Looking for a risk overview

Hi- This may be kind of a strange question but Im gonna try anyway. Im looking for an overview (either diagram or whitepaper) for a non-technical person that explains how data can be lost if power is unexpectidly cut from an informix server. If possible this source should come from some place authoratative. Any ideas? Jon

Isn't the whole point of spending money on a DBMS and using transaction logic that you *won't* lose data in the event of an unexpected server failure? -- Neil Truby t:01932 724027 Director m:07798 811708 Ardenta Limited e:neil.truby@ardenta.com "Jon Zero" <jon@nospam.org> wrote in message news:pan.2004.01.13.15.59.48.854583@nospam.org... > Hi- > This may be kind of a strange question but Im gonna try anyway. Im > looking for an overview (either diagram or whitepaper) for a non-technical > person that explains how data can be lost if power is unexpectidly cut > from an informix server. If possible this source should come from some > place authoratative. > > Any ideas? > > Jon

On Tue, 13 Jan 2004 10:59:49 -0500, Jon Zero wrote: Data can be lost if and only if you do at least one of the following no-nos: - You do not have a good recovery plan including system and database archives - You do not save logical logs to tape and/or disk (or save them to the same disk structure that the database is using!) - You use UNLOGGED databases - Your disk controllers volatile memory use write-back cacheing - Your disk controllers have non-volatile memory, use write-back cacheing, and you are forced to scratch the memory because of an unrecoverable hard disk crash. There is an increased risk of data loss under the following conditions: - You use BUFFERED LOG databases - You use RAID5 disk arrays - You save logical logs to disk but do not sweep them periodically to tape or to another physical machine and/or location - You perform diligent archives and log backups to secure media but do not take copies of same offsite One should recognise that all of these have little to do with Informix. IBM/Informix Dynamic Server is a secure reliable RDBMS that is capable of recovery from almost any soft or mildly hard server or system crash. It provides two different systems of server archive one of which integrates with all major system archive software vendors' products and using those archives and logical log backups can recover to within a few seconds of the crash the server's final state at the time of the crash and to rollback transactions not completed to that point insuring a consistent data image. Anyone want to vouch for the authoritativeness of the statements above and/or their source? Art S. Kagel > Hi- > This may be kind of a strange question but Im gonna try anyway. Im > looking for an overview (either diagram or whitepaper) for a non-technical > person that explains how data can be lost if power is unexpectidly cut from > an informix server. If possible this source should come from some place > authoratative. > > Any ideas? > > Jon