Knowledge (XXG)

Continuous availability

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61:. This is a measure of the reliability of the hardware, operating system, middleware, and database manager software. Another measure of high availability is the ability to minimize the effect of an unplanned outage by masking the outage from the end users. This can be accomplished by providing redundancy or quickly restarting failed components. 131:
are deliberate and are scheduled at a convenient time. These involve such activities as: - Hardware installation or maintenance - Software maintenance or upgrades of the operating system, the middleware, the database server or the business application - Database administration such as offline backup,
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Solutions to continuous availability exists in different forms and implementations depending on the software and hardware manufacturer. The goal of the discipline is to reduce the user or business application downtime, which can have a severe impact on business operations. Inevitably, such downtime
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refers to the ability to avoid planned outages. For continuous operation there must be ways to perform necessary administrative work, like hardware and software maintenance, upgrades, and platform refreshes while the business application remains available to the end users. This is accomplished by
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providing multiple servers and switching end users to an available server at times when one server is made unavailable. Note that a system running in continuous operation is not necessarily operating with high availability because an excessive number of unplanned outages could compromise this.
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and application design that protects users against downtime, whatever the cause and ensures that users remain connected to their documents, data files and business applications. Continuous availability describes the information technology methods to ensure
35:, global access to online business transactions and business-to-business communication, continuous availability is increasingly important based on the need to support customer access to information systems. 120:
combines the characteristics of high availability and continuous operation to provide the ability to keep the business application running without any noticeable downtime.
51:, continuous operation, and continuous availability are generally used to express how available a system is. The following is a definition of each of these terms. 138:
are unexpected outages that are caused by the failure of any system component. They include hardware failures, software issues, or people and process issues.
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can lead to loss of productivity, loss of revenue, customer dissatisfaction and ultimately can damage a company's reputation.
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US Patent 5027269, "Method and apparatus for providing continuous availability of applications in a computer network", 1991;
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Business Continuity: Delivering Data and Applications Through Continuous Availability, A META Group White Paper, June 2003
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High availability (again) versus continuous availability, IBM WebSphere Developer Technical Journal, April 14, 2010
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In early days of computing, availability was not considered business critical. With the increasing use of
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Gartner Survey Shows IT Availability Remain Top Priorities for U.S. IT Services Buyers, September 2010
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Various commercially viable examples exist for hardware/software implementations. These include:
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When defining such a percentage it needs to be specified if it applies to the hardware, the
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Bob Dickerson: Service Recovery & Availability, IEEE Computer Society, 2010 Meeting
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Availability is usually expressed as a percentage of uptime in a given year:
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TechRepublic: IT should establish realistic availability requirements
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refers to the ability to avoid unplanned outages by eliminating
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itSM Solutions Newsletter December 2006: The Paradox of the 9s
8: 328:Business Continuity for SAP on IBM System z 66: 239: 323:Continuous Availability for SharePoint 7: 107:or the business application on top. 333:Reliability and Availability Basics 14: 1: 318:Continuous Availability Blog 208:Business continuity planning 375: 228:Service Availability Forum 132:or offline reorganization 218:High-availability cluster 191:Tandem NonStop Computers 59:single points of failure 118:Continuous availability 43:Degrees of availability 17:Continuous availability 223:Fault-tolerant system 176:IBM Parallel Sysplex 111:Continuous operation 26:business continuity 313:Continuity Central 252:2012-04-25 at the 73:Downtime per year 19:is an approach to 213:Disaster recovery 136:Unplanned outages 105:IT infrastructure 101: 100: 55:High availability 49:high availability 366: 359:Computer systems 300: 295: 289: 284: 278: 273: 267: 262: 256: 244: 124:Types of outages 67: 33:mobile computing 374: 373: 369: 368: 367: 365: 364: 363: 349: 348: 309: 304: 303: 296: 292: 285: 281: 274: 270: 263: 259: 254:Wayback Machine 245: 241: 236: 204: 144: 129:Planned outages 126: 45: 21:computer system 12: 11: 5: 372: 370: 362: 361: 351: 350: 347: 346: 340: 335: 330: 325: 320: 315: 308: 307:External links 305: 302: 301: 290: 279: 268: 257: 238: 237: 235: 232: 231: 230: 225: 220: 215: 210: 203: 200: 199: 198: 193: 188: 183: 178: 173: 168: 163: 158: 153: 143: 140: 125: 122: 99: 98: 95: 91: 90: 87: 83: 82: 79: 75: 74: 71: 44: 41: 13: 10: 9: 6: 4: 3: 2: 371: 360: 357: 356: 354: 345: 341: 339: 336: 334: 331: 329: 326: 324: 321: 319: 316: 314: 311: 310: 306: 299: 294: 291: 288: 283: 280: 277: 272: 269: 266: 261: 258: 255: 251: 248: 243: 240: 233: 229: 226: 224: 221: 219: 216: 214: 211: 209: 206: 205: 201: 197: 194: 192: 189: 187: 184: 182: 181:MariaDB Xpand 179: 177: 174: 172: 169: 167: 164: 162: 159: 157: 154: 152: 149: 148: 147: 141: 139: 137: 133: 130: 123: 121: 119: 115: 112: 108: 106: 96: 93: 92: 88: 85: 84: 80: 77: 76: 72: 70:Availability 69: 68: 65: 62: 60: 56: 52: 50: 42: 40: 36: 34: 29: 27: 22: 18: 293: 282: 271: 260: 242: 145: 135: 134: 128: 127: 117: 116: 110: 109: 102: 63: 54: 53: 46: 37: 30: 16: 15: 166:CockroachDB 81:8.76 hours 234:References 196:YugabyteDB 156:BitTorrent 97:5 minutes 47:The terms 353:Category 250:Archived 202:See also 94:99.999% 186:Stratus 171:Dovecot 142:History 89:1 hour 86:99.99% 78:99.9% 161:Ceph 151:BIND 344:IBM 28:. 355::

Index

computer system
business continuity
mobile computing
high availability
single points of failure
IT infrastructure
BIND
BitTorrent
Ceph
CockroachDB
Dovecot
IBM Parallel Sysplex
MariaDB Xpand
Stratus
Tandem NonStop Computers
YugabyteDB
Business continuity planning
Disaster recovery
High-availability cluster
Fault-tolerant system
Service Availability Forum

Archived
Wayback Machine



itSM Solutions Newsletter December 2006: The Paradox of the 9s
Continuity Central
Continuous Availability Blog

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