May Your Old Data Not Be Forgot—Save Your IFS

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how large the IFS (Integrated File System) is getting on some IBM i servers. To refresh, the IFS is basically a directory system in IBM i disk space that lets you store data in UNIX and Windows formats. You’ll usually find data from applications such as SAP, EnterpriseOne, and Movex Enterprise Resource Planning. You’ll also find data stored in Windows formats such as PDF, XLS, GIF, and JPG.

As the IFS has grown on your server, it’s become a significant part of your backup and recovery plans because it takes longer and longer to back up and restore. If you want to speed things up, you need to split up the backups. But, for the typical IBM i administrator, this can be tough because IFS backups and restores don’t use the same syntax as traditional library backups.

Selective IFS Backups and Restores with Robot/SAVE 12

For years, Robot/SAVE handled this by backing up the entire IFS (or parts of it using Object Lists). The newest version of Robot/SAVE, Robot/SAVE 12, was released in October 2011 and added the ability to organize directories into IFS Groups to achieve more organized, flexible, and dynamic backups. Now, you can easily split your backups and use more than one tape device at a time. And, you can use multiple save files, or virtual tape solutions (like SPHiNX from Crossroads).

Robot/SAVE 12 also offers a convenient way to restore individual files from these backups. The benefit is greater granularity, which means selective, faster backups and restores. And, your administrator or system programmer doesn’t need to spend time setting things up using complicated CL programs—with Robot/SAVE, your operator can handle the setup.

Robot/SAVE is a user-friendly, easy-to-use, turnkey solution that comes with our world-class support. Try it for 30 days and see what you think.

Happy New Year

Tom