Orin,

We do things our own way. Maybe this could work for u to.
First here's why we do things the way we do.


We run our backups during the evening and night-time (who doesn't).
Because everything has to be A.O.K. at the time people get to work, we have
arranged a call-duty.
If an error occures during backups, the 24hr available operator gives a
on-call person a ring.
Then we have to correct the problem and redo the backup.

Now here's how we do it in a nutshell.
Let's say there is a SQL service running on the server.

Somewhere in the script (but before the backup starts):
NET START|FIND /i "sql" > %TEMPDIR%\netstart.sql.log
FOR /F "tokens=*" %%Q IN (%TEMPDIR%\netstart.sql.log) DO NET STOP "%%Q"
/Y||SET STOP=FAILED
IF /i "%STOP%"=="FAILED" NET SEND OPERATOR "Stopping the services failed."
DSMC INC -su=yes and so on....
FOR /F "tokens=*" %%Q IN (%TEMPDIR%\netstart.sql.log) DO NET START "%%Q"
/Y||SET START=FAILED
IF /i "%START%"=="FAILED" NET SEND OPERATOR "Starting the services failed."

Here, the scripts pauses execution untill the services are completely
stopped.
Because if this method, we don't use the pre and postschedulecommand
options.
We schedule commands to run our backups.

Met vriendelijke groet,
Kind regards,

___________________________________________________

Ilja G. Coolen
ABP / USZO / CIS / ES / Storage Management
Tel: +31 (0)45 579 7938
Fax: +31 (0)20 882 7286
Email : ilja.coolen AT abp DOT nl <mailto:ilja.coolen AT abp DOT nl>