| A | A is for Audit. Your backup system should be able to stand in front of an audit as complete and trustworthy. |
| B | B is for Backup. Without backup, you can't have recovery, and without recovery, your business is uninsured. |
| C | C is for Change Control. If your backup system isn't integrated into the change control process, neither your backup system nor your change control process works. |
| D | D is for DeDupe. You'll be seeing a lot more of it in Backup and Recovery moving forward. My money is on target dedupe being considerably more popular than source dedupe. Why? For the same reason that VTLs are around. Target dedupe = easier dedupe, both for vendors, and for companies with existing solutions to integrate. |
| E | E is for Errors, User. The most common reason you'll need to recover is from user errors. Use this to help plan how your backup system will work. |
| F | F is for Fast. Every person and their dog seems to have a story about making backups faster. Look instead for the stories about making recovery faster – they're the more important ones. |
| G | G is for Growth. Your backup environment should be scoped to handle at least 2 years growth upon implementation. If it isn't, budgets haven't been established correctly. |
| H | H is for Help. Don't try to solve backup/recovery problems in isolation; they're too important to let stew. |
| I | I is for Insurance. It's the central purpose of backup, and if you think of it any other way, chances are you're wrong. |
| J | J is for Jeckyll, not Hyde. When it comes to recovery situations, people should be able to work through them as calmly and cleanly as Dr Jeckyll might – not storm through them like Mr Hyde, flying apart. |
| K | K is for Knowledge. Know your system. Know your errors. Know where to look for information. Know your support hotline numbers. Know your averages. Know your performance peaks and your troughs. Know at a glance whether your system is running smoothly or having problems. |
| L | L is for Logs. Treasure your logs. Don't throw them away too quickly, make sure they're backed up too. With access to your logs, you can answer in 3 years time why a backup from yesterday is proving problematic to recover from. |
| M | M is for Magnetic Tape. It's not going away any time soon. Don't kid yourself, you'll still be using it in backup and recovery systems for some time to come. |
| N | N is for Napkin. If you can't summarise your backup system on the back of a napkin, it's too complicated. There are no exceptions to this rule. |
| O | O is for Order. Backups bring Order to Chaos. Hence, your backup system must be an ordered process, rather than a chaotic and haphazard arrangement of scripts and non-processes. |
| P | P is for Procedures; without them, you don't have a backup system at all. |
| Q | Q is for Query. If you're the backup administrator, you should be constantly prepared for a query about backup success. If you're a manager or system owner, you should feel confident you can get a positive response at any time to a query about backup success. |
| R | R is for Recovery, the most important facet of data protection. |
| S | S is for SLAs. (Service Level Agreements). Recovery Time Objectives (RTOs) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPOs) form the heart of SLAs, and contrary to popular opinion in many circles, SLAs are vital to good design. Having SLAs is the first, most critical step to getting the correct budget for the correct system. Without defined recovery requirements, you can't prioritise activities properly; i.e., you'll have a reactionary environment rather than a proactive environment. |
| T | T is for Testing. In fact, T is for Testing, Testing, Testing. If your backup system doesn't include test planning, test procedures and test results, it's not a system at all. |
| U | U is for Ululate. It's that sound you make when your only copy of a backup is destroyed by a failing tape drive or failing tape because you didn't clone it, and you know that recovery failure is not an option. |
| V | V is for VTL. Whether you like the need for them or not, they're not going away any time soon. |
| W | W is for Windows. No, not that Windows. Backup Windows. Clone Windows. Recovery Windows. Design your system first to meet you recovery windows, then your clone windows, then and only then, your backup windows. If you don't do it in that order, your system isn't designed for recovery. |
| X | X is for X-Ray. If you can't X-Ray your backup status, drill down and see how happened, you should assume the worst. (OK, I'm grasping there, but what do you eXpect?) |
| Y | Y is for Yes. Yes you should be backing up. Yes you should be checking the backup status. Yes you should be able to recover. |
| Z | Z is for Zero Error Policy. If you don't run your backup system with a zero error policy, you're not running it properly, and it's not actually a system. |
