Unix Tip: The perfect crash: Planning after the disaster

By Sandra Henry-Stocker, ITworld.com

Sadly, it is in the aftermath of a big network crash that some of us do our clearest thinking about what we should have done before the disaster struck. We might learn that, even with a powerful UPS, we can find ourselves in a situation in which a sudden loss of power leaves our computer center in the dark, our servers and networking equipment in unknown condition and us with a big problem to solve. How do we get our systems back online with some semblance of control and efficiency when we're not sure what we're starting with?

First, let's look at one scenario that could leave us in the dark. A loss of power that occurs when a UPS is in bypass (maintenance) mode will leave us nearly as unprotected as if we had no UPS at all. Alternately, if our UPS runs out of battery power after a blackout has lasted for an hour or two, we could lose power abruptly. If we are not set up with automated shutdown software, a UPS may extend the time we have before our systems crash, but will not prevent them from
crashing.

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