War Games

A few months ago a server crashed and took down two blogs that I read.  Within a short time, years of hard work had come down to one thing, a simple backup that did not exist for either of these blogs.  This event was so catastrophic that the International Backup Awareness Day was declared in remembrance.  It made thousands of developers, including me, question their backup/recovery strategies.  The “what if’s” played through my head for days.  Unlike Phil and Jeff, I would not be lucky enough to pull my data from users’ cache or old virtual hard drives.  Even the SEO Toolkit would be of little help. My room for error is thin and failure would definitely lead to my demise.

I needed a good evaluation of my existing backup plan.  The US military conducts War Games to test scenarios, theories, and battle plans.  Taking from this, I decided to conduct my own War Games to test my disaster recovery/prevention strategy.

Scenario 1: Server Failure – FAILED

REQUIREMENT: If the server should fail, I would be able to restore the database on another server, loosing less than 1 hour of data.

To test this, I “pretended” my server was shutdown.  Many will ask, “How did you fail this?”  To be fair, I did have a backup from offsite storage.  However, it was more than my required limit of 1 hour or less.  This or any other lame ass excuse is not good enough.  I would be in a tight spot trying to explain why the past four hours of transactions were lost.

I run regular backups of my databases.  Where I went wrong was not having a recent backup somewhere other than the database server.  Since our offsite storage solution allows me to schedule a pickup, it would be easy to use it for this.  I think there are better solutions that would cost less money and be more accessible to those that might need these backups.

Currently I am using Microsoft's Sync Toy to sync a shared folder with the database server’s backup folder.  The backups are small and take very little bandwidth on a 10gb network.  This is not my ideal method, but it works with the time constraints I have now.

Another option is to setup Microsoft SQL Server to save the backups to a shared folder.  This requires MSSQL to run under an account that has READ/WRITE privileges to the shared folder.  This seems to be a simple solution.

Scenario 2: Server Failure - FAILED

REQUIREMENT: If the server should fail, someone other than me would be able to restore the database on another server, loosing less than 1 hour of data.

There is a chance that you might not be available when something happens.  To cover your ass as well as provide a second line of defense, it is important that your disaster recovery/prevention plan be readily accessible to key players in your organization.  Besides being accessible, your plan needs to provide useful information and instructions.

At a minimum your disaster recovery/prevention plan should include:
1. List of databases and the applications they support
2. Ordered list of who is responsible for getting the databases up and running with at least two contact numbers for each
3. Details of where the backups are located
4. Detailed instructions on how to restore the databases from backups

I failed this scenario because I did not have a document that my organization’s key players could access.   I have discussed changes in backup plans with my boss as well as the IT department.  However, these conversations will likely be forgotten when the shit hits the fan.

To say the least, I did not fare so well on these two scenarios.  Yes there are many other scenarios to play against.  But these were the two that I assume would be the most beneficial.  In the spirit of actual military War Games, my organization’s key players will take part in future games, acting in response to possible real world events extending beyond just database recovery.  At least that’s my plan.  It will definetly require active participation from key players and IT.  Surely they will see the benefits from testing what you set to do.

Open Command Prompt Here

Navigating through folders from the command prompt is a pain.  I would rather browse the directories using point and click via Windows Explorer then open the command prompt from there.  The Windows 7 dev team made plenty of improvements, but somehow overlooked this.  All you have to do is:

1. Open RegEdit
2. Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Folder\shell].
   1. Alternatively you can also add the key to [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell].
3. Add a key and name it cmd.
4. Set the default value to something descriptive like “Open Command Prompt Here”.
5. Add a key under the cmd key you just created and name it command.
6. Set the value of the default value to cmd.exe /k cd %1

This has been as valuable as being able to open a folder as a VS web site from windows explorer.

Comparison of Date Ranges

A tricky problem that arises is figuring out if Item-B is available between 11:00 and 12:00 on a given day. If Item-B is not checked out at all you don’t have a problem. But what if it was checked out from 8:00 to 11:15 or 9:00 to 16:00?

