Re: Reducing downtime for backups

[Evan Harris <spanner@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Phil

Also consider journalling the files (if they are not already) and saving
only the journal receivers. How you set the journal up will influence it's
size - in particular the Open/CLose option.

You will need to think about when/how to change the journal receivers
regularly and how to integrate them into your save strategy.

You need some careful planning about how you do this - but I think all of
your options are going to need careful planning.

Regards
Evan Harris

>I am investigating options for reducing the length of time that the system is
>unavailable to users during our nightly backup job.  Not long ago we added
>disks
>and started creating *SAVF files in a separate ASP for the backups,
>copying the
>*SAVF's to tape later.  This reduced downtime to about 1 hour, but this
>continues to grow as we add files and the existing files grow.  We are doing
>full SAVLIB's using BRMS and have split out all of the program and
>non-essential
>libraries into a separate job.  We backup 50 GB of data which compresses to
>about 30 GB in the *SAVF format.  We are a single AS/400 shop running JD
>Edwards.
>
>At this point, the options I see are:
>      Use SAVCHGOBJ.  We have done some tests on this and determined it
> will not
>      save us much.  A large percentage of the objects are changed
> everyday and
>      the system takes too long trying to figure out which objects to save.
>      Separate "current" data from "prior year" data and store in different
>      libraries.  We have already done some of this for the largest
> files.  This
>      requires system changes because the users still need access to the prior
>      year data.
>      Use the Save While Active Option.  I suspect that this is the best
> solution
>      and there is little (if any) out-of-pocket cost.  The downsides are
> a)  The
>      time and risk associated with investigating and revising our current
>      procedures, and b) Making sure that everyone here understands the
>      implications of the new procedure.
>
>I would be appreciative of other ideas anyone may have.
>
>I have seen testimonials on this list that the newer tape drives are extremely
>fast (we have a 3570).  They couldn't possibly be faster that going to *SAVF
>files, could they?
>
>TIA
>Phil