Have You Forgotten the Backups?

Backing up your switch, or any convergence server for that matter, is a mundane process. However, I was surprised to find out that most organizations forget about their PBXs when planning backup and disaster recovery strategies. Imagine all of those hours of painstaking programming lost when something goes belly-up. The backup and restoration process differs for every type and model of server. Some Linux-based systems allow CRON jobs to be scheduled and run, while other vendors utilize proprietary methods of backup and restore. How frequently do you backup your server, switch, or voicemail systems? Do you do it manually, or have you configured automatic processes that do the job for you? Most importantly, no backup process is complete without the verification and testing of the actual backups. Likely forgotten amid the slew of other daily tasks, it’s vitally important to do a “test restore” from backup to make sure that the backups aren’t full of errors. Garbage in, garbage out!