GROUPWISE BACKUP, RESTORE AND DISASTER RECOVERY

JUST THE PLAIN FACTS IN BLACK AND WHITE!

AND

AN INTRODUCTION TO

GWAVA RELOAD

CREATED BYTay Kratzer

Novell Press Author, Reload Lead Developer

Updated Versions of this presentation are maintained at:

http://reload.gwava.com

Modern “GroupWise Administrator”

● There are rarely “GroupWise Administrators” whose sole job is GroupWise Administration except in larger systems.

● Even those who manage “only GroupWise”, have increasingly more systems and entry points to manage or integrate with than they did in the past. For example synchronization software, gateways, BES, GMS, GWIM, LDAP authentication, backup systems, archive systems, customized e-mail applications etc...

● GroupWise Administrators need access to backups increasingly more often – one more thing to (try and) do!

Modern GroupWise Systems

● Larger sites often consolidate to larger post offices, and implement clustering solutions

● GroupWise is the information lifeblood, lots of information is kept and organized in the user's mailbox and folders

● More and more systems are getting integrated into GroupWise

● GroupWise is a critical application in many organizations

Backup/Restore Questions?

● QUESTION Let's say you need to use your backup system in

order to restore a GroupWise user's personal address books, and some e-mail and calendar items

● How long will that take you?● COMMON ANSWERS

● We don't restore data!● Depends on who it is. . . ● Several hours● A couple of days!!!!!

Disaster Recovery Questions?

● QUESTION Let's say you had a data or server failure of some

sort for a GroupWise post office, and you needed to go to your backup system for disaster recovery purposes

● How long will that take you?● COMMON ANSWERS

• I hope it works!• Several hours• A couple of days!!!!!

Backup Software Reality!

● We are paying for a backup system that we hope we don't have to use!

● We only restore data for “important people” or if the data is “important” to the organization

● We only have our backup system in place in the case of a disaster

● Since we only use our backup system in the case of a disaster, we don't really know if it will actually work when we do have a disaster

Backup Architecture Reality!

● Tape backup technology is good for long-term storage, but that's it!

● Tape backup technology for disaster recovery or near-term restoration is obsolete and unrealistic!

● Hot backup technology is the solution● An “archive” solution is not a disaster recovery

solution, and an archive solution does not bring back GroupWise mailbox data in it's native format

Backup Software - Restore Events

● The need to restore items in their native format or to audit a GroupWise mailbox is increasing A user deletes an important contract, and it needs

to be restored. A users syncs their PDA with GroupWise, they hit

the wrong button, and when the sync is done, all of their calendar items and address book contacts are gone

Quick, you need access to Bob’s live mailbox, and then you need to go into last night's backup and sift through Bob's mailbox and folders looking for some evidence (Reload and GWAVA Reveal)

Backup Software - Disaster Recovery Events

● Data Disasters● Data becomes corrupt● Data gets deleted

● Server Disasters● Total Volume Failure● Hardware Failure

● Site Disasters● Server room is in two feet of water● Natural or man-made disasters

Real-World Backup Problems

● Restoring from tape is slow and cumbersome, several hours, if not days for some customers

● Getting just one item, is still just as slow● Some backup systems get incomplete backups

of GroupWise (no TSA integration)● We never test our backup system, it takes too

long● Not just the administrator is impacted by

inadequate backup solutions, IT Managers, CIOs and affected users are too!

GWAVA Reload – A Solution You Will Actually Use!

GWAVA Reload is a Hot Backup, Quick Restore, Disaster Recovery solution that you will actually use, beyond Disaster Recovery purposes.

No longer will you wonder if your backup solution will work in a Disaster Recovery scenario. Every time you use Reload you are effectively verifying the data on the Reload server, and that it can function for Disaster Recovery purposes.

GWAVA Reload Introduction

Restore data or access backed up data in two minutes Push-button Disaster Recovery – Really! No need to go to tape for near-term

backups (most customers need about two- weeks of backups available) Easy backup solution for GroupWise on any platform• Install the Reload Server, nothing to install to the

GroupWise servers or the GroupWise clients

Access to Backup Speed

• Reload backups are Hot Backups in that they are immediately accessible with a few clicks and available in two minutes. No need to go to tape!No need to go to tape!

