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The Shortcut Guide To tm PC Restoration and Disaster Recovery sponsored by Mark Scott Introduction Introduction to Realtimepublishers by Don Jones, Series Editor For several years, now, Realtime has produced dozens and dozens of high-quality books that just happen to be delivered in electronic format—at no cost to you, the reader. We've made this unique publishing model work through the generous support and cooperation of our sponsors, who agree to bear each book's production expenses for the benefit of our readers. Although we've always offered our publications to you for free, don't think for a moment that quality is anything less than our top priority. My job is to make sure that our books are as good as—and in most cases better than—any printed book that would cost you $40 or more. 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Don Jones i Table of Contents Introduction to Realtimepublishers.................................................................................................. i Chapter 1: Anatomy of a PC Desktop..............................................................................................1 User Perspective...............................................................................................................................3 Organizing Data Files ..........................................................................................................3 Data Sprawl..............................................................................................................4 Preserving User Information....................................................................................4 Organizing Configuration Data............................................................................................6 Identifying Hidden Data ..........................................................................................6 Preserving Hidden Data ...........................................................................................7 Organizing the Toolset.........................................................................................................7 Planning for Toolset Restoration .............................................................................7 Executing Toolset Restoration.................................................................................8 Organizing the Personal Space ............................................................................................8 Technician Perspective ....................................................................................................................9 Hardware and Firmware ......................................................................................................9 The Challenge of Knowing What You Have.........................................................10 Managing the Hardware Tangle.............................................................................10 Device Drivers ...................................................................................................................11 The Dilemma of Drivers ........................................................................................11 Dealing with the Driver Dilemma..........................................................................12 OS and Patches ..................................................................................................................13 OS Challenges........................................................................................................13 Restoring the OS ....................................................................................................13 Applications and Patches ...................................................................................................14 Application and Patch Creep .................................................................................14 Restoring the Application Stack ............................................................................15 Personal Configuration and Data .......................................................................................15 Capturing the Configurations and Data .................................................................15 Restoration of the Data ..........................................................................................16 Security and Compliance ...............................................................................................................16 Information Security ..........................................................................................................17 Securing Critical Data............................................................................................17 Restoring Secured Data..........................................................................................17 ii Table of Contents Operational Security ..........................................................................................................18 Locking Down the Network...................................................................................18 Restoring a Secure Desktop ...................................................................................19 Regulatory Compliance .....................................................................................................19 How Computers Become Noncompliant ...............................................................19 Restoration and Regulatory Compliance ...............................................................20 IT Management..............................................................................................................................20 Policies...............................................................................................................................21 User Policies ..........................................................................................................21 Technician Policies ............................................................................................................22 Processes ............................................................................................................................22 Backup Processes...................................................................................................23 Restoration Processes.............................................................................................23 Personnel............................................................................................................................24 Products..............................................................................................................................24 Chapter 2: PC Life Cycle Management .........................................................................................26 Planning the Hardware Life Cycle.................................................................................................27 Why Do Desktop Hardware Platforms Change? ...............................................................28 Projecting Hardware Change .............................................................................................29 Restoring Desktops on New or Changed Hardware ..........................................................31 Extending the Life of the Platform ................................................................................................32 Repairing Component Failure............................................................................................32 Simple Component Replacement...........................................................................33 Motherboard Replacement.....................................................................................34 Hard Drive Replacement........................................................................................34 Upgrading to Improve Performance ..................................................................................35 Enhancing with New Components.....................................................................................35 Recycling Hardware for New Users ..................................................................................36 Desktop Re-Platforming ................................................................................................................37 Meeting User Needs...........................................................................................................38 Integrating New Features and Capabilities ........................................................................39 Moving From One Standard Desktop Computer to Another.................................40 Moving to a New Form Factor...............................................................................41 iii Table of Contents Managing the Process ........................................................................................................41 Recent, Reliable Backups ......................................................................................42 Determining Desktop Restoration Needs...............................................................42 Executing the Restoration ......................................................................................43 Tracking the Process ..............................................................................................43 Lessons Learned.................................................................................................................43 Create a Knowledge Base ......................................................................................43 Analyze the Process ...............................................................................................43 Work with the Products .........................................................................................44 Managing the Hardware Life Cycle...............................................................................................44 Policies...............................................................................................................................45 Processes ............................................................................................................................45 Personnel............................................................................................................................46 Products..............................................................................................................................47 Summary ........................................................................................................................................47 Chapter 3: Software Life Cycle Management ...............................................................................48 Planning the Software Life Cycle ..................................................................................................49 Predicting Software Change ..............................................................................................50 Identifying Reasons for Change.............................................................................51 Planning for Desktop Changes...........................................................................................54 Service Pack and Security Patches ........................................................................54 Version Upgrades...................................................................................................55 Protecting the Investments.................................................................................................56 Perfecting the Process ........................................................................................................58 Changing Applications...................................................................................................................58 Adding Applications ..........................................................................................................59 Single Desktop Installations ..................................................................................60 Multiple Desktop Installations...............................................................................60 Removing Software ...........................................................................................................61 Removing Applications .........................................................................................61 Retrieving Obsolete Applications ..........................................................................62 Replacing Software............................................................................................................62 Data Format Conversion ........................................................................................62 iv Table of Contents Application Interoperability...................................................................................63 OS Upgrades ..................................................................................................................................63 Securing the Existing OS ...................................................................................................64 Replacing the OS ...............................................................................................................65 Preserving the Personality of the Desktop .........................................................................65 Managing the Software Life Cycle ................................................................................................66 Policy .................................................................................................................................67 Process ...............................................................................................................................67 Personnel............................................................................................................................68 Product ...............................................................................................................................68 Summary ........................................................................................................................................69 Chapter 4: Managing the Disaster Recovery Process ....................................................................70 Planning for Disaster......................................................................................................................71 Identifying the Risks ..........................................................................................................72 File-Level Risks .....................................................................................................73 Software-Level Risks.............................................................................................74 Hardware-Level Risks ...........................................................................................74 Site-Level Risks .....................................................................................................74 Mitigating Desktop Disaster Risks ....................................................................................75 Mitigating File-Level Risks ...................................................................................75 Mitigating Software-Level Risks...........................................................................75 Mitigating Hardware-Level Risks..........................................................................76 Mitigating Site-Level Risks ...................................................................................76 Designing a Solution..........................................................................................................76 Evaluating the Risks ..............................................................................................77 Choosing Mitigation Strategies..............................................................................78 Refining the Solution .............................................................................................78 Implementing the Solution.............................................................................................................79 Desktop Restoration Infrastructure ........................................................................80 Packages.................................................................................................................81 Agents ....................................................................................................................81 Desktop Backup .................................................................................................................82 User Policy.............................................................................................................82 v Table of Contents Resource Utilization...............................................................................................82 Archive Policy .......................................................................................................83 Restoring the Desktop........................................................................................................83 File Restoration......................................................................................................83 Application Re-Installation....................................................................................84 Hardware Changes .................................................................................................84 Administrate the Solution ..............................................................................................................84 Monitoring .............................................................................................................85 Desktop Backup Monitoring..................................................................................86 Infrastructure Monitoring.......................................................................................86 Organizational Changes .........................................................................................88 Leverage the Solution ....................................................................................................................89 Inventory ............................................................................................................................90 Distribution ............................................................................................................90 Compliance ............................................................................................................90 Summary ........................................................................................................................................90 vi Copyright Statement Copyright Statement © 2007 Realtimepublishers.com, Inc. 