Re: REPOST: RMAN question

From: Howard J. Rogers <hjr_at_dizwell.com>
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 08:46:37 +1000
Message-ID: <4136516c$0$12422$afc38c87@news.optusnet.com.au>

Joel Garry wrote:

>> > What you describe could have, as easily, happened with a tape.
>> 
>> Of course it could. But how many times have you ever wanted to install a
>> spare tape into a user's PC because their tape had failed? So whilst it
>> could have happened to a tape, it is vanishingly unlikely that the
>> motivation ever to do it would arise in the first place.

>
> Not a user's PC, but definitely on servers.

I was trying to be generalised about it!

Put it this way. The Scrooge in me sees a hard disk and says, "I could use that!". When I see a tape, however, I just think "Bugger. Do I really have to do the backup??"

At chez Rogers, at least, it is miniscule-ly unlikely that a tape would ever be over-written.

:-)

> (Well, I've come close on
> my own PC :-O but I'm the only person I know who uses tape on a PC.
> Because I'm a packrat. Yes, I have stacks of punch cards.)

My laptop sits next to a wind-up gramophone and a lovely valve radio from the 1940s. Which both still work (and both still get used).

Punch cards?... way too racy for my tastes.

> http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=65dd3
> i%24chj%241%40pebble.ml.org&output=gplain
> (And yes, I think hot backups and RMAN are now mostly properly
> debugged... after this many years since that post... and no, I don't
> know if any of those tapes still exist [the dot.bomb I was working at
> at that time apparently does not]).

Hey... I was still learning Access when you were writing that!

>> These guys work for the British Museum. They do long-term storage (for
>> centuries) for a living. I think the results of their deliberations have
>> merit.

>
> Agreed, and I'm sure I've seen something similar about NASA besides
> http://sdcd.gsfc.nasa.gov/SCB/whitepaper.data_survive.html . And
> besides the Veger stuff :-)
>
> Interesting slashdot discussion, claims that disk drives go bad when
> unused:
> http://ask.slashdot.org/askslashdot/02/12/08/2238227.shtml?tid=137
>
> jg
> --
> @home.com is bogus. "There's a big difference between a backup medium
> (a copy that's probably replaced every day / week / month and is
> intended for use in the immediate future) and archival storage (a copy
> that's intended for use 5+ years in the future)....If you want
> something you can just throw in a hole and forget about, sorry – that
> media doesn't exist. " - Sunspot42.

Except, as someone pointed out in that Slashdot discussion, clay tablets.

:-)

Regards
HJR Received on Wed Sep 01 2004 - 17:46:37 CDT