On Wed, Jun 27, 2007 at 11:54:53AM -0400, Clark, Patti wrote:
> adding an Exchange Server client to the fray.  I've read the doco,
> queried the Windows admin, and in anticipation, monitored the list for
> any helpful info.  Other than installing the client software and
> configuring via nsradmin per normal, I don't see any additional
> configuration areas that I need to do anything about, so, are there any
> special gotchas for Win clients and/or Exchange in particular?  It's
> looking way to easy at this point and I feel like I'm missing something
> important.

Hi Patti,

Welcome to a brave new world.  :)  I don't use any of the VSS or
Exchange, RMON Oracle pieces, but it seems to me those run pretty
independent of the normal Windows client.  In those environments, it
seems there's a standard way those database/system backups are done,
independent of backup software, and Networker just steps in where
required.  

Normal Windows client-wise, it's important to know that open files won't
get backed up.  Sometimes these are system files, sometimes they're
application files (like Outlook PSTs) so keep an eye on the reports that
certain files aren't backed up because they're open.  (Interesting side
note, if you license VSS for Windows, Networker doesn't use it for disk
backups (even if backing up a file share that uses VSS for previous
versions over a CIFS share.  VSS is just for Exchange/Oracle/etc, not
the basic file systems.)  I was really disappointed with St Bernard's
Open File Manager a few years ago when we bought some licenses, so I
usually work around the open files the hard way.  For PSTs, that means
http://www.google.com/search?q=personal+folders+backup

Also, in terms of archives bits and when files get backed up, many
Windows functions that change a file set the archive bit so backup
software knows it needs to back it up again.  However, Networker only
resets this bit after a full backup.  So, if you have a long duration
between fulls and the user updates a 10G file the day after the full,
every backup (incremental, leveled, non-full) will backup that file as
well until the next full backup resets the archive bit.  There's an
environment variable you can set on the client to make it ignore the
archive bit and work off timestamps, but there are also situations where
that's not a good idea, so read up and be aware.  I'm sure this quirky
behavior is the reason my Windows clients backup so much more than my
*nix ones nightly.

Dave

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