Repeating Backup Every 10 minutes?

[HALBURN]

FM8 Server - I am trying to create a schedule to backup all files every 10 minutes but it is only backing up once per day. I tried daily repeating schedules and also weekly.

What am I doing wrong here?

[Genx]

... can i just ask why you're backing up once every 10 minutes?

[IdealData]

Are you updated to 8.03?

There were some known issues with scheduling in previous versions.

[IdealData]

10 minute backup schedules can't possibly do you any good.

1. If there were a need to recover the data, It is quite likely that the fault would not be noticed until the next backup had executed, thereby overwriting good data with bad.

2. When schedules are executed the clients will be "paused" - this could be intolerable. Even if your backup took only 10 seconds you would be losing 1 hour of operation in every 6. Accordingly if you had more than 6 users you would lose a whole man day per day!

3. The time taken to recover the data is likely to exceed to periodicity of the backups - therefore pointless.

[Razumovsky]

Er, I believe 6 backups an hour at 10 seconds pause each = 1 minute per hour downtime.

It does sound like overkill to me as well though.

[IdealData]

Sorry, got the numbers wrong. Principle is the same though.

[HALBURN]

Are you updated to 8.03?

There were some known issues with scheduling in previous versions.

We are running 8.0v2. I will try upgrading to 8.0v3 after the current shift and see if it solves the problem.

[HALBURN]

... can i just ask why you're backing up once every 10 minutes?

When the government says they want a 10 minute backup, you give them a 10 minute backup. :

[HALBURN]

10 minute backup schedules can't possibly do you any good.

1. If there were a need to recover the data, It is quite likely that the fault would not be noticed until the next backup had executed, thereby overwriting good data with bad.

2. When schedules are executed the clients will be "paused" - this could be intolerable. Even if your backup took only 10 seconds you would be losing 1 hour of operation in every 6. Accordingly if you had more than 6 users you would lose a whole man day per day!

3. The time taken to recover the data is likely to exceed to periodicity of the backups - therefore pointless.

I appreciate the feedback. I think the ten minute schedule was more of test to see it it worked. My guess is that it will be on a 1 to three hour schedule.

[Genx]

...Sure if the government has a couple of terrabytes to spare a year for one small database, why not...

[Wim Decorte]

1. If there were a need to recover the data, It is quite likely that the fault would not be noticed until the next backup had executed, thereby overwriting good data with bad.

Doesn't have to be like this. Check out the "Backups! More Backups" white paper on www.connectingdata.com. It shows you can set up backups to a date/time stamped zip archive so no backup overwrites the previous one.

2. When schedules are executed the clients will be "paused" - this could be intolerable. Even if your backup took only 10 seconds you would be losing 1 hour of operation in every 6. Accordingly if you had more than 6 users you would lose a whole man day per day!

Not true. The backup scheme in FMS7 and 8 is unlike the one in FMS 3-5.5. The files are *not* paused for the duration of the backup. Only at the very end of the backup are the files paused for a very short time. Check the "new server features" tech brief on the FMI website for more details on this.

[HALBURN]

10 minute backup schedules can't possibly do you any good.

1. If there were a need to recover the data, It is quite likely that the fault would not be noticed until the next backup had executed, thereby overwriting good data with bad.

Yes, if you were just using FM server to do your backups it would not be a good idea to execute so frequently . We are using additional hardware and software.

The backup files that are created by FileMaker Server are backed up up via an external backup server. The external backup server executes and incremental backup before FM server writes over it's previous backups.

External backup server #1 alternates it's backups between two different drives and then after 60 days begins to overwrite it's files.

External backup server #2 backs up on a longer interval and stores the data for six months before overwriting itself. It also performs periodic and permanent backups to DVD for long term archives.

It's basically a triple redundant backup array that automatically reduces the redundancy of the archives over time.

[Genx]

... Why are you building in filemaker at all then? It clearly doesn't seem reliable enough for your applications of it. Try .net with sql backend or something, then it's only as reliable as you make it.

Further, you do realize you would have to schedule 144 backups in fm server to get this to work don't you? 144 backups even for a small file of 10 mb which i'm guessing yours wont be given a month or two, uses over 1GB a day which means that in your 6 month period you'd use around 250 GB ... if your zipped file remains at or below 10MB which it probably won't for very long. Some guy on these forums got his file up to 3gb in 8 years (too be honest im still not sure how) but even a 500mb file... think about it around 2.2 terrabytes a month.

Sorry, i just like big numbers

Rather than your triple redundant backup array you might consider looking at software such as doubletake, it only costs around 5000 and it will minimize your down time in the long run if your govenement agency thinks it needs backups every 10 minutes, it probably also thinks it cant have downtime extending past 10 minutes.

Anyway, i'm just having a rant, nm.

~Genx

[HALBURN]

I think the ten minute schedule was more of test to see if it worked. My guess is that it will be on a 1 to three hour schedule.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

When schedules are executed the clients will be "paused" - this could be intolerabl

That's not the way that Filemaker Server 7 or FileMaker Server 8 works. Backups start without pause, skip busy bits, then do a reconciliation at the end of the process.

Please take a look at the Server Tech Brief on the FMI Web Site:

http://www.filemaker.com/support/upgrade/techbriefs.html

HTH

Steven