Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Avoiding system crashes is almost impossible but if you have some kind of
recovery technique that can minimize the damage, you will be one step ahead of the
game. You won't be able to tell how reliable a specific disk from some manufacturer is
until you use it. However, talking to other corporations can give you some insight as to
whom to avoid and who may have a worthwhile product for you to use. You'll have to do
a great deal of homework but it will eventually pay off.
Power failures could cause nightmares so you need some way to handle them. The
solution may be as simple as backup systems on temporary generators so you won't even
feel the effects. Unfortunately it may not be that simple. You could be blessed with so
few outages that it won't even be a concern. Consider yourself fortunate.
You won't be able to live without backup of your files and systems. If you have
programs that update files, backups at the appropriate time will save you from a great
many headaches. You may need to restore files to some point in time but you won't be
able to do that without the right backup. If you use the one from the weekend, you could
lose a great deal of data and time even though some files have been restored. Once again
planning your system should reduce problems to a minimum.
Despite all precautions, even the best intentions can result in major screw-ups. In
the early 1980s, I worked full time for a computer company in the software department.
My assignment was that of a consultant without commensurate pay. I quit the company
after about a year and a half when I saw that there seemed to be no future in this specific
business. While I was in their employ, I was asked to create a purchase order system and I
was given two options: modify an existing system that the company had or write one
from scratch. I was specifically directed to determine my approach with some analysis, so
I set forth and discovered that using what was there would have required more time and
effort. Nonetheless, my boss insisted that I write the purchase order system using the
program in the software package at our office - that wasn't a good idea.
I should have wrote the system my way and not told a soul about it but instead I
foolishly did as told. The result was that my boss complained when it took longer than he
wanted me to spend. When I was done though, the effort was top-notch and the clients
were pleased as punch - whatever that means. They used what I produced and couldn't
have been happier with my creation.
Unfortunately, Murphy showed up one day. You've all heard of Murphy's Law, so
you know what I'm talking about. What happened was that the client ran into a problem
one day and had to resort to the backup of their system. Their practice had been to do a
daily backup of the system in case of any problems. When they tried to restore the system
from the backup, it turned out that it wasn't worth spit. They went back a few backups but
even those were as worthless as Tom Delay being in charge of the ethics committee.
Going back like they were doing meant that they would have lost a few days activities,
but at least they had a system.
The problem was that the tape drive backup wasn't working and it hadn't been for
some time, even though it appeared to be fine. I'm sure you've seen numerous examples
of technological processes that seemed to be working when in actuality nothing was
happening. That was just what was taking place with the purchase order system daily
backup and there was no suitable backup. Fortunately, the office where I worked - at the
