SAP backup / recovery - easy, but...

Recently, my partner called me and asked if NetWorker can backup SAP:

-        Sure!

-        But I am talking about SAP WITH ORACLE  –  Oracle platform was emphasized

-        Still, this is standard for NetWorker…

-        Hm… Can you make Proof of Concept (PoC) at customer site?

What occurred?

Another solution could NOT perform a single backup during 6 months! During another 2 months, this vendor could NOT perform restore!!!
And it was just 300GB SAP/Oracle.

This made customer wondering:
   Is it standard on the market? Or maybe I can still expect easy backup & restore of my SAP/Oracle.

Even more interesting was the next part of the conversation:

-        Let’s meet with the customer. I explain how backup works with SAP/Oracle, what is required, what can we expect  –  I proposed the fair approach

-        No  –  the answer was very strict

-        It cannot be NO... Before anyone (customer, you, me) invest in tests, I want to explain what we will achieve after PoC. If fine, I have no problem to prove the architecture in tests.

Customer was desperate to see that its SAP/Oracle can be easily backup&restore. Functionalities, performance did not matter. 

There was no choice. Starting meeting did not happen...

Our guy (very good one, greetings!) made tests with results as below:

·        FULL backup of SAP/Oracle 300GB took 5 minutes

YES! 5 minutes to make FULL backup!

·        De-duplication after just 4 backups: 1:15

·        Implementation of backup environment: 6 hours!

6h, it was time for the whole backup solution installation/configuration: Backup media (Data Domain) + Backup software (NetWorker), Backup agents, Defining backup policy, …

For previous solution, implementation was 8 months and not working well…

·        In the above environment, it was used:

o   Data Domain Virtual Edition as backup media

(http://gurago.com, 3rd link)

o   NetWorker as backup software

The customer was shocked!

I was shocked that he was shocked!!!

Anyhow, the buying process started...

100% of successful backups & restore!
BackupRecoveryGuy