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Realtimepublishers.com and the Realtimepublishers logo are registered in the US Patent & Trademark Office. All other product or service names are the property of their respective owners. If you have any questions about these terms, or if you would like information about licensing materials from Realtimepublishers.com, please contact us via e-mail at firstname.lastname@example.com. vii Chapter 1 [Editor's Note: This eBook was downloaded from Realtime Nexus—The Digital Library. All leading technology guides from Realtimepublishers can be found at http://nexus.realtimepublishers.com.] Chapter 1: Anatomy of a PC Desktop Most of you reading this document are sitting in front of your personal computer (PC). For most users, that computer is an integral part of their work environment, often more important than their desk, office, file cabinet, or any other accoutrement found in their workspace. According to Gartner Dataquest, over a billion PCs have been sold, with that number expected to double by 2008 (Source: As cited by BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2077986.stm). Most users have, at one time or another, had their PC fail. The cost of recovering from a failure in terms of lost productivity, permanently lost data, frustration, and loss of credibility is difficult to quantify. The challenge to Information Technology (IT) groups is to keep all those computers running safe and secure. This task can be overwhelming. Most of the information that keeps an organization running is scattered on hundreds or thousands of hard drives. They are located in different offices, regions, and countries. Although it is challenging to copy this information, the backup of these computers can save untold man-hours and hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost productivity and the preservation of irreplaceable data. This guide seeks to develop a framework to help the reader understand the issues. That understanding can help organizations develop a PC backup and restoration system that saves money, preserves employee productivity, reduces frustrations, and helps the entire organization operate more consistently and predictably. The purpose of this guide is to help IT departments develop a realistic approach to protecting the data on the PC desktops in their organizations. Each desktop—whether a mini tower sitting under a desk, a laptop, or some other form factor hardware—is actually an ecosystem of interrelated hardware, firmware, software, and data. This guide will look at these interrelated layers and examine the challenges of protecting their contents and restoring them quickly so that users can remain as productive as possible. This guide is organized into four chapters: • Anatomy of a PC Desktop dissects the PC by examining it from different viewpoints to determine what it contains and what should be protected and preserved. This helps determine the requirements for a PC restoration and disaster recovery plan. • PC Hardware Life Cycle considers the maintenance of the hardware platform from repair of failed components through upgrades to platform replacement. It includes re- tasking platforms for other uses and migration of desktops from one platform to another in a effective manner. • Software Life Cycle looks at maintaining operating systems (OSs) and applications. It provides guidelines for maintaining patches and securing software. The chapter looks at moving a personal desktop from one standard to another as people switch roles. It also addresses major upgrades. • Planning for Disaster Recovery provides guidelines for developing a practical, effective system for backing up critical data from individual PCs and creating a system by which those backups can restore individual worker productivity in minimal time. 1 Chapter 1 There is a tendency to think of a PC as an integral unit. But the PC consists of a variety of individual subsystems that work together to provide services to the end users. Like many multi- faceted objects, it is often best to view it from different perspectives. This guide will attempt to envision the PC desktop from four primary perspectives. Figure 1.1: The desktop can be viewed from many perspectives. Each perspective shows distinct challenges and options when that desktop requires restoration. Users see the desktop as a microcosm of their world. It is often a mixture of work requirements and personal life. They depend on this environment to get their jobs done. They store data, credentials, and pathways to the information they need to operate effectively. Technicians see the desktop as an eclectic collection of parts that must work together to provide the familiar services that the end user expects. Having an accurate view of the individual parts that make up a desktop and access its critical installation components and configuration data can facilitate the maintenance of the desktop. Those responsible for security and compliance care that critical data is saved and protected. They also care that the desktop environment is protected from unwanted viruses, spyware, and other incursions. IT management faces the challenge of managing hundreds or thousands of desktops scattered throughout the country or the world. They set policy for the Help desk and technicians, answer to Legal for licensing, provide for the requirements of security, and ultimately are responsible to keep the desktop serving the user. 2 Chapter 1 User Perspective If you talk to an average user, they think of their PC desktop as a physical entity. A laptop or desktop system unit they use every day. But if you talk to them more, they really consider the desktop to be the programs, data, connection options, and other elements that they often cannot even define. The desktop to them is really an environment in which they do their work. If you look at the desktop environment like an office, it starts to become clearer what makes the desktop important to the user: • The desktop contains the files that users create as part of their jobs • The desktop contains configurations to get to the services of the network • The desktop contains the tools that lets users do their jobs • The desktop contains personal customizations that keep them productive Figure 1.2: Users tend to see the desktop as a unified entity. They are often unaware of the different areas they configure and customize as they make the desktop their own. Organizing Data Files People organize information differently. Some people are quite particular about the way their files are organized with every scrap of paper in a properly labeled document, tucked neatly away in a drawer. Others want to keep an eye on things, so they buy bins and organizers, but leave the data where they can see it. Some just place papers in stack. Still others do not take care of their data, and perform endless searches for that scrap they distinctly remember seeing at some point in time. 3 Chapter 1 Data Sprawl Storing information on a computer hard drive is really no different. Some people quickly learn to organize the data on their drive into a complex array of folders. They carefully name their files and always know where they saved them. Many people will allow each application to determine where the data gets stored. They often rely on the "Recently Used" functionality of a program and struggle if they want to find an older file. A number of users will store the files they are working on right on their desktop, just the way they would a physical file. They can see it and it makes it easy to access via a simple click. Microsoft has recognized the challenge of managing data sprawl. The company created a Documents and Settings folder where all user documents can be placed. They have been adding to the folder structure with each subsequent releases of the operating system (OS), providing greater granularity to the standard folders for storing information. They enhanced that in Windows Vista, reorganizing the folder structure to include specific folders for Contacts, Cookies, the Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Favorites, Links, Music, Pictures, and so on. The goal is to help standardize where people and programs look for data. Applications must also establish a default location for storing data. Many applications create their own data directories, either adding special folders to the user directories available in Windows or storing data in subfolders of the directory in which the program is installed. The problem has become so ubiquitous that Microsoft, Google, and others provide software that maintains an index of all the files on your computer, including their names, content, and meta- data properties, just to help users find their files. Computer performance is impacted as these indexing programs search through the drive trying to find bits of data. Preserving User Information IT faces the task of finding a consist method of backing up the data in a manner that makes sense. For PC backup, there are three common approaches. Imaging technology With this method, imaging technology is used to make a complete copy of the user's hard drive. The copy should be exact, so restoration of the user's data (and for that matter, everything on the PC) is relatively straightforward. It is often considered the simplest method for restoration. Windows comes with a built-in utility that provides this type of functionality. There are some issues with the method that should be considered, however. This method copies all files indiscriminately. If there are 100 desktops that each have the same basic OS and application install, and that installation takes 5GB of space, then backing up a complete image of each hard drive means copying 495GB of redundant data. That consumes storage and bandwidth on the network. Since image copies grab the entire disk, not just the incremental changes to the hard drive, they are often too resource intensive to be practical. 4 Chapter 1 In addition, this method assumes a restoration to the same hardware platform. The data includes everything (OS, device drivers, and user data), so switching to a different computer can create difficulties in repairing and resetting the OS and device drivers to run on the new machine. Also, if any critical files are locked during the backup, they will be missing when restored. This can result in a non-functioning application or OS. Finally, the movement of data from one OS to another (such as moving from Windows XP to Windows Vista) may require the relocation of user data. With an image restore, it can be impossible to isolate and relocate that data. Centralized User Data File Storage This method requires users, by policy, to store all critical data on a centralized repository that is maintained by IT. File servers are ubiquitous and easy to set up and maintain. More sophisticated document management systems—such as Microsoft SharePoint, FileNet, Documentum, and others—attempt to make central storage of documents an extension of the application. They add value by versioning and organizing files to make them easier to share. The data is available from any computer, and can be shared with a group of users to facilitate collaboration. The company can declare that any data stored locally is considered at risk. If the data is not centrally stored, it will be lost if the desktop is lost. This approach is centrally managed and thus relatively easy and cost effective to implement. It does, however, have key deficiencies to consider. This approach requires the user to be connected to the network to gain access to the central storage location. As mobile workforce and PCs become more prevalent, this becomes an increasingly less-attractive option. In addition, there is no way to automate or enforce the policy without strict compliance from users. Applications may have options and add-ins that make central storage easy, but almost all of them require some user capitulation and most can be bypassed. There is often a lot of data that users do not want placed on public shares, from confidential information to work-in-progress to unclassified research. Although this is not good data to store centrally, it does help the user remain productive. User Data File Backups User data file backups identify the user data files and store them separate from the OS and program files. The Easy Transfer utility found in Microsoft Vista is a form of this type of backup. By collecting the data separately, there is no need to copy redundant OS and application files. The data can be redirected to the appropriate location on a target computer. It can easily be moved from one computer to another. Using this method requires some careful consideration. The backup must be able to locate user files. Files stored in locations other than those expected can be missed. And the backup system must have the ability to distinguish between user data files and program files. 