It is important that you make regular backups of your server tables. You can use the
standard file system backup and restore facilities that native operating systems provide
to back up and restore your server tables. Or you can use utilities provided by
SPD Server to back up and restore your server tables. Each approach has trade-offs. Therefore,
you might want to consider using a combination of the two approaches, depending on
the size of your server tables and how frequently they are updated.
Server tables can be enormous in size, surpassing the file size limits maintained
by some operating environments. SPD Server is also dependent on the operating environment's
ability to detect a modification
to a table, such as adding, deleting, or modifying a record.
A change in a table
is typically a signal to ensure that the newly modified file is backed
up. When a standard utility subsequently performs an incremental backup,
it processes the file change by backing up the entire table. If the
table is very large, the backup time can be lengthy. In addition,
the processing can consume considerable resources. Administrators
frequently struggle with a dilemma of whether incremental backups
of large tables are worth the resources that they consume.
The SPD Server backup and restore utilities alleviate these problems by backing up
and restoring
only changed rows. Instead of backing up an entire table, the backup utility backs
up only the rows that changed after the previous backup date. If a subsequent restore
of the table becomes necessary, the restore utility can incrementally restore the
table to its last backup state. By backing up and restoring only the changed rows,
SPD Server conserves valuable system resources. The software also gives you the option
to perform periodic full backups with your system's full backup and restore facilities
with SPD Server incremental backups.