The final backup

[daFranze]

my customer, a company, which is insolvent needs to run a final backup of it's SAP servers. An easy way is to run a filesystem backup, which would be my job. Since the tax authorities may doublecheck any book entry for 8 years (it's the law in Germany), the liquidator is responsible for restoring the data. But any filesystem backup might be worthless, since there is no old hardware available (who will have old A-Class servers in 2014!?), wherever I can install the data on. Would it make sense to run a database dump?
The customer is running a very old Version SAP 3.1* (afaik with Oracle 7.x). Which final backup do you recommend? Is there something like a extract everything to a *.xml File ;-)
Can SAP 4.x or 5.x include/run dumps made by SAP 3.x?
I do not need detailed descriptions how to do this, I just want to know the options. If it is a SAP admin job we will order a SAP consultant to do this. If there is no realy option we will run filebackups.

Best Regards, Franz
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UNIX System Manager from Munich, Germany

 

[onpnt]

Yes it would make sense to simply backup the Oracle DB and retain them either on Tape or Disc for the 8 year cycle.

Although typically there should be a true disaster/recovery model in place utilizing a third party tool that it driven to that task only. Something like netbackup enterprise or such. That way the backups are maintained in a more stable and recoverable manner. Remember with long retention periods to consider tape life and such. Don't skimp out on the cost of good disc or tape when retaining data so long. I know the life span of LTO is around 50 but in reality I've seen problems restoring with tape 5 years and older from cheap tapes

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The worst mistake you'll ever make is to do something simply the way you know how while ignoring the way it should be done[/sub]

 

[daFranze]

well, I intend to keep it as simple as possible: me and the OS! ;-)
the OS is hpux and it comes with an utility called fbackup and frestore. hp claims it is a little bit fault tolerant, so consistant restores should not be a big deal.

Any other ideas, hints, pitfalls...?

Best Regards, Franz
--
UNIX System Manager from Munich, Germany

 

[hoinz]

Hi Franz,

a few thoughts about it:
First I agree with onpnt that a backup of the Oracle DB will be sufficient. And if there were a desaster recovery plan, this could give you further ideas.
You may backup Oracle by means of OS, Oracle or SAP. Stay with whatever you feel comfortable with. But if you choose OS, make sure that Oracle is shut down properly, otherwise the file system backup will be useless.
And regarding the question whether there will be suitable hardware available in the future: This may be a problem; I don't know anything about old A-Class servers. But you won't need them, some hardware running a compatible new version of the current OS will do. (As you probably know, you needn't restore all of the old OS files, just Oracle, and SAP, and a few infos like username from /etc/passwd.)
And new versions of SAP will definitely not be able to run with data from 3.x. One good reason to backup SAP files (executables, profiles, ...) as well. I guess SAP will, if requested by tax authorities, be able to deliver 3.x even in 2014, but not sure about that...
And if you do not trust in HPUX, and want to guarantee full cross-platform compatibility of the backup, then there is no other choice but dump files created by Oracle's export utility, with option 'full database'. If some day in the future this dump needs to be restored to some other OS, this will be what is called an 'OS migration'. This usually is done by certified SAP experts only. Not sure if in 2014 there will still be certified experts for an OS migration based on Oracle 7.x and SAP 3.x ...

regards

 

[daFranze]

thanks hoinz, ok, the "OS migartion" is the keyword. I will offer this the customer as one option.

Best Regards, Franz
--
UNIX System Manager from Munich, Germany