If we are utilizing Acronis as a backup, to bring a recent image of our DeltaV system back from "bare metal", what is the minimum we'd want to back up?
If we have an image of the entire ProPlus, that backup should include all recent graphics files and trends (PHV "charts") as well as the database, etc. The first task to recreate the ProPlus -
Can I then only rely on a clean install of Windows from a factory recovery disk for workstations? They would need all the latest Windows patches and any software updates / service packs for "DelatV Operate" - a download would take care of the rest?
Is there a trick to backing up an image that captures all the Windows patches and DeltaV updates, without backing up the entire PC (multiplied by how many operator workstations there are)? If I only back up one workstation will this help me reconstitue the rest or would I be starting from scratch anyhow? I suppose if I have at least one complete workstation, that would give ops a couple pieces of glass (as we used to say) to look after their unit, which we worked on restoring the rest.
Comments / advice / thoughts from the community are welcome.
It is not sufficient to rely on only a full image backup of your Professional Plus, or any machine hosting critical applications and data. Acronis(and most backup solutions) rely on a mechanism known as VSS: Volume Shadow copy Service A fair majority of programs are VSS aware by virtue of their development. When VSS begins a backup all VSS aware applications attempt to quiesce(pause) their data structures so that they have fully committed all in-memory cached writes to the disk image and finalized any pending operations. There is a good deal more behind the scenes happening here but that is the quick version. Acronis either may use its own VSS or the built in Microsoft VSS. Applications that are aware have a software component known as a VSS Writer which is responsible for the freezing of that application. This puts them in an ideal state to be backed up and later restored without corruption. There are notable DeltaV Applications which do cache data in memory, and are NOT VSS aware. The most notable is the Objectivity Database that holds your system configuration Data. Even if the option to disable write caching on the database is enabled, it still has no understanding than an in-flight backup is being performed because it has no VSS Writer to freeze it. The best practice recommendation is that you use the built in functions of the various DeltaV Applications to regularly take backups of configuration and data and ALSO take full image backups. If full restoration is needed(Hardware Failure, Operating System Corruption, Cybersecurity Incident) what should be undertaken is a restoration of the Windows Operating system first, then restoration of all backed up databases and data which were taken separately. DeltaV Backup and Recovery provides Emerson developed templates which automate the backup of your systems configuration and data alongside the Acronis full image backups. BOTH of these are needed for a complete Backup and Recovery Implementation.