The NIH Backup and Recovery Service (NBARS) is a facility provided by the NIH Computer Center to ensure that everyone with a personal computer or server with a TCP/IP connection has access to a convenient method of backing up and restoring data.
Failure to protect critical data by backing it up can be disastrous. The failure can be caused by a variety of reasons—not remembering to do the backup, not having a place to put the backup because a diskette doesn’t have the capacity, or not having a spare cartridge or tape. Even when backups are made, recovery of a lost file becomes difficult—if you cannot find the media with the file on it, or if you cannot wait for your LAN administrator to locate and restore the file you need.
NBARS provides a backup and restore system without these inconveniences. The backup service is automatic, NBARS has plenty of room for your files, and you have no start-up costs. So why not try the NIH Backup and Recovery Service for a month or two?
You Are in the Driver’s Seat
NBARS uses client/server technology to
back up your data over the network to a secure, central server that can
store large numbers of files. You have great flexibility in the way you
control your back ups. You can:
In addition, you can restore backed up data yourself at any time—if and when you need to. You do not need to wait for someone to locate and mount the media containing your backup. Simply select the desired file(s) from a displayed list of your backed-up files, and the data is sent to your computer across the network.
Your Backups Are in a Secure Place
NBARS uses the ADSTAR Distributed Storage Manager (ADSM) product from IBM. The ADSM server is maintained and monitored by Computer Center personnel. Backed up files are stored and protected in the secure Computer Center facility on a combination of high-capacity disks and tapes. NBARS is already being used to back up more than 500 personal computers and servers at NIH. Almost six million backed-up files containing 336 GB of data are now being safely stored for these nodes.
ADSM clients are available for a variety of platforms, including Windows, Windows 95, NT, Macintosh, and UNIX. The clients can be configured quickly to use the standard services provided by NBARS. You can also customize backup services for your group of computers by setting up a "custom" NBARS domain.
The cost of this service is charged monthly to your DCRT account. Charges are a combination of a small fee for the stored backup files ($.0015 per file per month), plus a transfer charge for any data shipped across the network for backup or restores. The transfer charge starts at $.15 per MB and decreases to $.01 per MB for larger amounts transferred—with a monthly minimum of $2.00.
Web Access to NBARS
Online registration, free client software, and a list of "Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)" are all on the NBARS webpage at http://silk.nih.gov/silk/nbars. Or you may call TASC.
If you want hands-on experience, DCRT periodically provides training courses for NBARS users and custom domain administrators. Go to DCRT’s Computer Training schedule at http://www.dcrt.nih.gov/csb/training/train.htm.