Are your backups doing their jobs? Storage intelligence can tell you...

If data is not backed up, it cannot be recovered. The concept is simple. However, determining whether a backup has succeeded is the number one challenge facing managers of backup operations, according to a recent InfoStor poll. Despite investing millions of dollars on backup systems to ensure the availability of mission critical data, the typical organization still can only take an educated guess as to whether and what extent backup operations are actually protecting data, let alone meeting specific reliability and efficiency objectives.

This is where the concept of gathering "storage intelligence" about your backup operations becomes particularly useful.

Products that perform storage intelligence -- whether provided by a third party or developed in-house -- actively collect, consolidate, analyze and present critical information about the success of your company's data storage operations. By obtaining adequate storage intelligence, you can more reliably and efficiently determine how well your backup procedures and data storage operations are complying with your company's enterprise policies. At the core of storage intelligence is the collection of data generated by systems about their operations.

Applied to backup environments and analyzed in the proper context, storage intelligence data from backup systems can help:

It also can help with implementation of new backup systems, permit more efficient consolidation and migration of backup systems, train administrators and much more.

The typical enterprise backs up numerous applications, blocks and files residing in a mixture of Windows, Unix and Linux network operating systems. The typical enterprise also backs up these items across heterogeneous networks to multiple tape dev

To continue reading for free, register below or login

Requires Membership to View

To gain access to this and all member only content, please provide the following information (all fields required):

First Name:
Last Name:
Country:
Email Address:

Do you manage, evaluate, recommend, implement, support or purchase storage products, software or services?
Yes

No

What is your average annual expenditure on storage including hardware, software and services?

What is your role in purchasing IT related products and services? (Check all that apply)
Technical decision maker
Financial decision maker
Determine need
Evaluate products/services
Recommend/Specify
Implement products/services
None

By joining SearchStorage.com you agree to receive email updates from the TechTarget network of sites, including updates on new content, magazine or event notifications, new site launches and market research surveys. Please verify all information and selections above. You may unsubscribe at any time from one or more of the services you have selected by editing your profile or unsubscribing via email.

TechTarget cares about your privacy. Read our Privacy Policy

To read more you must become a member of SearchStorage.com

The result is a complex, volatile network of heterogeneous backup and storage technologies that can quickly degrade without proactive day-to-day management. The resulting complexity is one of the key reasons why the radical decrease in the per-gigabyte cost of hardware has not led to a corresponding decrease in the cost of managing these systems. In fact, for many organizations, administrative costs have continued to skyrocket while the reliability and performance of backup systems has decreased.

Three basic steps are required for implementing a storage intelligence solution:

Unfortunately, the information vital to measuring the reliability and performance of backup operations is often buried within vast log files or databases. It's also often mixed with massive amounts of non-critical data. Manually sifting through, collecting and consolidating these records is a tedious and time-consuming task that can take hours for even a small backup operation that manages only a few dozen protected resources.

In larger environments with multiple servers, operating systems and storage architectures, manual collection and consolidation of key operational data can be impractical. As a result, larger and more complex environments require an automated process to collect, consolidate, analyze and present key storage intelligence information.

Whether the storage intelligence solution is provided by a third party or is internally developed, it should meet the following minimum criteria:

A storage intelligence solution is required if an organization desires to establish, measure and proactively manage backup operations against enterprise storage policies. Furthermore, it is impractical, if not impossible, to effectively manage a heterogeneous backup environment without such a solution. Even a basic storage intelligence solution will substantially reduce storage administrative costs and at the same time reduce the risk of lost and unrecoverable data.


	Home > Storage Technology Tips > Backup and disaster recovery > Are your backups doing their jobs? Storage intelligence can tell you...