How to Back Up a Multi-User Project (Sybase)

You saw above that the project files--including the database file--could be automatically backed up by your regular tape back-up procedures as long as the project database file was not open.

However, you need a different procedure for working with multi-user database files. Because the database server program is constantly running, it constantly has the database (.db) file itself locked so that other processes, such as the tape back-up program, cannot access it. As such, you cannot copy it directly unless you stop the database server program.

One way of backing up the database while it is running is to use the Sybase Central back-up utilities to make a copy of the database and its log file. Since these copies are not in use, they are accessible to your regular tape backup or other file back-up procedures.

  1. Use the Windows Explorer to create a folder to hold the back-up copies of your database, for example, \archibus\projects\MyProjectBackup\data.
  2. Start the Sybase Central program by selecting Programs/Sybase/Adaptive Server Anywhere/Manage Adaptive Server Anywhere.
  3. Under "Utilities," select the "Backup Database" utility. Enter your database server computer name and the name of the database to back up. (This is the same name you supplied as the "-n" parameter when you started the database, e.g. "MyProject".)
  4. On the Enter Connection Parameters dialog, specify the database administrator account. By default this is user name "DBA" and password "SQL".
  5. On the Enter Backup File Location dialog, select the directory you just created in Step 1. Check the options to back up the main database and the transaction log file.

If you do not know the name assigned to your database server computer, you can find out by using the Windows Control Panel, selecting the Network options, and looking up the Computer Name value on the "Identification" tab.

  1. On the Transaction Log dialog, select the "Erase original log, start new log with original name" option.
  2. Now use your normal back-up procedure to archive the copies of your database files to tape.