Whitepaper : Understanding Database Backup Strategies

As seasoned database administrators, you should be well on top of your backup strategies. These strategies are not written in stone. It is a journey that any database administrator needs to refine over time. Continue to explore new capabilities of the platform that enhance your backup experience.

The basic building block of any effective backup relies on knowing what we need to backup. An adequate backup protects us from a multitude of possible failures occurring within our database as well as our backups. For systems that require 24 x 7 x 365 use, it is essential to know the database access patterns before any backup takes place. The database platform can provide a range of capabilities. Moreover, it is vital for us to know which of these are under production. Realize the real value of backups only when we can restore data after a disaster.

This whitepaper presents the basic fundamental building blocks of working with backups. The whitepaper touches upon determining what to backup and where to backup to, deciding when to backup and how to backup, and testing your backups.