Backup & Archival

Backup services are intended for users whose data is stored locally on their own machines and not through CCV's RData service. Data stored through RData is automatically backed up on a nightly incremental basis.

CCV maintains a Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM) backup and archival server and associated multi-petabyte tape library (LTO-3/4 Qualstar XLS). This system is available for backup and archival of research data from campus research computing systems. Backup of administrative and instructional data is not allowed under the terms of the TSM license.

TSM has support for Linux, AIX, Solaris, Mac, and Windows clients that are installed locally on users' computing systems. Please note that CCV's backup service does not include support for installing and configuring the TSM client, nor for regular maintenance such as managing logfiles and verifying backups. These are the responsibilities of the user or the user's system administrator. 

Cost

CCV has established a fee schedule for research system backups that partially recovers the cost of the server system and tape library maintenance cost, the cost of tapes, and the staffing cost for maintaining the server hardware and software. This fee is assessed per terabyte, per month, for data resident in the backup server, based on monthly accounting data collected on the 15th of each month.

Users will have a choice of policies for backup retention, redundant tape copies, number of file versions retained, etc., and it is these characteristics along with the frequency with which disk-resident files change, rather than simply the size of the disk or its utilization, that most significantly affect backup cost.

Request service

All use of backup services is subject to the General Terms and Conditions.

To request a new client system account please submit a backup services request. You will need to provide the following information:

  • machine name (resolvable through DNS)
  • machine OS type and version
  • approximate disk space used (this will help us to plan for tape purchases)
  • cognizant systems contact, with e-mail address and phone number
  • cognizant billing contact, with e-mail address and phone number