Policies haven’t gone, they appear per server and because the UI is asset centric (per server) you do have one policy for each server. But that doesn’t mean you have to write hundreds of polices – one for each server. The BE 2012 experience includes all jobs you need to backup your server and to duplicate those data from one storage to another, i.e. disk to tape in a single policy for that server.

I’ve heard that customers are having issues when they have a bunch of servers that they want to configure in the same way … so in the past you would have written a policy and then associated it with a bunch of servers. In the new version of BE you can still do that: you can build a group and then write a policy for that group. You will still end up with a policy for each server but you won’t have to write the same policy for a hundred of servers or more. The thing is that it really isn’t that obvious how to make the group in the first place. Actually, when you think about it, it really is obvious … ctrl select!

If with a previous version of BE you had a single job that protected several (sometimes 10s – 100s of servers) when you upgrade to BE 2012 it creates a single policy into separate jobs for each server protected. If you have already migrated, should you need to change any settings you will need to make a change across all those new jobs … painful? Not at all, you can change the setting for all of your backups at the same time and end up with one job per server, but all those jobs created in a single process (just like in BE 2010) and have an identical configuration. If you want to change a configuration on a group of servers or an individual server you can do this.

If you need to do this select all the servers that have the overwrite media option set by Shift+Clicking or Ctrl+Clicking, or by selecting a containing group. This is the way you can create groups in BE 2012, so although you end up with a job per server you can still create single policies and associate with multiple assets. So you can create or change policies or configurations for multiple instances without having to go through each individual server.

One issue we are aware of and will be fixing in  a service pack coming out pretty soon, where customers had overwrite option set to “Overwrite media” prior to migration, the migration creates a new policy for each asset and every one of those new jobs will retain all the attributes of the original policy, including the “Overwrite media” setting. This will cause all of those new jobs to request new media.

To do this:

1. Create all you servers you want to amend into a single group (Ctrl+Click)
2. Click “Edit Backups” on the toolbar
3. You get a list of all the server assets you selected, click on the checkbox in the header to select all the servers
4. Select “OK” taking you into the “multi-edit” view where you can make changes across all the selected backups at one time.
5. In this case click on “edit” on the backup stage
6. Click on the Storage tab, change the media overwrite option from “Overwrite media” to “Append to media, overwrite if no appendable media is available”
7. Click on OK twice, this changes this option for all those selected servers.

This only changes that option and will not change any other changes or customisations you may have made to other server assets – cool!

So what does it really mean to modernize your backup infrastructure? How do you know if your backup infrastructure is out of date? Is it the software, hardware or network that needs updating or is it a combination of all three?

To answer these questions and more, the Backup Exec team at Symantec have teamed up with leading analyst firm ESG to bring to you the latest backup trends and give pragmatic advice on how to apply those ideas to your environment that will truly modernize your environment. On Wednesday 9th May during Symantec Vision 2012 at the MGM in Las Vegas (http://www.symantec.com/vision), Jason Buffington from ESG will be presenting on: How to modernize your backups in 2012 (session number IM B01). In this session Jason will uncover his research on the latest trends in data protection. Not only will Jason give pragmatic advice on how to apply those ideas to your environment, he’ll also uncover backup and recovery best practices that will radically improve your backup and recovery performance. From virtualization to cloud, and from dedupe to replication, Jason will squeeze everything into 55 minutes.

If you are unable to attend vision this year don’t worry! This session will be recorded so if would like to get your hands on the replay, simply reply to this post and we will send you a link to view the recording as soon as it becomes available.

In the meantime, if you have a question in relation to modernizing your backups in 2012 send it via twitter to @JBUFF. Jason will be answering these questions and more during the session.

Before I sign out, I wanted to leave you with one closing thought. While many vendors talk about modernizing backup, there is only one company who is really delivering upon that promise and that’s Symantec. If you are attending Vision, stop by the Backup Exec booth and find out how.

So, how else can we leverage this exciting technology?  Well…how about recovery?  What if I said we were talking about both physical and virtual environments?

I often speak with administrators that look for ways to simply protect their virtualized assets for the purpose full recovery in the event of disaster- i.e. their backup solution is only working to back up, but not truly embrace their virtual solution.  What if we began taking the approach of having the backup software actually begin using virtualization as a true extension of the recovery plan?  Can we take virtualization from being a resource that is typically one that is only backed up to a resource that can be leveraged as the platform for recovery for both physical and virtual servers alike?