5 Chapter 1 Organizing Configuration Data The desktop is the primary gateway by which the user connects to their workplace electronically. It inevitably collects a wide variety of personal bits of data to help the user find and leverage the resources within their corporate network: • Database connections, cached credentials, and special software for connecting to servers on the intranet • Hyperlinks and cookies that help users work with sites on the Internet • Contact lists, personal mail folders, and account credentials for accessing colleagues electronically • Certificates, virtual private networks (VPNs), and security configurations • Connections to printers, faxes, scanners, and other shared network resources Identifying Hidden Data The issue with most of this data is that the user depends upon it but is seldom aware of the dependency. For instance, a user can create dozens of Open Database Connectivity Data Source Names (ODBC DSNs) that allow Excel to connect to databases operating within the enterprise. Saving the spreadsheets without the DSNs will mean this data cannot be refreshed. The burden of recreating the DSNs my be quite time consuming, especially if the spreadsheet owner did not define them in the first place and has no idea which server to which they connect or the credentials presented to that server. As Internet and intranet technology has become more popular, mission-critical applications are increasingly deployed through Web pages. A user builds a collection of these Web sites in their favorites (or worse yet, their browser history). They create an account and check "Remember Me" so that their credentials are stored in a cookie on their browsers. It is not good security or operational policy to maintain connections or security credentials this way, but the reality is, many users are completely dependent on their browser and cookie state. If they lose that state, they will spend a great deal of unproductive time replacing that lost data. Email, instant messages, and peer sharing programs are becoming foundational to collaboration within organizations. This type of personal information can be easy to protect. Email can be stored on central mail servers, along with contact lists. Most instant massaging programs store "buddy" lists on the server as well. Peer sharing programs, such as Groove and to an extent, Lotus Notes, can store shared collaborative data. The issue with all these services is that parts can, and often are, stored on the desktop hard drive. Personal post office box files and personal address books are kept locally. Often, policy and the need to keep server mailboxes small necessitate these options. Personal collaboration files shared by peers contain local data until the files are replicated to a peer. 6 Chapter 1 To allow users to connect remotely, it becomes more common to deploy specialized connectivity software. This software is often secured with digital keys. Although users are typically unaware of the keys, they need to be saved and secured. Without them, the user will not be able to connect to the network. There are many shared resources—such as printers, scanners, fax machines and the like— permeating the workplace. All these devices are necessary to do our jobs, they all require network paths. Most require drivers and some require specialized software. And until the user can re-connect to them, he or she cannot effectively do his or her job. Preserving Hidden Data Although the users are often ignorant of their hidden data, they truly miss it when it is gone. The process to collect this data is straightforward, but as with the user data, the method of collection and storage will help determine how it can be used. Imaging the hard drive will preserve the data. The process can be fast and simple to understand, but only practical for restoring a single backup at a time on a precise copy of the original hardware. The drawback is the limited means by which it can be restored. More sophisticated methods of backup can segregate this data and allow selective restorations of some of the data. This is quite effective when migrating between hardware and/or software platforms, or when troubleshooting selective subsystems. The art of restoring part of the system is to know what the system contained. There needs to be an effective means of inventorying what the user has and accurately backing up the information in a manner that allows selected parts of that information to be restored. Organizing the Toolset A desktop contains the tools that allow users to work productively. As with most toolsets, users become accustomed to what they have. They customize their tools and add new tools for specialized work. To keep them productive, those tools need to be kept available. Planning for Toolset Restoration It is not unusual for organizations to design a specific toolset of applications and OS components for their employees. By defining and distributing a standard desktop configuration, engineering and support costs can be better controlled. The issue is that people are not as standard as the desktops that the policy defines. Inevitably, some user or users need a tool that does not come in the standard configuration. Sometimes users follow the defined process for getting custom software installed on their systems. Sometimes they take matters into their own hands. Putting aside the policy and security considerations (some of these will be addressed later in the chapter), it is likely that if a user has installed a tool, the user will need it in the event of a disaster recovery or platform migration. Users also find add-ins and turn on features. They load them, or turn them on, and then forget that they are there. Sometime it is a simple thing, like turning on specific file associations. Sometimes it is loading a tool from the Internet. The users often come to think of this as the way the program works and forget they did something special to make it so. 7 Chapter 1 Executing Toolset Restoration The question then becomes one of support. In the event of a desktop restoration, how do the toolsets get distributed? There are a couple of approaches to distributing applications. One approach is to distribute the responsibility to the individual users. The organization will provide and restore a base set of applications. If the user deviates from that set, he or she must take responsibility to get the enhanced tools installed as a secondary step. This is easy to administrate because application deployment is seldom tracked. Many organizations fall into this approach by default. Whether or not the user or the desktop support technicians perform these installs, the extra effort takes time and reduces the productivity of the employee. Users are also ignorant of the version or licensing of a particular piece of software they are using. All too often, they do not even know the name of the application. This can make restoration much more difficult and time consuming. A more controlled approach is to maintain inventories of the software installed on individual user PCs. A list of what exactly composed the desktop is required by the technician if that technician is to accurately restore the desktop. Although the list can be kept manually, most organizations benefit from a solution that automatically inventories the contents of the desktop and stores it. Regardless of how the list is captured, the user can expect IT has the information they need to get their desktop fitted with the tools that they need. Organizing the Personal Space The desktop is analogous to a cubicle. People start with the same space but within days they take on a distinct feeling. They change the way the icons are arranged on the desktop. They change the background picture. They modify the system tray at the bottom of the screen. They turn on or off the Quick Launch toolbar and add program shortcuts. All this personalization makes that particular desktop their desktop. In the strictest sense, IT is not responsible for these modifications. If they are not preserved, they can be recreated eventually. Many of these steps are simple placements of files and shortcuts on the desktop, and are at least partially preserved with a thorough backup. Nonetheless, the ability to restore the backup to its state after the user gets it just so goes a long way to imbuing users with a sense of security and confidence in IT. There is definite cost benefit to the organization if the user does not need to spend hours or days re-applyng their personal settings manually after his or her desktop is restored. 8 Chapter 1 Technician Perspective Technicians tend to have a much more "three-dimensional" view of the desktop. They are keenly aware of the components that interact to create the desktop environment. Although the user tends to see the environment as a whole, technicians see it as a collection of parts, subsystems and interactions: • Hardware components and the firmware that allows them to operate • Drivers that allows the hardware to work with the OS • The OS, its service pack and hotfixes • The applications, with their service packs and hotfixes • The personal configuration and data mentioned in the previous section Figure 1.3: The PC Support Technician tends to view the desktop as a set of layers that must work together to produce the end result. Hardware and Firmware The overwhelming success of the PC market was to allow computers made with a wide variety of hardware to work with the same OS. It allowed a wide variety of manufactures to innovate, adding features and reducing costs, without changing the core experience of the end user from one system to another. Although it has been good for the market, it is a nightmare for technical support. 9 Chapter 1 The Challenge of Knowing What You Have Manufacturers are constantly replacing components within their computers. They may be controlling costs, compensating for shortages in available parts, or a host of other reasons. It means the technician really does not know what to expect when they start to work on an individual computer. A group of the same model of desktops may contain differing components. If there are three different but equivalent modems used in that model, a delivery may contain different units containing all three. Different manufacturers and suppliers will provide differing levels of uniformity, but variation is inevitable. The other issue is the notoriously short life cycle on individual hardware platform models. With the furious pace of innovation, a model may be available for only a few short months. The next time an order is placed, the equivalent unit has a different motherboard (and supporting chipset), different video and networking subsystem, sound cards, and the lot. It seems even worse with laptops and portable computers. Beyond that, most components have a set of internal programs they use, called firmware, to make the component behave well within the system. Components change quickly and OS changes often place differing demands on these components, so the firmware frequently needs to be changed. Changing firmware is tricky, and sometimes it is dangerous. Without valid firmware in place, the component, be it a motherboard, video card, optical drive, and so on, will not work. Firmware changes address specific issues and most manufacturers recommend that firmware be updated only to compensate for specific problems. Conversely, as drivers and OSs change, changes to the firmware may be mandatory. Managing the Hardware Tangle To manage the wide gamut of variations in the hardware, enterprise technicians need tools to help them organize the inventory of the units they keep functional. They need to keep current on the hardware deployed. This becomes more significant if the desktop is backed up through imaging. The image stores a specific set of drivers and configurations for the hardware platform from which it was copied. Applying the image to a different platform, or one that has changes in the components, can cause the restored desktop to work poorly, or even fail, once applied. Having a clear picture of the platform so that it can be accurately restored can save a great deal of time and headache come restoration time. If the backup is componentized, with individual components such as drivers and configurations reinstalled rather than copied, there is more flexibility in the restoration. It makes restoration more reliable, particularly when components must be replaced and elements of the desktop changed to meet new platform requirements. 10 Chapter 1 Device Drivers Device drivers represent the glue that allows hundreds hardware manufacturers to produce distinct devices and still have them all work with the OS. By varying the device driver, a video card can cross between OSs, working in a Microsoft Windows, Linux, even Mac OS computer, without changing the hardware to compensate. This miraculous layer of software that fuels much of the diversity and cost containment in the PC industry represents the greatest challenge to the technical support staff. The Dilemma of Drivers Device drivers are designed to work with very specific hardware components on a specific OS. There are several items one must reconcile before installing a device driver: • The specific version of the hardware component (many components will have diverse versions that support different drivers—network cards are notorious for this) • The firmware installed to support the device • The OS installed • The service pack installed on the OS It is not obvious what driver software should be used with a given hardware device. Although there have been substantial improvements, it is still quite possible for the OS to be unable to determine the correct driver to install. Even if the hardware can be identified, it must be made available. Without the device driver, the device will not work within the desktop. There are still more issues to overcome. A chipset manufacturer will often develop a driver to support their chipset. The manufacturer who uses the chipset to create a component may use the chipset driver as is or may modify it to provide enhancements or link it to additional hardware improvements. At that point, there may be two software drivers that could work with the device. Drivers are also difficult to test and maintain. When a new OS is released, the hardware manufacturers not only need to write software for the OS upgrade on their current devices, they must consider upgrading the software for older hardware. And even if they do not, the older driver may work with the new OS. 11 Chapter 1 Dealing with the Driver Dilemma There are several steps that an organization can take to help prevent the dilemma of drivers from interfering with the PC restoration process: 1. Know that drivers are required for a specific platform. As desktops are deployed, keep an inventory of the individual devices and drivers deployed to that desktop. This provides the information that technicians use to expedite the restoration process. 2. Certify the device drivers that work within an organization's environment. Device drivers can update frequently, and not all the changes make improvements. Test the device drivers in advance and know what version works stably with the desktop to be restored. Also, recording the previous version will help speed roll back if a new device driver introduces problems once deployed. 3. Cross reference individual components with their respective drivers. If components need to be replaced or moved between desktop platforms, the driver information should follow the device. 4. Provide a centralized repository for device drivers. Keep the drivers organized so that technicians can find them quickly, and preferably access them through the network (if anyone has seen technicians struggling to find CDs with device drivers, that person understands this issue). 5. Keep a knowledge base of the drivers installed on desktops, issues encountered while using those drivers and any workarounds or solutions developed using the driver. Keep this data available for the technicians. Backup methodology also plays a role in dealing with the dilemma. Image backups keep the currently installed device driver with the desktop. Restoration of the image guarantees that the same driver that they started with is in place. If the hardware is being replaced, then once the image is restored, the device drivers will need to be adjusted accordingly. This process used to frequently result in the dreaded "blue screen of death," but advances in OSs make them much more tolerant of these types of shifts. Nevertheless, having no network access because the network adapter changed can slow the process of bringing the desktop up to speed. If the approach to restoration is re-installation, then knowing the proper drivers to install on the target platform becomes much more crucial. Automating the process will go a long way toward accelerating the restoration and minimizing common human errors. 12 Chapter 1 OS and Patches The OS is the central control system that orchestrates the interaction between the applications, data, hardware, and network systems. Although individual components may fail, if the OS cannot function, nothing works. OS Challenges The first step is to know what OS the user is running. This would include the current set of service packs and hotfixes deployed. A large number of organizations set an OS standard and then proceed to help everyone comply. This process of moving to a new version of the OS and/or deploying a service pack could be as simple as programming an automatic deployment or as complex as having technicians visit each and every desktop in the organization for a couple of hours. The reality is that there are typically several versions of the OS running at every given moment. Some people are reluctant to change and will do everything they can to delay the inevitable. Others want to jump the gun and find ways to upgrade ahead of schedule. With service packs available through Internet download, it can be difficult to stop them. Sometimes, it is a matter of purchasing. PCs and laptops typically come with OSs pre-installed. The OS is already there and running, and the organization purchased a license for the OS with the hardware, so it is a difficult decision to remove a newer OS and install an older version. Users with remote locations may be difficult to get to and upgrade. Mobile employees can be difficult to slow down long enough to upgrade. And they can be connected infrequently and may miss standard upgrades. Users with older hardware may require hardware upgrades (and subsequent desktop restorations) before they can move to the new OS. All this says that most organizations have a diversity of OS and service pack levels with which to contend. Restoring the OS An OS restoration is wholly dependent on the hardware platform. The OS is the bridge between the user and the hardware, so it must span that gap. As previously mentioned, the bridge between the OS and the hardware is the device driver. If the hardware platform remains identical, there is nothing faster than an image restoration. If, however, the desktop must be restored on a new hardware platform, the drivers that are appropriate for that platform must be made available. And if the problem is contained within the image (errors in the registry, virus infection, or other anomalies), a restoration will be of no avail. The technician needs to know what OS and patches to install to restore the operation to which the user is accustomed. That means an inventory of the system, must be kept on hand to effect the restoration. 