Server recovery and data recovery revisited

When a server goes down, and there may or may not be data on the server versus in the cloud as well, what do you do? It depends. Do you have backups, or does cloud caching of your data for propagation to other locations and vendor support and backup exist?

 

This is about a recent recovery of a server and business after something failed. My team, now just me since market changes in 2017, and then COVID-19 in 2019, pretty much reduced me back to a one person operation, I/we/me was called in to this new client to look at the situation to fix it, and in the process, redesigned things where it would not happen again, ever.

 

For me, when I run into a server down situation; I look at the previous configuration, data drives and methods to ensure redundancy, server type and mode, application type and data backup and preservation methodology, and then the size of the organization and spread and complexity of the users and clients across the LAN/WAN/MAN/VPN, etc.

 

What do you do? If you ascertain data recovery is needed; do it. In the meantime, depending on the server and network configuration, maybe its time to make the server not be the crux of any outage and let the network appliances do their job and not the server do the job of the network connectivity. Plus, user and client authentication is always an issue when it comes to support changes over time. What do you do? Well, disconnect the domain as a control point if the organization user count is less than 25. If over 25, then consider the domain configuration restoration if possible. If restoration not possible, then rebuild.

 

What else? Data! make sure your data is figured out this time around and make sure the key people know it. Plus, administrative passwords and configurations, network passwords, and configuration, financial processing and security, wifi security, and backups are rebuilt and reconfigured properly.

 

What else? do it now, do it quickly, and document and verify.

 

more to come...