We at Symantec say YES! …and Backup Exec 2012 is just the catalyst needed to truly and finally unite vrtual and physical environments.

Sure, the world is going virtual in a strong way but this is not something that is going to happen overnight.  Although many early adopters have moved forward to become near 100% virtualized, most administrators are still governing environments that are heavily comprised of both physical and virtual server assets.  As such, administrators need a solution that is not only purpose-built to work for their entire environment but one that takes advantage of the virtual infrastructure specifically to allow them to further leverage their IT investments.

Backup Exec 2012 is just the solution to deliver the proverbial goods.  Not only is Backup Exec 2012 offering a fresh and new user experience but also is leveraging companies’ existing virtual infrastructure for items including instant recovery of any physical or virtual server that is protected but also has the ability to leverage the cloud to recover, test or migrate any VMware virtual machine that is in your environment.  And for good measure, imagine that when it is time to migrate that physical server to a new virtual body you simply power on the virtual copy that was created and maintained as part of the standard backup of a physical server with Backup Exec 2012?  Well, its time to stop imagining- the time has come to fully realize and embrace the power and fleibility of your virtual environment- and Backup Exec 2012 is here to help you do just that.

So again I ask….have you hugged your VM lately?  If not you should- it can help you in more ways than you know!

Interested yet?  If so please take a few moments to visit us virtually on the web or in person at Symantec VISION 2012 in May to learn more about how Backup Exec 2012 can help you truly embraced your virtual infrastructure.

In the meantime, check out this short video on leveraging “No Hardware” recovery with Backup Exec 2012:

http://goo.gl/sxDWo

Planning on attending Symantec VISION US this year?  Come learn more in our BE 2012 session!

Discover the power of your virtual environments with Backup Exec 2012

Session IM B15 @ Symantec Vision 2012

MGM Grand – Las Vegas – May 7-10

http://www.symantec.com/vision/welcome/?locid=las_vegas

Come join us at VISION US and learn more about:

• How to embrace and leverage your virtual infrastructure for near-line recovery, DR and sandbox testing
• Migrating to virtual?  Learn about how to simply use your future and existing backups to make the process painless
• Need offsite DR for VM’s?  Come see how we are leveraging the cloud for DR and much more!

Power is the currency traded at Lotus F1 Team  - a company that Symantec is proud to have worked in partnership with for over 15 years and an affair set to continue into the foreseeable future.

When we say power, we’re not just referring to the engines in its cars, though for sure they are some of the most powerful in the world.  But before an engine makes it onto the track, hundreds of engineers and scientists pour thousands of hours into engineering & testing designs before completing a final blueprint. The blueprint is the real prize.  It forms the basis of the most valuable asset a business can possess – Intellectual Property.   This is the stuff that sets your business apart from competitors, which can be sold or licensed, providing an important revenue stream.

But the kind of innovation taking place on a daily basis at Lotus F1 Team produces a by-product:  Data – reams of it.  Anything not directly related to racing and winning is going to be a distraction but get sloppy with how you keep and manage data and you may as well had over the blueprints to your competitor in person. Lotus F1 Team has for example developed Wind Tunnel technology used by the company in the development and measurement of aerodynamic forces – known as Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD).  This is an area of research not only important to car racing but also to the aerospace, road and wind turbine industries and one pioneered and perfected by F1 over the years.

As well as building and driving fast cars, there’s also a commercial and business side too – all of which produces data and business processing that needs to be managed effectively, efficiently and securely.  Ultimately, the organisation needs to know its power (information, knowledge, deals and ideas) are safe and subject to the highest integrity.

This is why we work with companies like Lotus F1 Team – because we are in the business of protecting and managing data at every level so that innovators can focus on the business they are in.

Backup Exec has an entirely new user interface.  You’re going to like it – it’s simpler, more intuitive, and much easier to navigate.  We’ve also taken a lot of time to keep all those great features you are used to in previous versions of Backup
Exec – so this interface is going to appeal to the new Backup Exec user and the seasoned professional.  At-a-glance status is easily available in Backup Exec 2012, both from servers you are protecting and from the storage you are using to store your backups.  The latest version of Backup Exec is just a cleaner, more intuitive way to manage your backup and recovery environment.

We’ve also included a new way to create and manage backup jobs and policies.  No longer do you need an advanced degree in Data Protection to set up disk-to-disk-to-tape backups or replicate data between sites – the new Backup Stages feature shows you, in graphical detail, how your backup data will be transferred, when it will be backed up, and where it’s going to be transferred to.