13 Chapter 1 Applications and Patches The reason people have their computers, beyond consuming time surfing the Web, is the applications. Companies commonly define a standard set of applications for their users. They license these applications and provide people who can help support them. It should be a simple matter to reinstall that list of applications on a computer when a restoration is requires. Application and Patch Creep The truth, however, is that it is very difficult to keep everyone using the same set of applications. There are a wide range of reasons for this: • Many people do not like to upgrade and fight to keep older versions of applications • Some people cannot wait to upgrade and move to the next version before everyone else— through legitimate or illegitimate means • Some companies link their licensing to hardware platform purchases; thus, the people with newer computers have newer software and those with older computer have older versions • Some users install add-ons that can be downloaded free from the Internet; they can easily fall under the IT radar • Some users have legitimate need for specialized software; as it is not widely distributed, it can be difficult to keep track of the source disks and licensing keys • Patches for applications may not be automatically or consistently distributed, particularly to remote location and mobile computer users • Users may install unauthorized or unlicensed software on their individual desktops For all these reasons and others, technicians often find it difficult to know what was on the desktop to perform the reinstallation. 14 Chapter 1 Restoring the Application Stack The simplest way to keep track of the applications installed on a user's desktop is to automate collecting an inventory of installed software. There are many product solutions that will periodically inventory the computers in the network and maintain a database of who has what (this is also useful for maintaining compliance, but more on that in the next section). The technicians need a simple means of organizing the installation packages. This can be as simple as file shares or cabinets filled with CDs and DVDs. Most products that provide automated inventory of applications will also provide for automated software distribution. The more automated and hands off the process, the quicker the restoration can be accomplished. The technicians need policy. How do the technicians respond to users who have unauthorized software installed on their computers? These illegitimate applications may be at the heart of desktop performance issues or even computer failures. Or they may be completely innocuous. There must be a clear understanding of how to approach this situation. A hard drive image restoration greatly simplifies this process. Everything that was on hard drive is contained in the image, so it all returns once the image is restored. But this method has a variety of disadvantages as well. Reinstallation of the application stack and reconstruction of the registry can go a long way toward improving desktop performance. It also makes it easier to move to a new OS or hardware platform. Personal Configuration and Data The first thing users hope for after a restoration is to see their familiar desktop displayed on the monitor. They want to open My Documents and find their documents. They want their contacts to appear in their mail program. They want things to be as they were before the restoration. Capturing the Configurations and Data Data files are easy to restore. They are plainly visible on the hard drive. As long as you have a copy and know where they came from, you can put them back. This problem is simple on the scale of a single desktop, but quite unmanageable on a large, enterprise-wide scale. Configuration information, however, presents a different problem. Configuration information can lurk anywhere in the system. Some of it is stored in the registry. Some of it is stored in configuration files. Some of the configuration files are stored in the same directories as the program files. Other are stored in personal data directories for the individual user. Some configuration information is kept in files that are always open. Post office files, database files, and other program files may contain important information that improper backup software may not be able to copy. If the restoration extends to upgrading an OS, things can become even more interesting. Microsoft reorganized the directory structure for user data in its recent upgrade to Windows Vista. To ease the transition, they created a utility to move personalization data and configuration information to its new location. Of course, to do so, the old desktop needs to be running so that the utility can find and store the information. In a disaster recovery, that is of little help. The overhead of scripting the solution and version compatibilities must also be considered. A solid desktop restoration solution should ease this migration through proven, repeatable processes that can adapt to changes easily. 15 Chapter 1 Restoration of the Data Restoration of the image requires that user data files as well as the system state be restored. The system state includes registry data and other internal information that is not typically copied in a backup. The technician also needs to ensure that the backup had the proper agents running on the desktop to back up hard-to-copy files such as databases. As long as the target system is nearly identical to the original, an images restore can make the restoration quick and simple. But if the desktop needs to be restored to a new hardware platform, such as a laptop or a desktop PC with a new SATA hard drive subsystem, the image restore will become much more challenging. Conversely, a re-installation approach must be carefully planned and managed. Configuration information must carefully be restored, and there is a significant risk that some configuration information will be lost. For the technician, the best teacher is experience. If a technician has practiced the restoration, they will be cognizant of the issues and can prepare to deal with them. Security and Compliance The challenge for the organization to help users remain secure and more compliant is steadily growing. Increasingly, software companies are enforcing licensing policies and agreements. More and more malware, viruses, spyware and other malicious software finds its way into the Internet. It affects the performance of the desktop and threatens the security of the data it contains. Corporate and government regulations require that data remain secure and access be monitored and audited. The perspective of the organization concerning security and compliance seems quite straightforward at first glance. The desktop must be a secure, compliant place where the employees can perform their work. But as the workforce has become increasing mobile and people want desktop services extended outside the office, the challenges grow. The techniques that protect data and secure extranets can interfere with backup and restoration. There are several areas the security team must consider: • The data stored locally on the computers must be secure • The desktop must be able to operate in a secure, safe manner within the network • The desktops must comply with legal and corporate regulations 16 Chapter 1 Figure 1.4: There is a growing need to protect the data contained on desktops and the operational efficiency of the desktop and to ensure that it reamins legal and compliant. Information Security As more users employ laptops and mobile devices, more information leaves the security of brick and mortar walls. 4GB of critical corporate data can be slipped onto a device the size of a postage stamp. Data is freely and easily moved. Securing Critical Data The proliferation of identity theft and the devastating effect that these security breaches cause is triggering more companies to utilize encryption to secure their data. Encryption can extend to files, folders, even entire hard drives. The Microsoft Windows OS can provide these services, and there are a variety of other products that can be implemented. Restoring Secured Data The restoration of secured data requires encryption and decryption keys. These keys are random numbers used to scramble the data. When the original encryption is established, the keys are generated. They can be backed up onto an external, portable medium (CD, USB key, floppy, and so on). The keys are also stored on the computer hard drive. This allows simple (often transparent) decryption of the scrambled data. The keys can be backed up by most commercial software. From a restoration standpoint, the most critical issue is to be aware that encryption is being deployed. Whether or not encryption is employed, the backups themselves must be secured. If the backup file can be copied and restored without authorization, the data therein contained is at risk. An opportunity offered by a restoration is to ensure that data is properly secured. Data that should not be stored locally on the desktop can be identified and moved to secure storage. Data that should be local can be tested to ensure that it is indeed encrypted. 17 Chapter 1 Operational Security It is critical that networks remain secure. There are several considerations when securing the network: • Who can connect and get an IP address? • What software should be installed and functional before a computer can connect? • What is required to connect from outside the local campus? The answers to these questions directly affect the backup and restoration process. Locking Down the Network Different organizations provide different levels of internal network security, depending on their individual policies and tolerance of risk. Most organizations will allow anyone who can plug into a port to gain access to the local network. This approach is simple to administer and does not require any special configuration. Organizations that are more security conscience will require the media access control (MAC) address of the network adapter to be registered in order to obtain an IP address. Some networks scan for required software before a computer is allowed access to the network. The scan may check for required software patches and antivirus and/or anti-spyware software to be installed and operational. As network access extends to allow users an entry to corporate network resources remotely, there is a need for virtual private networking (VPN) software. This may be the client that is integrated into the Windows OS, but frequently relies on other software from vendors such as Novel, Cisco, and others. This software builds an encrypted bridge through the Internet and allows people outside the campus to connect securely. To secure these networks, vendors implement various levels of Network Access Control (NAC). Unless a computer can validate its security health (virus protection running, firewalls enables, and so on), the computer not be granted access to the network. 18 Chapter 1 Restoring a Secure Desktop The challenges of restoring the desktop are shaped by the internal security of the network. If network access is granted to designated network adapters, restoring the desktop on a different hardware platform requires coordination to allow the new hardware access. If the desktop is rebuilt through re-installation, the system must be brought into compliance before it can be reconnected to the network. The requisite software must be clearly defined to the technicians performing the restoration. The network must tolerate a computer connected to the network that is not compliant during the restoration process, or the computer must be isolated during restoration. Viruses and malware can cause crashes, so it is often wise to examine the desktop for software infection. If an image restoration is performed, this process should take place in isolation, disconnected from the network. If a re-installation is performed, controlling the software that is placed on the restored desktop will typically resolve the problem. VPNs must be reconfigured. This task often involves the use of security keys, so either the old keys must be properly restored or new keys generated. During restoration, computers may be non-compliant. They must be tested for connectivity to ensure they will function outside the local area network (LAN). Success restoration will require a clearly defined set of policies and procedures. Regulatory Compliance Companies regulate what runs on computers for a variety of reasons. For many industries, there are legal requirements covering the use and auditing of data. This often means using specific programs that adequately audit the use of such information. There are real costs that accompany the support of software, so company policy commonly dictates the software installed to help control those costs. Companies are responsible for the software installed on their computers and must properly license that software. How Computers Become Noncompliant People use their computer to get work done. They are looking for ways to make things easier for themselves. If someone can find a way to get to data more quickly or with greater access, they will try. It is important to meet the needs of users, but they do not always appreciate the other dynamics involved, such as maintaining complete audit trails. Some people do not like change, and find ways of holding onto old software after it has been officially obsolete. Others like to jump the gun and get the latest version of a package before it has been released by corporate IT. Still others will find alternative packages that do the same thing. Some of them are freeware or shareware. Others may be Internet applications that pass data through the public cloud. Any of them can incur support costs and cost time. Software piracy is rampant. Users often have software at home that they know and would like to use at work. It is often a simple matter to run a quick install and get an unlicensed version of an application on a computer. It often goes unnoticed and seems harmless enough. 19 Chapter 1 Restoration and Regulatory Compliance Restoration of a desktop is an ideal opportunity to check the compliance of a desktop with corporate policy. If the restoration is performed by image restoration, the computer can be checked after the restoration is complete. Unauthorized, unlicensed, and unsupported software can be removed. If a re-installation approach is adopted, the issues become simpler. Only authorized, licensed software is re-installed. The process of the restoration ensures that the resulting desktop is compliant. The restoration may also result in computers that perform better because the registry will be cleaner and any unbidden software installs will be eliminated. IT Management The IT group has the task of considering all the various perspectives on the desk and creating a system that ensures that the desktop is protected and users can be kept productive while containing costs. They must work in four key areas to meet these goals: • Policies • Processes • Personnel • Products Figure 1.5: IT must develop policies and procedures, train and hire personnel, and choose the product suite that will ensure that the desktops in their organization will be protected. 