Unix Backup and Recovery

Documentation and Testing

Restoring an RDBMS is the most complex procedure that you will ever do, and there is usually very little time in which to do it. The users want the database up now and don’t really care that you’ve never done this before. You need to document and test your database backup procedures often to make sure that they work. The following guidelines may help:

1. Set up a standalone machine that does not have any other databases on it. This machine doesn’t have to be large or even dedicated to this purpose, but it would be good if you could reinstall the OS for a new test. This often can be done when you buy a new machine. Before you put it to work for real, do some test database restores on it.

2. When you test your restores, test the worst-case scenario. Make sure that you know how to install the product onto a new system and that you know all of the files that you need to edit to make it work. This is why you should be doing this on a virgin operating system. That way, you will always have to edit /etc/system, for example, instead of forgetting it without penalty because it’s already been edited.

3. You can set up a test instance and then back up and restore that. However, the best thing to do is to take a normal database backup from one of your production systems and try to restore it to the test system.

4. Make the procedure detailed enough that anyone with good SA or DBA skills should be able to follow it. If possible, do not have the person who wrote the procedure perform ...