I am asking this question as I GET asked
this question a lot.  I don’t really recommend any software in particular
for backups.  I have a bit of affection for Commvault Galaxy, as I
have had good experiences with it, but I find that experience with backup
software is typically a personal one (i.e. what is great for one guy is
shit for another).  What I liked about galaxy was the ability to restore
documents into databases through the API.  It worked, and worked well.
  Other products, including Tivoli do not seem to have that functionality
out of the box (at least that is what I am told).

Of course, one of my favourite customers
does the following:

At 11pm – net stop server A in a cluster
and perform an xcopy backup of all data.  Net start when finished.

Next night at 11pm – Net stop server
B in a cluster and perform an xcopy backup of all data.  Net start
when finished.

Retain all backups for two weeks, and
then retain 1 backup per week from each server for six months, then monthly
backups retained only.  Data stored on a cheap NAS and also tape.

Tie that in with smart management of
nightly tasks (not using the servertasks lines for example and scheduling
maint programs using program documents).

Now this is not a small company.  Of
course by IBM’s standards its tiny, but 3000 users happily and reliably
backup data using this method.  The IT manager loves its simplicity.
 Im not saying it will suit every company, but what just works, sometimes
just works.

So what backup software have you had
a great experience with, and what backup software have you .. em.. not.

A reader of this site mailed me recently
with this question, and I can’t seem to find anything to help them out.
 They are looking for a product that can be used to load test a Notes
application (not browser).  I have only ever really used server.load
for stuff like this.  I know there is other software out there, but
it seems very old and unsupported.  Does anyone know of software that
could be used for this?  If you have a product and are looking for
a sale, drop me a line or comment here.  

The application in question will have
15,000 users, hence the need to load test it.

For an excellent, grown-up, mannerly discussion,
click here.
 For a thought-out, reasoned comment in the discussion, read Alan
Lepofsky’s comments.  Smart words by smart people.  No bitching
- just constructive thinking.

I will begin with the following important
points:
1. – This is true
2. – Nothing at all to do with me
3. – Names of all those involved are removed to prevent their removal from
the global gene pool (by death) or at the least some sort of Darwin award.

A businessman has a windows mobile device (Weapon of mass destruction -
whichever you want to call it).  He is using (quite happily) Lotus
Traveller to replicate mail/contacts/pim data down.  Unfortunately,
he loses the unit and contacts the support desk.  The support desk
asks third line support "what do I do to stop his data going to the
device?".  He is told to reset the internet password.  Support
guy does…. to the SAME password that is there already.  Ergo, traveller
is still working.

The businessman is unhappy he lost his
device, but will live on thinking the unit is disabled.  Then, he
starts to notice that his contacts are disappearing from his address book.
 A few at a time… disappearing.  

THEN he notices that new numbers are
appearing in his personal address book – people he does not even know.

The person that "found" the
device had deleted all the entries that were in the address book, and started
to enter his mates’ details.  Traveler was still working, so the deletions
and new entries started to go to the businessman’s personal address book.

One of these entries was "Dad",
and had a phone number.

The businessman phones "Dad"
and turns out that he knows him!  A frank discussion ensues and a
while later the son, who "found" the device returned it, redfaced…..

I laughed so hard I choked.

Gotta hand it to them.  The bleedyellow
site is coming along strong, and amassing an impressive community.  I
logged into their im.bleedyellow.com Sametime server for the first time
this evening.  Its a veritable who’s who for the Lotus world.  Take
a look.

Is on November 9th in the Alexander
Hotel in Dublin city.  For details on the event and how to register,
click here.

I know Chris
blogged this a while ago, but
its just damn annoying.  It came up in one of the sessions and Rob
pointed it out to me.  Lotus Connections is getting a lot of attention,
but Rob pointed out to me already that the 1.0 release does NOT support
the Domino LDAP directory.  This is (hopefully) to be resolved in
the first point release, which we don’t have a date for.  For the
past few weeks, I have been banging my head against authentication and
LDAP/Domino. Please follow my through process below (which is very close
to becoming a RANT process).

 I assume that the majority of
people using Quickr/Sametime/Connections/Portal et al are also Lotus users.
 

Following that assumption I will also
assume that these users have Lotus for mail.

Following that assumption I can
assume that the mail directory is usually the most accurate (as people
tend to complain if their email account name is incorrect, as opposed to
their log-on name).

So why not Domino LDAP support as the
primary supported directory??  Or at least holding it in the same
light as Tivoli and AD? Why do we have to jump through hoops of bad documentation
and poor support to get this stuff to work!??!!?

Connections supports Tivoli and AD LDAP
with 1.0, but not Domino LDAP.  

And connections is out aswell. Severe geekfest this weekend.

Download the monster for Portal… or just download the 66Mb version for Domino that works as well

This look familiar to anyone?