20 Chapter 1 Policies The policy for desktop restoration needs to be clearly spelled out for the users and the technicians who must implement the policy. It should clearly state the requirements for each and set a level of expectation for what will be restored. The policy should be written and kept up-to- date as the needs and demands of the business change. Clearly stated policies will help users understand what to expect as well as how and why they should participate in the process. Policy will direct the technicians in what they need to do, what they should not do, and help them work with the users in a productive manner. User Policies User should be given an expectation of what they will get if their desktop is restored. If any information is at risk, they need to know. Items to include in this expectation contain: • File backups (with some indication of when the last backup was likely to have occurred) • Types of configurations that will be restored and those that will not • Software that the user can expect to find on the computer • Any changes to service, such as VPN connectivity or other security-related matters • Any upgrades or other changes the user may expect to receive • Actions that will be taken for detection of unauthorized data and software found on the desktop Users should also be aware of their responsibilities in the process. If data is to be backed up, the computer must be operating and connected to the network while the backup procedure is performed. This can range from letting computers run during a scheduled time during the day (say over lunch) or leaving a computer on overnight. This can become more difficult for remote users who may connect to the network at irregular intervals. These users are often at higher risk, so they must take their responsibility to back up their system seriously. Users should also be given some level of expectation of the process with which they interact to get their desktop restored. This forms a service level agreement (SLA) between IT and the user. 21 Chapter 1 Technician Policies The technicians need to know the scope of the service that they provide to the users. Since they will deal directly with the users they service, it helps to know what they are authorized to offer and how to explain what they cannot provide. The policy can help mitigate issues and prevent hard feelings. If a technician discovers compromising or potentially illegal material on the drive, they need to know the proper steps that they are expected to take. First, users will only receive data that is backed up. Many people believe (or at least hope), there are technicians that can always find data, even when hard drives have been destroyed, erased, or physically misplaced. They believe that backups happen magically, even though they, themselves, left their computer off or cancelled the regularly scheduled backup in progress. The policy can clarify this point. Some users are going to have unauthorized material on their computers. It could be inappropriate files or links to questionable Web sites. It may be unauthorized or unlicensed software. There are a variety of things that may not be restored. The technician needs to know what to keep and what to remove. He or she must also know their responsibility in reporting what they find, and whether or not to dispose of unauthorized material from the hard drive. The technician needs to know the SLA. It is quite useful to refer to the policy when users want to know what is happening with their restoration and when it will be done. The policy is not meant to be a shield between the user and the technician but rather a vehicle that helps to explain the process in a consistent, predictable manner. Since the technician is interacting with potentially secure data and network connections, he or she must also understand the security policy as it relates to the handling of data backups, security keys, and communications software. The manner in which they handle sensitive materials will underlie the security of the entire backup and restoration process. Processes The process used to backup and restore desktop data will greatly determine the success of the system. Backing up data is tedious. The only way to truly confirm the backup is to restore the data. A technician or user can go years performing backups and never once perform a restoration. When they finally do get a failure, they only then learn that the backups did not capture critical data or cannot actually be used to restore the desktop. 22 Chapter 1 Backup Processes Restoration is only as good as the last backup. A backup schedule that can be adhered to by the users is critical. Most systems can be set to perform backups during the night. That sounds simple enough, but the systems must be available to perform the backup. For standard desktop PCs, this can be as simple as getting users to leave on their computers when they leave for the day. For mobile users, the challenge is far greater. The success of the backup process can only be maintained through monitoring. IT must review the status of the desktop backups on a regular basis. Missing an occasional backup is typically not crucial (but, of course, Murphy's Law indicates the backup will work perfectly until the backup just prior to failure). If multiple backups are missed, an alerting system will help determine why the backups are failing and correct the situation to restore the security of that desktop. Restoration Processes The only way to know for certain that a restoration will be effective is to perform it and test the results. The restoration process must be documented and tested, and standards for a successful restoration must be established. As long as everyone involved in the process knows what constitutes a successful restoration, the process can be measured and proactively updated to provide the best results. Restorations should be performed on a regular basis. As new hardware is rolled into the organization, new applications are installed, OSs are upgraded, new data security policies are implemented, and new types of credentials are added to the desktop, the ability of the system to capture and restore these changes must be validated. The process, through use, must be validated to work as designed. The process must also handle the exception policies. If image restores are used, and security policy indicates that a restored desktop must comply with corporate policy, the process should examine the restored desktop for unauthorized content and provide the means for extricating it. If either an image restoration or a re-installation approach is taken, restored data files should be checked for appropriate security measures and filtered for illegitimate content. There should be a final certification process to indicate that the restored desktop is properly restored and ready for use. 23 Chapter 1 Personnel The technicians used to monitor the processes and perform the backups require both technical and interpersonal skills (a tough combination to find in technicians). People who have lost their desktop may be irritable and even unreasonable. The desktop is often an extension of their work, so it can be very disconcerting to have that extension fail. The technical staff needs to be able to deal with coworkers who may be acting in stress while their desktop and its precious contents are unavailable. Also, if the desktop cannot be fully restored, due to aged backups or unauthorized content on the drive, technicians must understand how to deal with the user who will not get back what he or she lost. Good systems can help technicians do their work, but a skilled technician is invaluable when things do no work as planned. There are often challenges involved in getting a desktop to reconstitute on a computer, let alone manifest on a completely new piece of hardware. For drive images, there are the challenges of readjusting drivers and configurations when the hardware changes. For re-installation, the challenge comes in getting the customization information re- located in the proper place. IT needs to keep technicians well trained and familiar with changes in policies, processes, and products used to maintain the security of the desktop. From changes to OSs and applications to securing different information to upgrades to backup agents, technicians need to be kept aware and prove their ability to fulfill the SLAs between IT and the users they serve. Products There are a wide variety of products available on the market to help protect desktop computers. Before choosing a product, it is important to understand the expectations of the restoration policy and process. This will help develop the criteria by which the products can be compared. Consider the following questions: • Will restoration be used to migrate desktops from one hardware platform to another? • Will restoration be used to bring desktops into security compliance? • Will restoration be used to assist in OS or application upgrades? • What are the requirements for performing backups? • What are the hardware requirements for storing backups? • What are the hardware and network requirements for the restoration process? Once these criteria are established, they can be used to help determine the features and services that should be offered in the backup and restoration product selected. In addition to performing a simple comparison of price and features, there are a number of intangibles that should also be considered. 24 Chapter 1 Finding people who use the product are very helpful in determining the overall quality of the product. Learning how the product works under real field conditions can be most telling. The value of the product can be difficult to quantify. The cost must be considered in terms of total cost of ownership (TCO). In addition to the cost of the product itself, the cost of the product's impact on servers, storage, network bandwidth, management time, and a variety of other factors beyond the cost of licensing must be determined. In addition, the time spent backing up and restoring data must also be considered. It is important to bear in mind all these factors when choosing a product. Most vendors will help break down all the associated costs for running their individual systems (albeit, perhaps, cast to emphasize their individual strengths). By using the information provided by several vendors and creating a common chart, comparing all costs and all features, it is possible to develop an effective matrix for comparison. It is also helpful to contact people who have the product in place and validate the claims of the vendor. There is a great deal to consider when developing a comprehensive program for securing the desktops of an organization. This chapter defined the PC desktop ecosystem of hardware, firmware, OS, applications, data files, and configurations. The subsequent chapters of this guide will provide additional details about what to consider when building such a program. Chapter 2 will build on the foundation laid here to explore in detail what role hardware plays in providing a user's desktop. 25 Chapter 2 Chapter 2: PC Life Cycle Management In the first chapter, the PC desktop was defined as the ecosystem of hardware, firmware, OS, applications, data files, and configurations that the user thinks of as his or her computer. Although users may think of the tower sitting under their desk or the laptop they tote on the airplane as their computer, it is only one of the components that contributes to their computing experience. For most organizations, the investment in personal computer hardware is extensive. It is often a target for budget cuts. A carefully thought-out plan can help produce the greatest yield from that investment. The more productive use that workers get from the desktops, the greater is the return from that hardware investment. Hardware changes and replacement are the central theme of this chapter. Hardware changes are closely linked to desktop restoration because the required capabilities of the desktop restoration system are intimately linked to various types of hardware changes. Conversely, the ability to quickly and effectively manage hardware changes can be strongly improved by a robust, scripted desktop restoration system. Understanding the hardware life cycle changes most organizations encounter will help develop a desktop restoration system that makes the most effective use of that hardware. This chapter will consider the role that hardware plays in providing a desktop for the user. It will examine the reasons hardware changes and the appropriate steps to take to restore the desktop to full operation once the hardware changes—whether it be small incremental changes or migration to a completely different platform. The chapter is organized into four sections: • Planning a hardware life cycle—Hardware goes through a cycle of changes. This chapter addresses the reasons that hardware changes, compares different approaches for planning hardware replacement, and the process of projecting hardware changes. A desktop restoration system than is designed for these changes will best meet the needs of the organization. • Extending the life of the platform—Organizations have a great deal invested in hardware. This chapter discusses troubleshooting hardware component failure and using upgrades to get more life out of systems without leaving users stranded without a usable work system. The desktop restoration system can help make changing hardware incrementally cost effective and help to mitigate risks. • Desktop re-platforming—Computers all become obsolete. This chapter examines moving the desktop to a completely new hardware platform. It addresses changes such as upgrading from 32- to 64-bit or moving to a laptop from a desktop personal computer. The right desktop restoration system will minimize downtime and protect the assets of the desktop. • Managing the hardware life cycle—Working with hardware is a process, integrating policies, people, processes, and products. This chapter treats managing the changes in hardware and the policies and procedures used to keep user desktops operating on the right systems. 26 Chapter 2 Figure 2.1: The desktop restoration process can help to optimize investments in the organization's hardware. Planning the Hardware Life Cycle Personal computer hardware has a tendency to become obsolete long before it wears out. The effect of Moore's Law on hardware is that it typically becomes obsolete within a year or two of manufacturing. The hardware works fine, but it lacks capabilities of the newer computers available in the marketplace. For more information about Moore's Law, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_Law. This leaves companies in an uncomfortable place. They have an installed base of functioning hardware that serves their employees. Replacing that hardware could improve productivity, but determining how much it would improve and assigning a dollar value to that improvement is difficult and often inaccurate. The process is not trivial. It is a common belief that a 5-year-old computer with a 500MHz processor and 128MB of RAM running Microsoft Windows 98 and Office 97 is all the common office worker really needs to do their job. Yet it is currently difficult to find a computer that has less than a 1.5 GHZ processor and 512MB of RAM. Microsoft XP would not run well on that older piece of hardware, and one can no longer keep Windows 98 or Office 97 secure against malicious programmers. Microsoft has spent billions of dollars making their new OSs more productive and secure, but quantifying the value of those enhancements is challenging. The life of a particular hardware platform can be extended by upgrading components. A portion of the cost that must be considered when repairing, upgrading, or enhancing hardware is the time and expense involved in changes to the desktop environment. From a desktop restoration standpoint, the time and expense of getting a working computer to employees when hardware is repaired, upgraded, enhanced, or replaced is a critical part of determining the cost of the enhancements. 