The LA Fox Developer Newsletter

July 1999

Data Backup (Con? from page 3)

was unreadable. When they went to restore from their backup

tape they found that the tapes were all blank. The tape drive unit

was on a workstation that was used by someone who came in

early each day. When she arrived for work each day, the backup

software displayed a fatal error message. Since it wasn’t her

responsibility and she had no training on performing backups

she clicked on the cancel button and went on with her day. The

drive was sent to a data recovery house and the data was

recovered at the cost of several thousand dollars.

Lessons Learned

1)The person responsible for performing backup has to be

responsible for checking that it works correctly.

2) When all else fails, data recovery companies can often

retrieve lost data.

Reading these cases, studies I find that in every instance the

customer thought they were adequately safeguarding their data.

In most of these cases, data loss could have been prevented by

simply checking the backup logs and performing a test restore.

In the case of the SQL database, data loss could have been

prevented by following the manufacturers recommendation of

using transaction logs stored on a different physical device.

Epilogue:

Data loss happens every day. The statistics are pretty numbing.

In most cases, a company suffering complete data loss will go

out of business in 90 days As an IT pr fessional

responsibility to help safeguard this date and prevent it’s loss. If

you are a corporate developer, and not personally responsible

for backup of your network you might want to think about

making your own private backup of the data on a regular basis.

You never know when it might come in handy. If you are a

consultant, you should work with your customers to make sure

their backup system is working correctly. I know from personal

experience that telling someone their data is irretrievably lost

isn’t much fun. It’s a much more pleasant experience to tell the

customer that everything is going to be OK. If you want to be

able to do that you need to take steps now so that you aren’t

the one saying “He’s dead Jim”.

(Ed. Note: George Sexton is owner of MHSoftware and a

Microsoft MVP. He can be reached at:

george@MHSoftware.com.]

Out and About (Can’t from page 2)

Since We Last Met

3rd Annual Southern California VFP Conference Adds

More Sessions, More Space. That’s right, it’s been expanded

to better address the needs of the attendees. MES has added

more speakers and more vendor sessions to give “the masses”

even more of a choice. So the event breaks down to a 6X5

(Con't, next column)

Out and About (Con't from previous column),

session grid (6 separate tracks with 5 sessions in each track)

for Friday, August 27th; a 6X5 session grid for Saturday, August

28th; and back to a 5X5 session grid for Sunday, August 29th.

The session schedule is now up on the conference website. If

you haven’t been there yet, point your browser to http:ll

www.mesllc.com/conf99.html.

New Website Debuts. It’s been a long time coming, but I think

the wait is worth it. The FoxForum, not related to

CompuServe’s place of the same name, has finally opened at

http://www.foxforum.com. Even though it’s new, this site

promises to be a great.source of information and exchange of

ideas. And the best part of aIl...well, not really.. .it’s absolutely

free. So go there, sign up, sign in, and grow with it.

Kudos to Bill Anderson. Bill Anderson, LA Fox Vice-Presi-

dent and Programs, has done an exceptional job in arranging

the remainder of our 1999 meeting schedule. So...hats off to

you, Bill, for ajob well done!!

More About the New Place...and Kudos to Twila Miller.

Unless you completely bypassed the lead article in this issue,

you should know that LA Fox has found a new meeting place.

Thanks to the efforts of Twila Miller, LA Fox Treasurer, we’ve

been able to move our meetings back to 7:30 PM, which many

members felt was a more reasonable time, we’re able to save a

substantial amount of money annually (which means lots-’o-

things to the group). So.. .a tip of the hat to her! Somethinq

else you should know. ..the LA Fox Board of Directors will now

be meeting at 7:00 PM before each meeting and, as is our

custom, every member who’s interested and current (“paid-up”)

is invited to participate. So, if you’re there and you’re so

inclined, pop in for a visit.

The New LA Fox Mail Server (or, “How to Reach Every

Member of the Board in One Easy e-Mail”). We now have a

quick method for our members to reach all of the LA Fox Board

members with one message. Just address your e-mail to

board©Iafox.org and each of us will receive a copy.

La Fox Website About to be Remodeled. We’re about to

revamp our website. The website, already an award winner (See

May 1999.), should be remodeled over the next thirty days and

we’d like your input as to features you’d like to see imple-

mented, such as a “members only” section, a local/national job

board, member listing with qualification/experience/expertise,

etc. So, if you have any ideas, please e-mail me at

brlee@earthlink.net

Well, like Porky Pig used to say....”Th-th-th-th-th-that’s all

folks!!” Hope to see you at the next meeting...

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