk. Business Continuity is not something implemented at the time of a disaster, but instead refers to those activities performed daily to maintain service, consistency, and recoverability.

Mind you that this is just the basic definition, as there are multiple pieces that are required to fulfill a complete BC plan.

But if I were to translate this definition to apply specifically to Windows Servers, it would read something like this:

The daily proactive processes, procedures, and tasks performed by an IT staff to ensure reasonable availability of business critical Windows services and applications in any given situation.

Not as wordy, but more succinct for today’s Windows administrators.

Windows Business Continuity is a constant moving target because it requires providing “business critical” services and applications in any situation. Who determines which services and applications are critical to your business? What defines “reasonable availability”. And who decides the definition of “any given situation”?

So today, Windows BC must be looked at as a process rather than a definition. IT groups must create detailed plans with the input of management and staff to ensure that “critical” services and apps are protected. They must establish RPO’s, RTO’s, & SLA’s for said services and apps that meet the business need. They must be willing to establish service tiers for recovering all systems in a timely fashion. And lastly, they have to determine the need for solutions that employ different topologies such as local, remote, or hosted availability.

As you can see, there is a lot to Windows BC and the best place to start for any business is to establish the need. If you are a 4 person flower shop that can write hand invoices in the event of a outage, then your BC plan is to keep a few pens and invoice books handy. But if you are a business that relies on one or more Windows servers, then you need to start developing a BC plan right away. You can start the process by establishing the following:

Critical services & applications
Recovery Point Objectives (RPO)
Recovery Time Objectives (RTO)
Service Level Agreements (SLA)
Service and Recovery Tiers

This information together will be the basis for your Windows Business Continuity Plan, and when completed will be something that you, management, and the business can depend on for years to come.

In coming posts I will discuss in detail RPO, RTO, SLA, as well as recovery tiers and how critical they are in a good Windows Business Continuity plan.

And so it begins......

noreply@blogger.com (James Senecal) — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:20:00 +0000

After 15 plus years of working in the Windows HA & DR space it has become apparent that we all have different ideas of what Windows Business Continuity is and how it relates to our jobs. No two ideas are the same, and neither is more correct or applicable than the other.

Thus I have decided to venture into the blogging waters to promote my ideas of what BC is in the Windows world, and at the same time offer advice on how to design and build a viable plan of your own. It is not my goal to pontificate but instead to offer real guidance based on my years of experience meeting the needs of the companies and customers I have worked for.

So that being said, I submit for your approval my new blog: Windows Business Continuity Journal - Thoughts on Microsoft's Server Operating System.

Please follow along and comment as we weave through the acronyms, buzzwords, and FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) of Windows BC.

Thanks, and I hope you enjoy the ride.