OK folks, please bear with me on this. For those who decide to read through it 
I would appreciate any insights you may have.

Being a former mainframe guy I had a hard time coming to terms with the fact 
that backups for servers won't always be 100% successful everyday. I've also 
accepted that without OTM, or something like it, in place it's entirely likely 
that even if a server backup is successful, I might not have gotten a complete 
100% backup because some files may be in use. We are currently implementing NBU 
OTM on our servers but it is a time consuming process that is taking place with 
5-10 servers per night on a catch-as-catch-can basis. With close to 300 servers 
in inventory, it could take a few more weeks.

Having said all that, how do you appease a manager or director that is adamant 
that all files that aren't backed up should be reviewed frequently (daily if 
possible) and a determination made as to whether it's a problem or not? I have 
someone who would like to see a daily report of the servers that had files that 
didn't get backed up, organized by application group and support person so each 
person can review their servers to make sure the impact is minimal. First off, 
NBU doesn't have such a robust reporting feature so the server backup team is 
manually producing this report (and we're not scripting gurus by any stretch of 
the imagination).

I was just wondering how others of my species (server backup mavens) are coping 
with this. When does it become futile to perform this type of research, if 
ever, and at what point do you say "you know, it's a generally accepted 
practice in the server backup community to .... "

Maybe this isn't the right forum for this and I'd be happy to take it offline 
with anyone that has an opinion. Or maybe there are others out there who also 
want to know. In this age of doing more with less (we just lost six people) 
some things will have to wait or fall off the edge of the earth because we just 
don't have the time to deal with it because our hair is on fire with a 
different problem right now.

What say you all?

Regards,
Dennis

Dennis F. Dwyer
Manager, Systems Software
Tampa Electric Company

(813) 225-5181  - Voice
(813) 275-3599  - FAX

Visit our corporate website at www.tecoenergy.com

Quote: "Time is not a test of the truth"
Translation: Just because you've always done it that way, doesn't make it right