The product uses many operating system and application resources that you should consider
adding to your backup and recovery procedures.
About this task
Save and restore of WebSphere® Application Server
resources uses the same IBM® i commands used for other IBM i
resources.
WebSphere Application Server resources can be saved while the product
environment is active. When backing up database data, you may have to shut down some or all services
if a snapshot cannot be obtained. This would occur if there are requests which obtain locks or have
open transactions against the database being saved. In a distributed environment, you may need to
consider how to get a consistent backup across several systems. If the data on systems is not
closely related to data on other systems, you may be able to backup each system in isolation. If you
need a snapshot across systems simultaneously, you may need to stop activity on all systems while
the snapshot is taken.
How often you back up resources depends largely on when or how often you expect them to
change.
Procedure
- Back up your product environment configuration.
This category covers the resources that define your
WebSphere Application Server operating environment. Once you have done initial
setup, this information should change very infrequently. You might backup this information only when
you change these settings, and not include these resources in regularly scheduled backups.
- Administrative configuration files
- Administrative configuration
- Servlet configuration files
- Security properties files
- HTTP configuration (see the documentation for your web server)
Avoid trouble: If you are using the IBM Installation Manager to manage
product installations, it is recommended that you backup the Installation Manager IMShared, and
DataAgent directories at the same date and time, especially before and after applying fix packs,
ifixes or any installation that is being done using the Installation Manager. Similarly if you do a
restore of your product environment configuration, it is recommended that you restore the
Installation Manager IMShared, and DataAgent directories at the same time such that the time frame
of the two restores matches.
- Back up your applications.
- Back up your application data.
This category covers the data stores used by your
WebSphere Application Server applications. Unless your applications serve only
static information, these resources are usually quite dynamic. You should back these up the same way
you back up other business data on your system. These resources are suited for inclusion in a
regularly scheduled backup.
- Servlet session data
- Enterprise bean data in a database
What to do next
If your applications are using other resources or services that are external to the product,
remember to include those in your backup plan as well.