27 Chapter 2 Figure 2.2: Planning for hardware change can help optimize the process of restoring desktops when the change occurs. Why Do Desktop Hardware Platforms Change? There are a variety of reasons that drive hardware change. By understanding these factors, it becomes easier to plan for the changes and to be prepared. Think about the reasons that a user might need to change or replace their hardware. • A change in position requires different applications with different hardware support. It may mean a more advanced graphics card, faster CPU, enhanced networking or communications hardware, and so on. • A user may move to a different office or physical location. They still need their desktop but it may be difficult or impractical to move the hardware. • Users may become dissatisfied with the performance of their computer and be granted a more performant machine. • Security requirements may change. Installation of hard drive encryption devices, smart card readers, or bio-identification devices, such as fingerprint readers, may trigger a corporate-wide change in hardware. • A user may need to move from a standard PC to a notebook PC. • An older component, such as a graphics card or network adapter may fail. This can often lead to replacing the component with an upgrade. • Older hardware may not support required security patches and necessitate a refresh to support the current desktop requirements. • New applications may be deployed, requiring additional computer resources and greater storage. • Users may overrun the storage they have and require additional space to keep their individual data. 28 Chapter 2 The reasons for change vary from organization to organization. One organization may feel that faster CPUs are simply a waste of money while another organization runs software that taxes their computers and looks to provide more responsive platforms. If all employees have mobile computers, relocation to a new location will not play a role. Some companies must provide computers to employees in multiple countries, so shipping a PC to a new location is a long and expensive proposition. Each company should brainstorm the reasons hardware switches in their organization and use that list as the starting point for their analysis. Simple recordkeeping for the reasons for hardware change—from component replace to upgrade to entire computer replacement—will provide the basis of determining this pattern. Knowing why hardware changed and categorizing that information can expose trends that can change the way a business thinks of hardware modification. It is easy to allow the changes to occur without recording them. By setting processes in place to capture this data and providing personnel with tools to simplify capturing and analyzing the data, the reasons for change can be easily defined. The reasons for change touch desktop restoration directly. Knowing the reasons for change can help define the correct desktop restoration solution and define the policies, processes, personnel, and products required to implement that solution. Projecting Hardware Change If you understand how things have changed in the past, it becomes much easier to predict how things will occur in the future. The process is much less intimidating that it appears at first blush. There are two areas of concern: quantitative change and qualitative change. For quantitative change, the process is simply a matter of noting the type of changes that occur and at what frequency. To simplify analysis, break down changes into simple categories. The categories will be determined by the needs of the organization. A common approach is to track by component type. Tracking the number of replacements over time will allow the changes to be graphed. Most spreadsheets have a built-in capability to project a trend once baseline data is graphed. Simple recordkeeping and a few minutes in a spreadsheet can provide IT with the data they need to project hardware changes into the future. Figure 2.3 illustrates such an approach. 29 Chapter 2 Figure 2.3: Tracking hardware changes can provide a basis for predicting and budgeting change. The graph can show what items are consistent, what items are increasing, and what items are too unpredictable to project. All this information can help to develop budgets and planning contingencies. For qualitative planning, the reason for the change becomes central. If the reasons for change can be identified, these drivers can be tracked and used to project changes. For instance, if an application was deployed to accounting and required 50 percent of the computers to replace their hard drives, rolling out the same application to inventory management may well have the same result. A defective component can be identified. If a network adapter starts failing at a 50 percent rate, the adapters currently in use are at risk and will likely require replacement. The results may not be perfect but simple steps to analyze these trends and use it to project future activity can produce surprising results. The tools used to backup PC desktops frequently provide inventories of what those computers contain. A little recordkeeping and some simple analysis can provide the basis for determining the direction in which an organization is headed. The trends in hardware change, and a project of the time required to complete these changes, often become the basis of the budget for a desktop restoration system. In addition to the costs of the hardware change itself, many factors should be considered: • Lost productivity while PCs are unavailable • Time spent implementing the changes • Capacity planning for desktop restoration solutions • Costs of solutions compared with losses incurred during downtime and restoration 30 Chapter 2 Restoring Desktops on New or Changed Hardware All this analysis may seem like overkill if the only real question you have is, "How do I get the desktop restored?" Every solution for desktop restoration has a cost. Every approach will consume some type of corporate IT resources. The cost of that system must be the balance for the costs and risks of losing desktop PCs. In the rest of this chapter, restoration is meant to be the process of getting a desktop back into functional status. A restoration could be as drastic as replacing all the data on the hard drive, or it could be installing selected pieces of the OS, such as drivers or support utilities, to accommodate changes in the system. The desktop restoration solution used will determine how flexible it can be in making the restoration. It can mean saving time, cost, resources, and much frustration to have a flexible restoration solution at the disposal of the IT staff. Understanding the types of changes that are required help define the requirement of the desktop restoration solution. Consider the following scenarios: • A user migrates from a standard PC to a laptop. A manual approach to moving the applications, configurations, and data may take 8 business hours. Twelve hours when the user cannot use his/her computer (either desktop or laptop) and 8 hours during which a technician is tied to the project. If this occurs two or three times a quarter, this might be an acceptable approach. If it occurs two or three times a day, a system that automates the processes and reduces the migration time to less than 30 minutes is in order. • A department has been outfitted with 20GB hard drives. A new document-scanning solution requires the documents to be stored locally. The units do not have room for a second hard drive, so the only realistic solution is to change the existing hard drive. A desktop restoration system that can replace the image of the old hard drive 20 minutes after the new hard drive is installed is clearly worthwhile. If a second hard drive could be installed on the computer with minimal change to the application, a desktop restoration may not be required at all. • A department is re-located to another office. In addition to new furniture, the department members are getting new computers. They still want their existing desktops—application, configurations, and personal data. A system that can re-install the desktops on the new hardware in the new location becomes very valuable. • A corporation decides that Microsoft Vista Enterprise will become the new corporate standard. The new requirement calls for each computer to contain at last 512MB of RAM (according to the box) and a display adapter with 128MB of RAM. Two-hundred and twenty-five computers require hardware upgrades to meet the new standard. New video drivers must be installed with the new display adapters. A desktop restoration solution that maintains a hardware inventory can be a great boon to this type of assessment. It can identify the computers that meet the current need and those that will require upgrade. Although not strictly part of desktop restoration, it can help in the planning of the corporate hardware life cycle. • A budget excess allows a department to replace the PCs for their 38 users. The desktop environment for each employee must be moved to the new hardware with a minimum of disruption. 31 Chapter 2 These are examples of how understanding the areas that drive PC change can be used to specify the correct solution and determine the budget that makes sense for the specific needs of an organization. By projecting the expected changes and estimating the costs those changes represent, an organization can lay the foundation for a budget. Pricing the cost of differing backup and restoration solutions can determine the best value for that organization. Extending the Life of the Platform As defined earlier, a desktop is an environment combining hardware, OS, software, personal data, and configurations. Any of the components in the ecosphere can be changed, including part or all of the hardware. If hardware can be modified, it can enjoy a much longer useful life. From a desktop restoration standpoint, these changes to the underlying hardware can be supported, or greatly hindered, by the solutions put into place to protect the desktop. This section will explore using the desktop restoration system to support modification of the desktop platform to help get the most life out of the hardware. It examines the common hardware modification tasks—repair, upgrade, enhancement, and re-tasking—and explores how the restoration can be used to make this process smoother and more efficacious. Figure 2.4: The desktop restoration can make it easier to extend the life of existing hardware. Repairing Component Failure Although computers are quite reliable, most users have had a computer stop working. Component failure is inevitable. Hard drives have moving parts, so the safest approach is to plan for when the hard drive fails rather than if the hard drive will fail. 32 Chapter 2 It is very comforting to know that a personal computer has been backed up. Knowing that the personal data files, configurations, applications, and other elements that comprise the desktop ecosphere can be moved wholesale to another hardware platform can preserve the productivity of the PC owner. A reliable desktop restoration system can provide such assurances and comfort. It is even possible that a technician could come with a replacement PC in tow, unplug the defective unit, drop off a fully functional replacement, and get the user back to work in minutes rather than waiting for days. Once the technician takes possession of the defective PC, they begin by troubleshooting the problem. If the computer is at all operable, the component can be tested. A very common approach is to replace the component device driver or even upgrade the driver. The difficulty for the technician is to know what device driver to use and where to find it. If the desktop restoration solution can inventory the device drivers and make them readily available, it helps accelerate this process. Many of the more comprehensive solutions provide this service. It is also convenient to know what version of the driver is currently installed and whether an upgrade is available. A desktop restoration solution that is aware of the hardware installed on a given system and one that can distribute the appropriate drivers and support software to a system based on its actual hardware configuration can make the process of hardware changes much faster and more reliable. Simple Component Replacement If a component needs to be replaced, the type of component will determine how the PC restoration system can be employed. Simple component swaps replacing one component for another of the same type and model are the simplest, and rarely require restoration. That is providing the component is not the hard drive or motherboard. Often an exact component replacement is not available. Components frequently change and become obsolete. Some components have a common device driver that can be shared across many versions of the component. Display adapters often follow this model. Other devices change device drivers based on the revision level of the hardware within the same model (a common issue found with network adapters). The device driver often needs to match the firmware level of the component. A component can have updated firmware and use an updated device driver. If a "new" component is substituted, it will not work properly until the new component's firmware matches that of the replaced component. If a different component must be substituted, the driver will need to be replaced. Again, unless a motherboard or hard drive is replaced, the need for desktop restoration is unlikely. However, access to the new device driver can be a great assistance to the technician performing the repair. Another approach to the problem may be to keep a small number of replacement computers on hand. A desktop can be restored on the reserve hardware and gotten quickly to the users. The defective unit can be returned for repair. Once the hardware issue is addressed, the user's desktop can once again be restored and the desktop returned to the user or the repaired unit can be placed in reserve for the next user who requires a replacement. 33 Chapter 2 Motherboard Replacement The trend to integrate more and more functionality into the motherboard means that the exact model of the motherboard determines many of the device drivers used by the system. Also, as more components are integrated into the motherboard, the more likely it is that a repair will require a motherboard replacement. It is quite common to have the display adapter, network interface, drive controllers, and all other major subsystems integrated into this single circuit board. A motherboard replacement, if it is an exact match for the defective unit, requires no changes to the system. The issue is that motherboards change quite rapidly. A visit to the support site for many of the major PC suppliers shows that any given motherboard can have a host of options that requires the selection of the proper drivers. Some of the options are driven by the purchaser; others occur as the PC manufacturer modifies the board to lower costs or enhance the product within the bounds of a given model. Sometimes a motherboard can be replaced and the OS will detect the changes and help the technician through the process of updating the device drivers. More recent versions of the Microsoft Windows OS—such as XP and Vista—are better at this than older versions. There are dangers to this approach, however. The OS may miss a component/driver mismatch. This may lead to poor performance that is difficult to detect. And the further the motherboard replacement is from the original makes this process less and less reliable. The alternative is re-installation. The hard drive can be cleared and a new desktop built, component by component. In this process, the desktop restoration can make a major contribution. If the backup of the desktop is configured to layer the data back onto the target computer, changes can be made during the re-build to accommodate the revised hardware. Re-application of the personal data and configurations will quickly restore the desktop to full functionality. If a drive image is used to preserve the data, the process may be a bit more cumbersome. The personal data must be extracted from the image and reapplied. Configuration data is often stored in the image in such a manner that it cannot be individually re-applied (separate from other computer state information that should not be reapplied on the repaired platform). Hard Drive Replacement The greatest fear for any user is that they lose their hard drive. A PC backup/restoration solution can allay many of these fears. The data is as current as the last backup. A proactive process of monitoring backups to ensure that they remain current will allow the solution to protect against this loss. If the only component that failed is the hard drive, a new hard drive can be installed. An image restoration will provide the fastest and simplest restoration of the desktop in this type of repair. If a more sophisticated system that re-builds the PC layer-by-layer is implemented, an additional benefit will be realized as a result of the restoration. Most PCs accrue unwanted software over time: everything from expired demo software to Internet Explorer add-ins to spyware and malware that got through the antivirus and anti-spyware barriers. Things are installed and uninstalled, leaving remnants scattered on the hard drive and in the registry. A re-installation will not replace many of these old vestigial artifacts. After re-installation, many PCs run faster. 