• Most customers need to restore backed up data from the near-term (the last two weeks). Near-term backups are available on the Reload server. No need to go to tape!No need to go to tape!

• Each Reload backup is like a full copy of the post office, although only 12% of the post office needs to be replicated and stored. Far superior to Far superior to snapshot or full mirror backup solutions!snapshot or full mirror backup solutions!

Push-Button Disaster Recovery

• Push a button and a GroupWise post office or domain can be completely functioning on the Reload server in 30 seconds!• When a production server is back and available for service, the Reload server can migrate 90% of the data back to a production server, while the Reload server is functioning as a live post office. This minimizes downtime.•The data can be migrated to a whole new server, it does not have to be the original server that Reload backed up the data from

Off-Site Disaster Recovery

• Reload supports an off-site solution via a “Remote Reload Profile”. Site A's Reload server can be backing up Site B's Reload server, and visa/versa. Or you can just have an off-site Reload server at a dedicated DR site. The practical limitations of this model is that 12% of the size of the post office needs to replicate across the link between the two sites.

• Viable Solutions provides an off-site ASP solution for GWAVA Reload. See http://www.viable-solutions.com

Reload Software Manageability

• Reload software management is easy. Nothing is installed to the GroupWise Servers or GroupWise Clients. No NetWare server No NetWare server ABENDs! Nothing to manage at the desktop!ABENDs! Nothing to manage at the desktop!

• The Reload Backup Agent backs up GroupWise post offices on any platform, and faster than any other solution. Reload is even faster than the TSA on the NetWare platform. No special platform specific modules to No special platform specific modules to purchase or implement!purchase or implement!

Everything is Backed Up

• Users cannot purge items from their mailbox until they are backed up by Reload. Even items that are deleted or archived intra-day cannot be purged until they are backup up by Reload. You You have a truly indisputable backup!have a truly indisputable backup!

• Users cannot purge items from the Reload Hot Backup either.

Superior Backup Design

• Reload only requires a full post office replication (full backup) one time, and then never again. Full backup time windows never Full backup time windows never needed again, and full backup bandwidth needed again, and full backup bandwidth never needed again!never needed again!• For long-term Tape backup storage, Reload enhances Tape backup solutions by presenting one file to backup (a *.tar file), not thousands of separate files. Backing up Backing up one *.tar file or restoring a *.tar file is one *.tar file or restoring a *.tar file is significantly fastersignificantly faster then restoring thousands then restoring thousands of files from full and incremental backup of files from full and incremental backup sets!sets!

Where Reload Fits• Many customers still will want to implement a tape backup solution for long-term storage. Tape is cost effective for long-term storage. Also, a Tape backup of the live GroupWise message store is still the most indisputable form of backup. GWAVA recommends SyncSort for Novell and Reload environments. You can choose to use Reload to backup your GroupWise servers, and then just backup the Reload server to tape.

• Reload is not an archive solution, GWAVA's Retain product is, we recommend Retain.

• No archive solution allows items to be restored in their native format, and an archive solution is not a disaster recovery solution.

Customer Quotes – From NGWList

Customer Quote # 1: For what it's worth, we have struggled for a long while trying to create a backup environment for GroupWise that allowed us to sleep at night without worry. We have tried several approaches including RAID arrays, drive mirroring, SANs and "snapshots", etc. We have decided that the best option for GroupWise in our environment is Reload. It does just about everything we want it to do and does it the way we want it to do it.

Customer Quote # 2:By the by, those of you NOT using Reload should give it a serious look. This is the best backup/DR solution I've ever seen for a GWenvironment. It's a breeze to setup and works super fast (2.0 was displayed at GWAVACon and it's supposed to be even faster).

Enjoy GWAVA Reload

Tay Kratzer

www.gwava.com

www.taykratzer.com