Invisible wrote:

> I'm now attempting to write a responce to them... Really struggling not 
> to be flippant here! Just how *do* you tell somebody that there ideas 
> are completely stupid in a tactful way?

I have just sent a large... 10-point email... explaining... step by 
step... in meticulous detail... precisely why I think that THIS PLAN IS 
FRIGGIN RIDICULOUS!! >_<

Sorry, I ran out of calmness at the end there. Fortunately, you can edit 
emails UNTIL you send them. ;-)




For anyone who's interested...

1. They want to keep backup tapes (even differentials) forever. (No 
regulations require this.)

2. They want to allow the vagaries of the Gregorian calendar and its 
lack of synchronisation with the 7-day week affect when our backups do 
and don't happen.

3. They want to keep the weeks' tapes in the server room until the end 
of the week.

4. They want to verify that tape restoration works by restoring a 
standardised, unchanging 0.09 KB file and performing a visual inspection 
to check that it "looks the same". (In fairness, if the backup software 
says it's restored, you can be 99% sure it's fine. Usually if there's a 
problem the software will complain that it "can't" restore the file, 
rather than restore gibberish. But even so...)

5. The order in which tapes are run is not clearly described. In fact, 
the relevant section is utterly incomprehensible. Surely *they* know 
what they meant - but *I* haven't got a clue!

6. Similarly, there's a new form to fill out - but I don't understand 
why, what does on it, or when it's meant to be done.

7. The procedure talks about "software backups". As most of you won't 
know, the regulations make a distinction between "backups" and "archive 
copies", and this document is confablating the two. The result is a most 
inappropriate procedure, which is outside the scope of the document anyway.

8. Did I mention yet that THIS PLAN IS CRAZY?!

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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