Speaking of backups, how many of you just want to create backups to protect your critical servers and applications without any headaches?  How many of you would rather not pore over every detail of application backups?  Well, if that sounds like you, Backup Exec has made it much easier for you to set up backup jobs, because we have included some seriously intelligent defaults – based off our own expertise in data protection and by taking the most successful backup configurations from
our customers and partners – and building them into Backup Exec.  If you want to get into the nuts and bolts of backup job creation, however, Backup Exec has all the same great features and customizability you have used before – so you have the right tools to get the job done.

With Backup Exec, we’ve also stepped up our “telemetry” program – gathering non-personally identifiable information from our customers and partners who choose to participate in the program.  This gives us invaluable intelligence about how backups and restores are working in the field, and we have used that information extensively to make Backup Exec the easiest to use, full-featured data protection application for physical or virtual environments on the market.

Be one of the first to find out what other new ground breaking backup and recovery features are coming soon in Backup Exec.
Visit the Countdown to Better Backup web site here: http://bit.ly/yenx3z

By Aidan Finley … Symantec’s Aidan Finley talks about simplifying intelligent backup: http://bit.ly/vHJXoa #BetterBackup [Video]

BEDAT – What’s that?

The Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) is a utility designed to help partners demonstrate the value of Backup Exec and its deduplication technology to their customers – without having to have Backup Exec installed on the system! BEDAT scans user-selected data sets on one or more Windows-based systems in a customer’s network environment and estimates the deduplication savings that would be experienced if the same systems were protected using Backup Exec or the Backup Exec 3600 Appliance and deduplication – using the same algorithms used in BE itself. BEDAT returns global deduplication results, per resource deduplication results, and per data type deduplication results. BEDAT does not actually capture or transport any customer data during the assessment process; it only captures deduplication fingerprint information and transmits this data to be included in deduplication results.

How does it work?

The Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) installs to almost any Windows-based, x86 or x64 computer system. When run, it can calculate deduplication results for the system on which it is installed, as well as other systems available on the network. When capturing deduplication data from remote network systems, a small agent is temporarily installed to the remote servers and removed after deduplication calculations have been completed. BEDAT is designed to be as simple and as easy to use as possible. It is a wizard-driven utility that does not require any specific IT expertise to use successfully.

Who is it for?

The Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) is designed to be used by Backup Exec partners as they help customers understand the storage optimisation benefits of the deduplication technology found in Backup Exec. If you are a customer please feel free to ask your Symantec IT supplier to provide this service.

Where can Partners get it?

The Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) is available for partners to download at the Symantec PartnerNet site. For end user customers interested in using BEDAT in their environments, please contact a local Symantec partner and talk to them about how Backup Exec can help optimise your backup storage and network utilisation.

What platforms and data types are supported?

The Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) supports Windows 2003 and Windows 2008 x86 and x64 platforms, including both physical and virtual systems. It supports estimating deduplication results for file system data, Exchange data, and SQL data.

Please note: while designed to be highly accurate, the results offered by the Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool (BEDAT) represent estimates of the storage savings that would be gained by using Backup Exec deduplication technology.

In fact it’s wonder we manage to do anything given the amount of information we need to process. As a consequence we are now facing a greater threat – too much information. There are somewhere between 60 to 160 Billion mails sent around the world every single day. These emails include attachments such as reports, presentations, letters and pictures. In spite of the limitations such as privacy and too much unwanted mail, email is the best way to communicate efficiently, quickly and cheaply. The danger with email, as with any other way of sharing information, is that too much information simply clogs the system up and become a bottleneck to productivity.

Here are some useful top tips that may help:

• Understand the new business user – organisations must better understand the challenges employees are facing when navigating the world of information management. Look at when and how employees are accessing their information, make sure that data is indexed and categorised, and that intelligent archiving and search tools are available
• Prepare the infrastructure – with the relentless flow of information only set to continue, IT infrastructure must be able to cost effectively manage the increasing requirements for storage by implementing solutions able to dedupe and archive appropriately, automate processes and monitor and report on system status across all different devices and environments
• Prepare people – create IT policies that educate employees on how to manage their information – from email practices like limiting the ‘CC’ and ‘reply to all culture’, to saving only the latest document version and overcoming the fear of the delete button. Help employees understand the company’s information retention strategy so they know what information is recoverable. This will empower them to take charge of information control and maintain productivity and efficiency
• Keep security front of mind – it seems like an obvious statement, but reinforcing company security policies around mobile devices could protect against significant and damaging data loss. Make sure employees know the company processes and take advantage of technologies that enable the IT department to see where the most important information is, at all times
• Encourage staff to switch off – with the information era in full swing and with more and more opportunity for employees to stay connected at all times, it’s important that organisations support staff welfare and encourage them to switch off every once in a while

