disaster recovery - how pre recovery works

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Disaster RecoveryHow the Pre-recovery process works

www.planb.co.uk


Overview

• Pre-recovery is the latest innovation in disaster recovery.

• Your IT system is recovered in advance every 24 hours, just in case you need it.

• It provides the fastest return to service time of all cloud DR solutions

• It is only provided by Plan B Disaster Recovery

• It offers a hot standby equivalent for a price comparable to traditional DR methods


Process Diagram


• The client is sent an appliance with instructions on installation and configuration which takes about 20 minutes.

• Once set up, the appliance automatically takes a copy of the system images of each machine it is set up to protect. This is called a ‘snapshot’/

• Snapshots only contain files of new data that has chanced since the last snapshot.• Our standard service takes snapshots every 24 hours, but there are options to have

them more regularly.• Snapshots are encrypted for secure transfer to Plan B. The appliances are

designed to accept no incoming connections of any nature, not even Plan B for optimal security.

• Data sent to Plan B is stored in Plan B’s snapshot storage system. This holds an up-to-date copy of every file within every host that we provide protection for and the ‘last known good’ set of files for regression if the new snapshot fails for any reason.

Snapshotting


• The new snapshot is scanned to calculate any changes to the previously held system image.

• The new snapshot is combined with files that have not changes to create a new physical system image. We call this a ‘rescue image’ and it is ready for conversion so that it can run on the virtualised Plan B rescue platform

Update


• The physical image is then converted from a physical to a virtual image. This is where the Plan B ‘magic’ comes in and is done automatically by applying various Plan B ‘overlays’. These overlays make changes to the system files so they can run successfully on a virtual machine.

• Plan B has many standard overlays for common system elements and applications, but will write new overlays for customers with unique configurations.

• Once a rescue image has completed its physical to virtual conversion, it will be queued for testing

Pre-recovery


• All new virtual rescue images are automatically tested.• This is at least every 24 hours.• Testing is done by booting up a newly created rescue image on a live virtual server

and applying a test harness to check the image is functioning.• All rescue images that pass testing are moved to the rescue image repository

where they are stored ready for booting.• If an image fails testing then the Plan B process scheduler will ticket it and a Plan B

engineer will investigate the cause of failure. Our automated email notification and customer portal will alert the customer of any failures.

Testing


• In the event of a disaster Plan B provides customers with replacements for their systems running on virtual servers on a Plan B rescue platform.

• All invocations must be authorised by pre-appointed executive(s) using a specific security process.

• Plan B engineering will agree the course of action with the executive, allocate virtual servers and boot up the appropriate rescue images.

• Other services like DNS & email redirections and VPN’s are set up.• Plan B runs test criteria to check the services are running properly and then hans

over the system to the customer’s IT staff.• Customers can access the platform via various options depending on their BCP, and

run on the platform for as long as they need to ensure that rebuild options are well thought through.

Instant Recovery


Pre-recovery – learn morehttp

://www.planb.co.uk/disaster-recovery-service/pre-recovery

08448 [email protected]

http://www.planb.co.uk/disaster-recovery-service/pre-recovery



disaster recovery - how pre recovery works

Technology

disaster plan b

plan b disaster recovery

plan b engineering

plan b magic

plan b rescue platform

virtualised plan b rescue

plan b process scheduler

plan bengineer