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Multiple tape drives and/or upgrading to a faster tape drive will help you
cut time from your backup, but these options can also be very expensive.
OS/400 does provide a feature called Save_While_Active and I'd recommend
using Save_While_Active
to cut the time your system is unavailable to your users while you run a
backup.
I would also recommend, from a usability point of view, that you quiesce the
system
for a few minutes in order to obtain a synchronization point. It will still
take several hours to copy data to tape, but the system may be used while
the backup is running.
On my system using SWA results in the application being unavailable to my
users for only about 15 minutes whenever I run a backup.
The Save_While_Active (SWA) feature of OS/400 could be just what you are
looking
for and the cost of implementation would be $0.00! That's a pretty good
price.
Some things to consider when using SWA...
1. SWA is a wonderful tool. It is a bit complicated to configure but well
worth the trouble.
2. You could configure your backup process to eliminate ALL downtime, but
in my opinion. It isn't worth the effort.
3. Quiesce your system for a short time instead, in order to obtain a
synchronization point.
4. In the event of a recovery, you will be able to recover data to the time
of this synchronization point.
5. You can NOT use SWA for SAVSYS. To execute a SAVSYS command still
requires that the system be in a restrictive state.
6. As with any backup, run it during a time of light system use.
7. Because of the extra processing required for SWA processing your backup
will run longer, but users can use the system while it is running.
8. Full implementation details can be found in the OS/400 Backup and
Recovery Manual, SC41-5304.
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