34 Chapter 2 Upgrading to Improve Performance Often, a hardware platform has room for improvement through installation of advanced components. For instance, most computers can host more RAM than is currently installed. They can support a larger hard drive or more hard drives. Many can operate with a faster CPU or may entertain upgrading to a multi-core version of the CPU. Many performance upgrades will not require a desktop restoration nor will the solution play a direct role. Upgrading memory, adding hard drives, and even upgrading the CPU seldom requires a change of driver. The hardware is installed and used immediately by the OS. It is wise, however, to back up data prior to the upgrade. A bent pin on a CPU can easily destroy a motherboard, changing an upgrade to a repair. Many component upgrades do require new drivers. New display adapters, network cards, and human interface devices (mice, trackballs, tablets, and so on). Although the restoration system will not play a direct role, many of the solutions help provide a catalog of device drivers and simplify their distribution. A motherboard upgrade would require re-installation of the OS. Most organization would replace the entire system unit rather than just the motherboard if they were attempting to improve performance. The next section of this chapter provides more information about moving desktops to new computers. If the primary hard drive is replaced with a larger drive, a desktop restoration will be indicated. A simple drive image transfer will be effective for this, although the aforementioned re- installation will provide a cleaner system after the restoration is completed. Once the upgrade is performed, it is important to back up the refreshed desktop. This is important to capture changes to device drivers and configuration settings. Also, if additional drives are installed, backup of the new drives may need to be configured. Enhancing with New Components Often a hardware platform lacks a particular piece of hardware to serve in the capacity for which it is tasked. This may be simply adding an external peripheral, such as a scanner, printer, or other device. It may require the installation of an internal component, such as a tape backup device; a USB, Firewire, or Bluetooth adapter; or some other form of new or specialized hardware. Enhancements differ from upgrades in that they often involve the installation of drivers and software that will utilize the new hardware. If a DVD burner is installed, DVD burning software will be required in the desktop to fully utilize it. The change will require distribution of new drivers and software. The hardware and software will require configuration. This information should all be backed up by the desktop restoration system once it is completed and tested. If the enhancement is applied to larger numbers of computers, many desktop restoration systems will provide facilities to help in the distribution and installation of the new drivers and software. These systems also help track the enhancements. This data can be analyzed and used in planning to help budget and determine policies and processes. 35 Chapter 2 Recycling Hardware for New Users Eventually, people move from one platform to another. A user receives a more powerful computer or needs to move to a desktop. Users move from one physical location to another. They leave the organization to pursue other opportunities. IT then inherits a piece of hardware that has no desktop to house. The hardware is often in good shape. Most organizations will simply wipe the old desktop from the drive, install a fresh version of the OS, and issue it to the next user who requires a desktop. Sometimes, they do not even delete the old data and configurations. A robust desktop restoration system makes pressing this recycled hardware platform back into service smoother and much more flexible. If an organization has the ability to move a desktop from one hardware platform to another quickly and reliably, then re-allocation becomes much more realistic. Image restorations allow desktops to be moved quickly and easily between equivalent platforms. If a person moves between physical locations, their desktop can be restored at a computer at the destination if it is equivalent. An image of a generic, un-personalized desktop can also be quickly placed on a new or recently recycled platform. The user can then begin the process of customizing the desktop to their individual needs and tastes. If a scripted restoration system is employed, there is much more flexibility in re-locating desktops. If a recycled piece of hardware becomes available, any user can be moved to it in an automated manner. This allows computers to be pressed into service more quickly. Also, right-sizing hardware becomes more practical. If a user's needs change, the user can be moved to a more powerful or less powerful hardware platform with minimal cost or loss of productivity. Often, new employees get new computers. The new computers are often more powerful and the new user gets that more powerful hardware simply because of the difficulty of moving a more senior employee (with greater needs) to a new piece of equipment A system that facilitates the movement of a desktop to a different computer helps IT get the right computer into service for the right employee efficiently. The aforementioned concept of placing a desktop on a reserve PC also becomes more practical if desktops can be easily placed on different hardware. A small pool of reserve computers can help keep users working while repair technicians work on the defective hardware. 36 Chapter 2 Desktop Re-Platforming As mentioned in the previous section, it can be very effective to move desktops smoothly from one computer to another. Whether replacing a damaged computer, the obsolescence of old platforms, migration to a new form factor, or just getting a different box in a different place, the need to move a desktop from one computer to another is inevitable. An organization that plans properly can leverage this need into an ability to keep all their desktops secure and preserve many hours of lost productivity (not to mention reducing user frustration). The process for moving a desktop should include several steps that will ensure the desired outcome: • Understand the needs of the user—Attempt to quantify the hardware requirements of the desktop and match that to the hardware supplied. • Analyze the new features available in the new platform—Determine how they can best integrate into the desktop without compromising the user experience. • Manage the process of migration so that the user experiences as little loss as possible. • Learn from each migration—Use these lessons to refine and improve the desktop migration policies, procedures, personnel, and products. Figure 2.5: Several simple steps help keep the desktop re-platforming process at peak efficiency. 37 Chapter 2 Meeting User Needs The first step in a success platform migration is delivering a hardware system that will do what the user requires it to do. As simple as that sounds, it can be a challenge. The performance of a system is very difficult to quantify. A successful IT department will try to compose a repeatable way of determining the true requirements of the system. Start with a relatively simple process. Almost all software lists the minimum and recommended requirements for operation. By compiling the minimum requirements for each application, a baseline "bare bones" system can be defined. This bare bones system is not realistic for deployment; it just forms a foundation for the specification for the system. The recommended hardware is often a better choice for setting the bar for minimum hardware. Figure 2.6 shows a spreadsheet that offers a sample of building this baseline: Figure 2.6: Building a minimum hardware platform requirement. The baseline may run the software one application at a time, but as multiple applications are opened simultaneously and applications are added, the system can become overtaxed. For most organizations, a healthy amount of reserve capacity is defined to ensure a performant system. Systems can be overtaxed, so the question becomes how to quantify that fact. Users often base their ideas of the performance of their machines on opinion or mood. Just because it takes 3 minutes to get Dilbert to open at 9:00 in the morning (when 2.5 million other people are trying to open it as well) does not mean the user needs an x64 dual-core machine with 4GB of RAM. However, if it take 3 minutes to open a Word document file because the computer has only 128MB of RAM and the hard drive has less than 50MB left for the paging file, it may be time to address the issue. Microsoft Windows has a comprehensive set of system counters to measure the utilization of system resources. It can periodically sample key subsystems and record how they are exercised over time. This can be used to determine whether a user (or more likely a group of users) truly has a system that that requires more, or less, of a given resource. This data can be used to project the real needs of users and accurately map the systems they need to the system they use based on their actual demonstrated requirements. The most common resource to become overrun is RAM. Fortunately, it is one of the easiest to upgrade and does not require any system configuration or driver to increase. However, an increase in RAM will also require more space on the hard drive for paging. Excessive paging will add load to the CPU and make it appear overtaxed. The interpretation of performance counters requires careful consideration of the interrelated causes. 38 Chapter 2 Figure 2.7: Performance monitoring can help validate demonstratable user needs for computer power. Of course, real need and perceived need are often at variance with one another. Although the department may have a need for 512MB or RAM, several users may feel that unless they have 2GB of RAM, their system will not perform. They often feel their system runs slower than every other machine in the department. Part of the balance in meeting user need is balancing perceived need against real, demonstratable need. It also involves helping users understand the diligence that has been expended to ensure that they have the system they need to perform their work. A solid desktop restoration solution will allow a company to flexibly move their users to the hardware that best suits their needs. Image restoration can be used to move personal data between machines. A restoration process that re-installs can help ready the machine and then replace the configuration and personalization setting on the new platform. This can help optimize the utilization of hardware and help foster a feeling among users that they are being carefully supported. Integrating New Features and Capabilities With new hardware come new capabilities. Most hardware comes with a plethora of pre-installed OSs and utilities that support the latest features offered by the new hardware. They come with applications and automatic diagnostics and other devices to help ingratiate the user to the new hardware and its manufacturer. The question for the IT department becomes which of these new features they intend to support and which ones they want to disable. The problem differs depending on the platform shift. 39 Chapter 2 Moving From One Standard Desktop Computer to Another When a person moves from one desktop to another, there is often little in the way of new hardware feature with which to deal. From one standard desktop PC to another, the platform may have new features internally, but they do not often affect the user or their perception of their personal desktop workspace. This does not mean that there are not significant differences internally that must be addressed. For instance, the advent of Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) interfaces means that Microsoft Windows does not automatically detect the attached hard drives unless a special driver is included during the installation. This has a major impact on the desktop restoration. If moving from a computer that used a standard ATA or IDE drive, a reinstallation of the OS will be required. If a drive image is restored on this type of system change, the SATA driver will be lost as the backup image replaces the data on the drive. Upon reboot, the OS will not be able to communicate with the SATA drive and the reboot will fail. A scripted solution that allows on-the-fly modification of the installation components is preferable in this circumstance. Most other changes are not so dramatic. Often they involve new drivers, like adding a Bluetooth adapter or wireless network connectivity. These components are not central to the operation of the desktop, so the only point of contention is the New Hardware Detected message. The hardware can be implemented by installing the correct drivers and software as part of the restoration or it can be disabled. Although disabling hardware might seem wasteful and even draconian, not all hardware is safe or good to operate. For instance, if an organization does not implement wireless connectivity, allowing computers to activate their wireless adapters can invite them to connect to computers and even networks outside corporate control. These spurious connections can become backdoors into the corporate network. They can expose client PCs to viruses and malware and allow malicious attacks on the resources in the network. This is just one example of hardware that, while available, may not be advisable to enable. Desktop restoration can help with this issue. A restored desktop will not necessarily install the required software or configurations to activate unsupported hardware. A restoration that only re- installs approved corporate software will effectively remove unauthorized software that may activate the unsupported hardware features. Once the move is validated, the revised system should be backed up. This will secure the system once the move has been completed and speed restoration should an incident occur quickly after re-installation. For most systems, if a hardware failure is to occur, it will occur soon after a system is pressed into service. The brand-new components are tested as they are put under real load for the first time. 40 Chapter 2 Moving to a New Form Factor There is a definite trend to move users to portable computers. This can often improve the flexibility and availability of workers. The move from a standard desktop to a laptop or notebook computer, however, brings a set of challenges. Much of the hardware found in notebook computers is specialized for use in mobile devices. It is smaller, more rugged, and often more power efficient to help conserver battery power. All this means that it requires a different set of drivers than its standard desktop computer counterparts. Notebooks often include specialized hardware to support their unique form factor. It is becoming common to integrate fingerprint readers into notebook computers; this hardware enhancement is often pleasantly received and can, in a small way, improve productivity (particularly for the typing and memory challenged). Software to secure hard drives for travel, support the special keys on the notebook keyboard, and monitor and extend battery life make a good deal of sense to embrace. A desktop restoration that allows installation of software and drivers particular to a specific piece of hardware yet preserves the applications and configurations specific to a particular user can prove very useful in these moves. If drive images are preserved, the notebook can be installed and configured (or left as delivered from the manufacturer) and the personalized data can be restored. Some configurations and options may need to be reapplied manually. As with standard desktops, the final product should be carefully tested and then backed up. It can be a challenge to get mobile users to keep their desktops secured with timely system backups. A proactive system for monitoring the frequency (and delinquency) of such backups can protect against disappointment later. Mobile computers are at higher risk for loss, theft, or damage than their stationary counterparts. This makes the data they carry more at risk, and regular backups even more prudent. Furthermore, portable computers connect more frequently to unprotected networks, so they are exposed to more viruses and malware. Data backups can sometimes save data that might otherwise be lost to malicious software attacks suffered outside the protection of the corporate Local Area Network (LAN). Managing the Process The ability to move a user desktop from one piece of hardware to another with a minimum or time, expense, and risk depends on a well-defined and well-managed process. There are keys to ensuring that the process flows well and provides the results demanded by the organization. 