Backups, Redundancy and Archiving are strategies that may be employed to ensure data
integrity and preserve the viability of a company's operations. For some companies, Backups
will be sufficient. For others, all three may be needed.
BillMax offers a backup and three month archival service for BillMax related databases and
files. If interested please contact sales@billmax.com. Whether or not BillMax services are utilized, having good backups
cannot be emphasized enough.
Backups
Backing up "BillMax" consists of making a copy, if needed in compressed form, of the
following:
- On the BillMax Server:
- The /opt/billmax directory.
- The /usr/local/billmax directory.
- The billmax database.
- The billmax_reports database.
- Any system files used for emailing, printing, networking, etc.
- On the BillMax Customer Portal Server, the files used for the customer portal. The
location of these files differs depending on the setup of the web server hosting the
Customer Portal.
A program such as tar may be used to create a backup of the directories.
There are many utilities such as mysqldump and
mysqlhotcopy to create database backups. Some customers prefer
commercial solutions. Other customers prefer to shutdown the database completely and use
tar to backup the database files.
Regardless of what is used to backup BillMax, storage and maintenance of the Backups is
critical.
DANGER
STORE YOUR BACKUPS OFF-SITE!!! This cannot be emphasized
enough. True story: A customer had the BillMax servers and all company paperwork in one
location. The location burned to the ground. The business never recovered.
DANGER
IF POSSIBLE, STORE YOUR BACKUPS IN A DIFFERENT GEOGRAPHIC REGION!!!.
True story: A company had facilities in both Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas. The Fort Worth
site was hit by a tornado, the Dallas site was flooded, all from the same storm
front.
DANGER
DO NOT RELY ON RAID!!! There have been several
instances where multiple disks and even multiple power supplies in a RAID array have
failed simultaneously. Whereas RAID has its place, it is not a substitute for
Backups.
It is strongly recommended that recovering from a backup be tested periodically to make
sure backups are being done correctly.
Redundancy
Redundancy may be used when waiting for a backup to be restored is not desirable.
Redundancy consists of having a server that has a duplicate copy of the software and a
duplicate version of the database. Database replication may be of use in this scenario.
DANGER
DATABASE REPLICATION IS NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR BACKUPS!!! True story: A
BillMax customer relied on replication rather than backups. When an administrator issued
an improper DELETE command on the production database, the replication database was also
affected. Without backups the data was lost.
Archiving
Archiving backups is useful if there is a need to revisit database status and activity from
the past. True story: A company had a disgruntled ex-employee that managed to still have
access to BillMax. Rather than cause a catastrophic failure this employee would periodically
delete accounts from BillMax. When discovered, the company was able to analyze 6 months of
data and logs to rebuild the deleted accounts and collect evidence of the malfeasance. In
this case Backups and Redundancy were insufficient.
