By Caitlin Gordon, Senior Product Marketing Manager, EMC Backup Recovery Systems
After Tuesday’s keynotes by a couple of the most well respected CEOs in the industry (Joe Tucci and Larry Ellison), I didn’t think today could top it – but it did! Today, the focus shifted from IT transformation in general to backup transformation. This morning I discussed ‘Boosting Oracle Backup and Recovery with Data Domain’ with a passionate crowd of Oracle DBAs. Judging by the size of the crowd, it was clear that there’s a dramatic shift happening in IT and traditional backup solutions simply can’t keep up.
Back in April, we introduced Data Domain Boost for Oracle RMAN – the industry’s first solution to provide DBAs complete control of backup and disaster recovery procedures. Today was the first time we’ve discussed this technology in depth at Oracle Open World and the reception was phenomenal. DBAs from all industry’s were thrilled to hear how DD Boost is transforming Oracle backup and recovery. Specifically, we discussed:
Gaining Faster Backups, Less Server and Network Impact
Who wouldn’t want faster, more efficient backups – especially for Oracle? By distributing parts of the deduplication process to the Oracle server, DD Boost enables RMAN to send only unique data over the network. This results in 50% faster backups, reduced backup impact on the Oracle server and reduced LAN bandwidth requirements. So with the same infrastructure – you’ll be able to backup more Oracle data faster and more efficiently!
Giving DBAs Control of Replication/DR Processes
I admit it, I’m a control freak, so although DBAs aren’t all control freaks like me, I fully understand why DBAs want to control their backups. RMAN has made this quite simple with most disk targets. However, if I were a DBA, control of backup alone wouldn’t be enough! With DD Boost for RMAN, DBAs can now control replication as well – with full RMAN catalog consistency. With DD Boost, RMAN can direct Data Domain to create a second copy of the database backup, which will trigger replication to the remote site. Once the database backup has been replicated to the remote Data Domain system, the RMAN catalog will be updated with the location of that second copy. This is the only solution available that extends DBA control to DR processes eliminating the reliance on a separate infrastructure (and team) to recover Oracle data in the event of a disaster.
Simplifying Management, Keep Backups Running
As if that wasn’t enough – DD Boost also simplifies management of RMAN backups. Unlike leverage a hard NFS mount, as traditional RMAN solutions do, DD Boost enables link aggregation at the system. This enables all backup jobs to be automatically load balanced across links. In addition, if there’s network glitch or link failure, DD Boost will automatically failover the backup jobs to remaining links. This means that NFS mount failures will no longer bring down the database – Data Domain will simply failover the job seamlessly in the background. You may not even know it happened!
After reviewing the benefits of DD Boost for RMAN, we showed discussed how EMC ‘drinks our own champagne’, which I found the best part of the session (and not just because I got to sit down). Specifically, Darryl Smith showed how EMC IT gained 4x cheaper, 8x faster and 10x better Oracle backup and recovery using Data Domain. Instead of rehashing the details here, I recommend you check this out.
Today was truly energizing – it is clear that DBAs are frustrated with their current backup solutions, but excited to hear how EMC can help them. However, the most exciting part about today and Oracle OpenWorld in general is that we’re just getting started! Wrapping up 2012 and heading into 2013, we’re eager to share the DD Boost for RMAN champagne to help transform Oracle backup across the industry.