Table1

Item	Start	End
Book	7/26/2009 8:00	7/26/2009 16:00
Pencil	7/26/2009 6:00	7/26/2009 20:00
Paper	7/26/2009 10:00	7/26/2009 14:00
Eraser	7/26/2009 6:00	7/26/2009 13:00
Ruler	7/26/2009 12:00	7/26/2009 18:00

Lasse Karlsen provided an excellent solution and explanation in this StackOverflow question.

If I wanted to see what was checked out between 11:00 and 12:00 from Table1 I would use:

select *
from Table1
where Table1.Start <= @end
  and Table1.End >= @start

Debt Consolidation

A few months ago I read The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey.  In case you have not read it and/or do not plan to: the book provides common sense strategies to get out of debt and remain debt free.  I’m not in financial despair.  But you never know when you will wake up and find yourself sleeping in your car. 

Shortly after reading the book I read Jeff Atwood’s article on technical debt.   Finally I had a way to tell my boss why I cringe every time someone wants to add or tweak something.  Finally there was a way that everybody can relate to.  She understood completely.  Of course the first question was How?  A light burst in my head.  In great excitement I went over Dave’s plan.

Dave’s method is fairly simple in theory.  You list all your debt.  Things that are due now go on top.  Under these items you list your debt from the least to the most money you owe.  Once you have your list you start with #1.  The other items you pay your minimum.  #1 gets every extra cent you can pinch out.  Sale the lawnmower if you have to.  Once #1 is paid off you take that payment and add it to the minimum payment for #2.  You keep collapsing the list in this manner until you are debt free.  The most important thing is that you do not acquire additional debt through this process.  The reason you list your debt from least owed to most is the belief that you will accomplish one goal, get excited, and continue on accomplishing these goals.

This is perfect for the technical debt I have.  Using Covey’s quadrants I can prioritize my debt to find what has to be paid today.  Next in line will be the 10-minute fixes followed by the 16-hour fixes and so on.  Once my list is complete I can work to remain debt free.

Open Folder as VS Web Site

Thank you Brad for this.
From VS go Tools --> Macros IDE
Right click My Macros
Add new module named WebSite
Add reference to VsWebSite.Interop.dll
Copy the following into the the WebSite module


Sub OpenWebsite(Optional ByVal path As String = "")
If (String.Compare(path, String.Empty) = 0) Then
MsgBox("Must supply a folder path to the OpenWebsite macro",
MsgBoxStyle.OkOnly)
Else
Dim webPkg As VsWebSite.VSWebPackage
webPkg = DTE.GetObject("WebPackage")
webPkg.OpenWebSite(path,
VsWebSite.OpenWebsiteOptions.OpenWebsiteOption_None,
False)
End If
End Sub


Create a new file named OpenWebSite.reg

Copy the following into this file:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Folder\shell\OpenVSWeb]
 @="Open as Visual Studio Website"
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Folder\shell\OpenVSWeb\command]
 @="devenv.exe /command \\\"Macros.MyMacros.Website.OpenWebsite %1\\\"" 

Double click on OpenWebSite.reg

WSS 3.0 Installation

I recently installed WSS 3.0 on my laptop that is running Server 2008. By default the installation installed the databases in Windows Internal Database which is not what I wanted. I want the tables running SQL Server 2008 instance and I want them named WSS_Config and WSS_AdminContent. Here's how to do it.

1. If you have not done so already, add C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\bin to the path System Variable. This is a must if you plan to work with SharePoint.
   
2. run psconfig.exe -cmd configdb -create -server SQLServerInstanceName -database WSS_Config -admincontentdatabase WSS_AdminContent
3. Administrative Tools ---> SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard

After this completes goto Administrative Tools ----> SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration to create a new site or upgrade an existing web app.

Intro...

A spot in case I have something to say.