Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery - Reducing Your Risk Profile by Robert Mahood
Like all plans, there is an ultimate goal to achieve. The goal in a business continuity plan is simply that: to continue your business in the face of a disaster or a disruption. A business continuity plan is not just for a disaster. It’s also for the smaller things in life, like your friendly... However, through risk analysis, business impact analysis, selecting effective strategies, documenting detailed recovery plans and testing your plans, you can significantly reduce many of your risks, often in a very cost effective way.

Want To Beat The Odds? Disaster Recovery Planning is Essential by Renee Rich
Statistics show two out of five businesses go out of business within five years of experiencing a major disaster. These statistics are staggering. Even if the business survives the initial attack or natural disaster, it typically leaves the business so devastated that long term survival is not... Business of all sizes should develop a business continuity plan, and test it on a regular basis. ... The bottom line, disaster recovery planning for the continuity of your business is a key to survival in the new millennium.

Scalability Testing: 7 Steps Towards Success by Mark Trellis
Systems that work well during development, deployed on a small scale, can fail to meet performance goals when the deployment is scaled up to support real levels of use. An apposite example of this comes from a major blue chip company that recently outsourced the development of an innovative high... This is a fundamental stage of risk based testing, and applies equally to scalability testing or load testing as it does to functionality testing or business continuity testing. ... The load testing programme needs to include other types of load testing including stress testing, reliability...

Scalability Testing - 7 Tips For Improvement by Mark Trellis
Systems that work well during development, deployed on a small scale, can fail to meet performance goals when the deployment is scaled up to support real levels of use. An apposite example of this comes from a major blue chip company that recently outsourced the development of an innovative high... This is a fundamental stage of risk based testing, and applies equally to scalability testing or load testing as it does to functionality testing or business continuity testing. ... The load testing programme needs to include other types of load testing including stress testing, reliability...

Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery - A Business Not a Technology Issue by Robert Mahood
Hackers, hurricanes, fires, flooding, power outages, denial of service attacks, application failures, employee error, sabotage and now terrorism are helping companies to focus on the necessity of a business continuity plan. Through the late 1990s as companies prepared for Y2K, many IT... Business continuity planning sounds expensive and it can be time-consuming. ... However, losing your business functions, processes and systems as well as your company, customer and financial data can be devastating.

Mystery of the Unknown! by Dina Safar
Your Work place is no longer available, disaster has struck, and time is money! How many times have you heard these statements? It is a nightmare for CIOs and IT directors to have to explain downtime to their CEO and CFO. For many CEOs and CFOs, what was important yesterday is no longer valid... Does the company need business continuity to the extent of an off-site disaster recovery? ... Business continuity can be differentiated in two levels. ... Business continuity where we require an offsite backup (Disaster Recovery Site) to resume the same level of productivity in case of workplace...

Hurricanes: Disaster Prevention - Recovery by Mario Ramis
Before the next time you hear hurricane --think inland flooding! Conduct another walk-through of your organization's business continuity plan. Look for business and computing changes since the plan was originally implemented, last tested, or revised. ... They will also probably want to review your business continuity and disaster recovery plans. ... Mark your emergency flashlight positions on a floor plan that is kept off site (preferably as a part of your systems continuity and disaster recovery plan).

Disaster Recovery Services: Questions to Ask of a Service Provider by C Seagrave
With increasing dependence on systems availability, the recovery of your core servers, applications and network are fundamental in the event of a disaster. In fact, as organisations rely more and more on ‘anytime, anywhere’ connectivity, ‘systems availability’ has become synonymous with... Business continuity plans and disaster recovery services ensure continuity and viability.” ( Disaster Recovery Plans and Systems are Essential , September 2001) This article discusses your considerations when selecting a service provider to deliver disaster recovery services – a partner on whom the very...

IT Security and You! Part 4 - Tips for the Office by David Baldwin
IT Security and You! Did You Lock the Doors and Windows When You Left For Work This Morning? Part 4: Tips for the Office IT Policy I will not say much on this other than to say, you should have a policy in place that tells your employees what they can and cannot do on the network and with... Business Continuity Planning Companies should always have a continuity plan in place that will be activated should there be a business disaster like a flood at your office, meaning you have to relocate.

How to Perform an Exchange Migration - Part 2 by Tanya Wiseman
Developing a Migration Strategy The typical site where Microsoft Exchange 2003 is installed has an existing mail system that provides messaging services to its users. Migration is the act of moving or copying the data for all users from the legacy (existing) system to the Microsoft Exchange... At least one test host is required for migration testing; this host acts as a surrogate for the actual online e-mail hosts and holds all mailbox data required for testing. ... If possible, you should identify a group of "friendly" users willing to assist in identifying any problems or errors...