Seriously consider optimising your storage to reduce overall front end storage usage. Improving capacity can be done through integrated archiving and deduplication as well as tiering your storage. Archiving moves old data to a separate store so you don’t have to backup the same data day-in, day-out – forever. Deduplication only backs up data (at a block level) once, using a pointer to the unique data. So you can both reduce the amount you backup as well as dramatically reducing your backup window with archiving and data deduplication.

But, I hear you say, if I implement deduplication technology what are the benefits? Well, Backup Exec can help with that too. Read all about the Backup Exec Deduplication Assessment Tool in Part III.

Accessing work information out of hours, compulsively checking emails, texts and social media and hoarding endless emails and multiple versions of the same file are all symptoms of information overload experienced by those we surveyed. See the stats here.

But whereas the technology enabling us to do this (fantastic mobile devices and faster connectivity) all purport to make us more productive in the workplace, is our mismanagement of information actually counter-productive?

IDC has recently estimated that in 2011 over 1.8 Zetabytes of information was created and replicated (IDC, “The 2011 Digital Universe Study: Extracting Value from Chaos”) and if we go by Moore’s Law this will continue to grow almost immeasurably over the coming years. What does this mean for our state of mind and the systems we work with – will we reach a moment when we are essentially ‘drowning’ in information?

Not if the technologies that store and manage information also continue to improve. We are working very hard to make managing information easier, faster and more efficient for businesses of all sizes. This means making sure that what is actually useful and valuable is stored, archived and backed up correctly, while the rest is relegated to permanent deletion.

But technology can only go so far, some of the onus is still on businesses and individuals to moderate their work behaviour to take into account this new work paradigm.

Part II – What can we do about it?

• Unite Virtual and Physical: Powered by Symantec V-Ray technology, Backup Exec 2012 enables visibility across both virtual and physical environments for fast and efficient backup and recovery while eliminating the need for specialised point products.
• Eliminate Backup Complexity with a New Administration Console: A newly redesigned administration console will provide users with fast, concise management and monitoring capabilities.
• Integrated Disaster Recovery: With bare-metal disaster recovery and Backup Exec’s “no hardware DR” built in, organizations will be able to easily recover a failed system to a physical server, or to a Hyper-V or VMware guest.
• Capacity Licensing: New capacity licensing model for Managed Service Providers (MSPs), mid-sized and lower enterprise organizations will provide easier purchasing and maintenance by capacity as an alternative to existing a la carte pricing.
• Small Business Edition: In less than 10 minutes and with just three simple steps, Backup Exec 2012 Small Business Edition will install and configure backups so small businesses with limited IT experience can protect their data with ease.  The new Backup Exec Small Business Edition will bundle Symantec’s data and system recovery technology into one affordable solution with a single license that’s designed specifically for a growing business.

I’ve been meaning to do this forever but now I am delighted to announce the newly available website. Launched at VISION EMEA, Barcelona 4-6 October, in a nutshell, this is Backup Exec Guide “Made Simple”. For customers, partners … anyone interested in backup frankly, it drills into each Agent or Option and explains what it does.

This publication is designed to give an overview of Backup Exec 2010 R3. It is aimed at all professionals working in or with Symantec Backup Exec and Symantec System Recovery to improve general knowledge of Symantec’s Data Protection strategy and wider Information Management capabilities. Using this document you should be able to build availability solutions and data protection strategies for all types of organisation.

Maximise the potential of Symantec Backup Exec

Whether you want to go straight to Agents & Options or whether you want to search by Backup priority including Virtualization, Storage Management, Disaster Recovery, Application Recovery or Management & Platform Support, there is a route for you.

The portable website has been designed to be accessed in multiple ways. We will shortly be announcing the BE Guide Mobile App available for iPhone, iPad and Android. More-to-follow.

Find out which Backup Exec Agents and Options are right for your business using this new interactive guide – simply click either to select a business priority or view our complete list of Agents and Options – simple, easy and effective – have a play today.

Adding to the Guide all the time

We will be adding content to the guide as we go – this will be of a technical nature to keep an eye out for updates.