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The Definitive Guide to Windows Application and Server Backup 2.0

Author: Don Jones

ISBN: pending

Synopsis:

Are you still making backups the old-fashioned way? Whether you back up Windows, Exchange Server, SharePoint, SQL Server, or virtualization servers, the old-school backup mentality may not be serving your actual needs. IT author and Microsoft MVP Don Jones explores the “Backup 1.0″ mentality and its shortcomings, and proposes a new “Backup 2.0″ way of thinking. He examines the true business needs behind backup (namely, quick recovery and as little lost work as possible), and proposes new techniques – using leading-edge technologies that are available today – that do a better job of meeting today’s business and technology needs. With special chapters devoted to Exchange Server, SQL Server, virtualization, and SharePoint, you’ll learn about new techniques and technologies designed to take backups out of the 1960’s and into the 21st century.

Chapter List:

	Chapter 1: Introduction: Why the Backup 1.0 Mentality Is Killing You
	Chapter 2: Horror Stories: We Thought We Had a Backup!
	Chapter 3: Rethinking Whole-Server Backups
	Chapter 4: Rethinking Exchange Server Backups
	Chapter 5: Rethinking SQL Server Backups
	Chapter 6: Rethinking SharePoint Server Backups
	Chapter 7: Rethinking Virtualization Server Backups
	Chapter 8: Getting More from Backups: Other Concerns and Capabilities
	Chapter 9: Keeping Your Backups: Storage Architecture
	Chapter 10: What’s Your Disaster Recovery Plan?
	Chapter 11: Upgrading Your Backup Mentality: Is It Really Worth It?
	Chapter 12: Tales from the Trenches: My Life with Backup 2.0

Author Quote:

“We’ve been doing backups basically the same way for more than three decades. Even the medium of choice—magnetic tape—hasn’t really changed much. That ‘Backup 1.0’ mentality doesn’t actually buy us much, though. We still have lengthy backup windows, lengthy restore times, difficult bare-metal recovery, and other downsides,” explains author Don Jones. “It’s time to rethink all that: I call it Backup 2.0. In The Definitive Guide to Windows Application and Server Backup 2.0, we look at what works and what doesn’t, what we’d love to have in an environment, and what technologies exist today to make it a reality.”

Author Biography:

Don Jones has more than a decade of professional experience in the IT industry. He’s the author of more than 30 IT books, including Windows PowerShell: TFM; VBScript, WMI, and ADSI Unleashed; Managing Windows with VBScript and WMI; and many more. He’s a top-rated and in-demand speaker at conferences such as Microsoft TechEd and TechMentor, and writes the monthly Windows PowerShell column for Microsoft TechNet Magazine. Don is a multiple-year recipient of Microsoft’s “Most Valuable Professional”

(MVP) Award with a specialization in Windows PowerShell. Don’s broad IT experience includes work in the financial, telecommunications, software, manufacturing, consulting, training, and retail industries and he’s one of the rare IT professionals who can not only “cross the line” between administration and software development, but also between IT workers and IT management. Don is a co-founder of Concentrated Technologies, and serves a series editor and CTO for Realtime Publishers.

Chapter 1: Introduction: Why the Backup 1.0 Mentality is Killing You

Series: The Definitive Guide Series
Author: Don Jones
ISBN: pending

Synopsis:
The first backup—technically—was around 1951, when the first generation of digital computing appeared in the form of UNIVAC I. The “backups,” such as they were, were the punch cards used to feed instructions to the massive [...]

Chapter 2 – Horror Stories: We Thought We Had a Backup!

Series: The Definitive Guide Series
Author: Don Jones
ISBN: pending

Synopsis:
Horror stories. Tales from the trenches. Case studies. Call them what you will, I love reading them. They’re a look into our colleagues’ real‐world lives and troubles, and an opportunity for us to learn something from [...]

Chapter 3 – Rethinking Whole-Server Backups

Series: The Definitive Guide Series
Author: Don Jones
ISBN: pending

Synopsis:
Ready to start ensuring solid backups in your environment, the Backup 2.0 way? That’s what this chapter is all about, and what I call “whole server backups” is definitely the right place to begin. This is [...]

Chapter 4 – Rethinking Exchange Server Backups

Series: The Definitive Guide Series
Author: Don Jones
ISBN: pending
Part 1

Synopsis:
Ask anyone in the organization what their most mission-critical piece of infrastructure is, and you’ll probably hear “email” as a common answer. Or you might not: Many folks take email for granted, although they expect [...]

Chapter 5 – Rethinking SQL Server Backups

Series: The Definitive Guide Series
Author: Don Jones
ISBN: pending

Synopsis:
More and more companies are using Microsoft SQL Server these days—and in many cases, they don’t even realize it. While plenty of organizations deliberately install SQL Server, many businesses find themselves using SQL Server as a [...]

Chapter 5: Rethinking SQL Server Backups

More and more companies are using Microsoft SQL Server these days—and in many cases, they don’t even realize it. While plenty of organizations deliberately install SQL Server, many businesses find themselves using SQL Server as a side effect, because SQL Server is the data store for some line-of-business application, technology solution, and so on.

Chapter 4: Exchange Server Backups

Many folks take email for granted, although they expect it to be as available and reliable as a telephone dial tone. As one of the most popular solutions for corporate email, Exchange Server occupies a special place in your infrastructure. It’s expected to be “always on,” always available, and always reliable. Disasters simply can’t be tolerated. Discover how Backup 2.0 can better serve your Exchange Server backup needs.

Chapter 3: Whole-Server Backups

In Chapter 3, I’ll address the most common kinds of servers: file servers, print servers, directory servers, and even Web servers. I’ll show you what some of the native solutions look like, discuss some of the related Backup 1.0-style techniques and scenarios, and detail why they just don’t cut it for today’s businesses.

Chapter 2: Horror Stories: We Thought We Had a Backup!

Horror stories. Tales from the trenches. Case studies. Call them what you will, I love reading them. They’re a look into our colleagues’ real-world lives and troubles, and an opportunity for us to learn something from mistakes – without having to make the actual mistakes ourselves.

Chapter 1: Why Backup 1.0 Is No Longer Enough

Our decades‐old backup techniques are not sufficient anymore. They may be great for creating backups—although in many cases, they aren’t even good for that—but they do not excel at bringing the right data back into production as quickly as possible. Despite advances in specialized agents, compressed network transmissions, and so forth, we’re still just making a copy of the data, and that doesn’t always lend itself well to restoring the data. Why?