41 Chapter 2 Recent, Reliable Backups The only data available to restore is the data that was backed up. Most users do not plan for a catastrophic failure of their hardware, but if it occurs, all data not collected at the last backup is at risk. This risk can be managed by proactively monitoring the backup process. Missing a single backup can be a risk, but it is seldom disastrous. Problems come when users habitually miss backups. These patterns must be monitored and detected. Once identified, the cause of the problem can be investigated and a solution resolved before a major data loss occurs. This can be difficult because a data backup is like an insurance premium. Everyone pays to be safe and hopes they never need it. Many users begrudge the time required to perform the backup because they have never suffered the loss of data. Standard desktop users are the easiest to manage because the process can be managed to run automatically while they are not using their computers. Most desktop backup solutions include some form of scheduling. If the computer is shared among workers, it may be more challenging to find a schedule that minimizes the impact of the backup on the computer. Mobile users can be more difficult. It can be difficult to find a time when they are connected to the corporate LAN and are willing to allow the process to occur (and complete). Most backup solutions will only back up the changes (although some make a full drive image backup) and this can take some time. A suitable arrangement must be made so that the mobile computer is backed up and the user is not too inconvenienced. Virtual Private Network (VPN) connections can connect users from remote connections and allow backups to occur. They often run slower, but if the backup can occur overnight, it will have less impact on the user. Determining Desktop Restoration Needs If a computer is being repaired, upgraded, or enhanced, contingency plans should be made depending on components changed and the risks involved. If a system is functional enough to execute a backup, it is always prudent to capture the most recent data before attempting any hardware change. If the move is due to change in the user's status, a new job, work location, new software, and so on, the appropriate hardware must be identified. Corporate standards for the types of hardware used for different job roles or software suites can simplify this process and prevent inequitable distribution of resources throughout the organization. 42 Chapter 2 Executing the Restoration For changes that require no or minimal changes to drivers, the only real requirement is to have a fresh backup. If major changes, such as new motherboards or hard drives are required, the process should be well defined. There will be a re-installation of the OS and applications. Then the personal data and configurations of the user will be re-applied. The restoration system in place will determine the process required to effect the re-application of the personal data as well as what settings and configuration may be lost. For a hardware re-platforming, the IT staff needs to know the appropriate hardware to provide the users. IT may be using new hardware or may be re-tasking a system for a user. If the system provides new hardware, the process must direct whether to enable or disable the new hardware. There should also be a process to introduce the user to new features found in the hardware and how the user should employ those features. Tracking the Process As stated at the beginning, simple recording of what happened during a hardware change can provide an invaluable basis for planning. If the restoration system provides for recoding of activity, time, parts used, and so on, the staff has an ideal place to collect and analyze this data. If not, spreadsheets or simple databases can be configured to keep track of the activity. Lessons Learned In haste to complete the process, it may be easy to forget the obstacle encountered and overcome during the repair, enhancement, or replacement of hardware and subsequent desktop restoration—yet this data is the most valuable that the organization can accrue. Veteran employees are valuable because of the experiences they have gained and the lessons that years at the job has taught them. Helping to capture this information can help improve the restoration system make the process more cost effective and reliable. This process of refinement will improve the outcome, regardless of the tools and techniques used to perform the restorations. Create a Knowledge Base Record the reasons for a change, any difficulties encountered, workarounds discovered, or things that should be done differently next time. Keep this in a central repository where all the technicians can access it. Microsoft's System Center products allow technicians to add to the knowledge packs by entering their own observations, discoveries, and solutions. Using this type of approach can reduce time used to perform operations and help proactively avoid common pitfalls. Analyze the Process Processes should never be static. If a user desktop is lost and the backup is old and valuable data is lost, investigate to determine what went wrong. An isolated error cannot be remedied by this approach, but patterns can be uncovered and overcome. By leaving a forensic trail of the events that occurred and quantifying those events, the top issues with the process can be exposed and steps can be taken to overcome them. 43 Chapter 2 Work with the Products In haste to implement something new, many people will master a subset of the features of the product. Once that subset is mastered and the immediate problem is solved, people tend to move on. They do not explore the full capability of the product they have and do not leverage the complete range of its capabilities. Not every feature of every product is the right solution for all companies, but it can be quite frustrating to struggle with an issue that the product solves just because one is ignorant of said solution. Working with others who use the product can help you understand the full range of its capabilities. Most vendors are eager to serve their clients, so they listen to their frustrations and enhance their tools to mitigate those frustrations. It can be very helpful to cooperate with vendors by supplying feedback. Also, examine upgrades. They often supply new solutions to common issues and may help improve an organization's management of the desktop restoration solution. Managing the Hardware Life Cycle The hardware life cycle and desktop restoration are intrinsically intertwined. Many hardware restorations will necessitate the recovery of a desktop from a backup. Migration of users from one platform to another will call for restoration on the new platform. Even when a full desktop restoration is not required, the process of backing up can safeguard the data. The restoration solution often supports common activities of technicians repairing, upgrading, enhancing, and re- tasking hardware. Thus, management of the restoration solution must embrace the hardware life cycle. There must be clear policies that govern the individual decisions made regarding the organization's solution. Processes must be developed and refined to provide a reliable, repeatable system. Personnel should be put in place to implement and track the process. And products that support the policies ratified by management should be purchased and utilized. Figure 2.8: The hardware life cycle and desktop restoration management are intrinsically intertwined. 44 Chapter 2 Policies Policies help provide consistency, repeatability, and governance to systems and procedures. In the case of the hardware life cycle, they should be used to direct the decisions made for how hardware is modified. A clear understanding of the drivers for hardware change will help define the areas in which hardware policy should be set. If everyone can understand what consistently occurs when hardware needs to be repaired, upgraded, enhanced, or replaced, both the IT staff and users can more easily set expectations. If a user feels that they need more performant computers, a policy can help define why they have the machine that they do. Processes can be enacted on that policy to determine whether, indeed, their computer complies with the corporate standards for performance. If it does, the user should not feel singled out. If the computer does not comply, IT staff has actionable cause to investigate and determine what should be done. Policies should be firm without being inflexible. If a user serves two roles in a company, that user may need different hardware t support his or her unique role. The desktop restoration solution should provide the flexibility to support that unique solution. People with atypical roles often have a more critical need for their desktop, and an inflexible policy that forbids them from having the hardware and software that they need will only harm the organization. Simultaneously, being too flexible allows users to become resentful of others whom they deem as favorites. The proliferation of non-standard configurations can begin to overburden the processes, personnel, and programs used to provide the solution. Analysis of the actual utilization of the system will suggest improvements and refinements. Those refinements will begin as changes to policy. A careful review of policy should be conducted on a regular basis to ensure that policy alleviates issues rather than causes them. Processes This chapter discusses many processes as examples for utilizing desktop restoration to help support the hardware life cycle. Some of the examples will work in one organization but not in another. Each organization must consider the resources that they choose to expend to mitigate the risk and reduce the productivity loss incurred by hardware change and desktop restoration. For organizations that do not track the real costs of desktop unavailability, much of this chapter might seem like overkill. But for organizations that understand the impact of keeping workers from their jobs, the principles put forth in this guide can help to put numbers and budgets together to help control these costs. It can seem prudent to demand that users store important documents on file servers and consume 2 days to get a generic PC to a user that they spend 2 more days trying to restore to effectiveness. Then they must redo the work that they had failed to store on the file server. That is as much a process as discovering that a user's hard drive has failed, taking a newly refurbished computer from inventory, and restoring last night's backup so that the user has their desktop fully restored in working order 2 hours later. The cost of the 2- hour restoration should be carefully compared with the 4 days of lost productivity to determine the real value of the restoration system. 45 Chapter 2 The processes must be tracked to determine trends and validate the expenditure or resources. Thus, in addition to performing the hardware alterations as outlined by policy, people and tools must track their own efficiency. A little time spent in analysis can uncover areas for improvement that can save more money and time. Proactive replacement of a motherboard that shows marked trends of failing before data is lost and users are left without the means to do their jobs can save a great deal of frustration and reduce corporate waste. Having processes in place that facilitate this type of decision (providing management with the confidence to understand the costs and risks of making the replacement) can make a company much more nimble. Personnel Regardless of the policies, processes, or products put into place, execution will eventually come down to the staff. People who respect the policy, understand and properly implement policy, and who know the products used and wield them well are the key to success for any solution. Keep the staff deeply involved in the other elements of management. If staff members do not understand policy, they will not use it to help direct their decisions. If they find it does not solve problems but rather interferes with getting users back in operation, they will find it difficult to respect. They must also understand that some policy decisions affect areas outside their normal sphere of influence. By openly discussing how policy is formed and helping the staff take ownership of the policy, they become its greatest defenders. At this point, policy truly can be used to direct and govern the solution. Staff works the process every day, so they should be the ones most proactive in refining it to help it work as effectively as possible. The more input they are allowed to have in the formulation of the procedures, the more they will be able to follow them effectively (and perhaps enthusiastically). They must also learn to respect the less desirable elements of the process. Almost no one likes to record what they did. But as this forms the foundation of determining process improvement, it is a necessary evil. One suggestion that may help is involving the staff in the evaluation of the data. If they see the patterns for themselves and then help to resolve the issue, their self satisfaction in overcoming a problem may help them embrace the less desirable aspects of the job. It also needs to be someone's job to monitor the backup process. It is not glamorous to check the report and find out why the backups are not occurring. But after a catastrophic hardware failure occurs, it is too late to figure out that an agent was not installed or a senior executive always turned off his computer at night so that the data was never captured. The task can be more daunting with mobile users. Still, the task of ensuring that timely backups are captured remains at the heart of the desktop restoration solution and someone must take responsibility to assure that the backups are processed. The staff also needs to understand the products that they use. It may be easier to tote a CD around to install an updated device driver, but it is far more effective if this task can be done through automated distribution. They need time and training to get the full value of the investment made in the desktop restoration solution. 46 Chapter 2 Products Throughout the chapter, suggestions have been made concerning areas in which the product or products used to facilitate desktop restoration may play a role in maintenance of PC hardware. At a minimum, the products used should capture a copy of critical data stored on the local hard drive so that it can be placed on another hard drive in an emergency. But the PC restoration system can provide much more. It can be used to facilitate the repair, upgrade, and enhancement of personal computer hardware. It can facilitate re-tasking hardware from one user to another. It can ease moving desktops to new hardware—even moving from standard desktops to mobile computing solutions. A careful examination of why hardware changes in a given organization can help define the types of hardware alterations that the organization expects. The time consumed in making these alterations can be projected to determine the real costs to the business for these changes. Once the costs are established, products can be reviewed. Each should provide some relief from the costs expected by the business. This relief becomes the return on investment (ROI). With this information, the value of the restoration product can be cast in the appropriate terms to make a decision. If a product is already in place, the full capability of the product should be explored. Often products have features that were not implemented when the product was first installed. As time goes on, the value of these features may become more evident or compelling. Also, consider product upgrades. Although some product upgrades may offer little value, most vendors seek to increase the value of their product by addressing the real problems of their customers. Reevaluate the features of the available upgrades to an existing product to determine whether they offer real value in the context of a specific restoration solution. Summary This chapter has discussed how hardware changes over time. It provides practical advice on how to integrate the hardware life cycle with the desktop restoration system to help maximize the life of computer hardware while minimizing downtime and lost productivity. The next chapter will examine how the desktop restoration system can influence the software life cycle. 47 Chapter 3 Chapter 3: Software Life Cycle Management A desktop represents an ecosphere of hardware, software, data, and configuration that work together to provide a workspace for the users—a workspace defined in this guide as a desktop. The hardware provides the basic physical foundation on which that workspace is built. The OS and applications provide the individual spaces, services, and amenities to be found in the workspace. This chapter reviews how changes to that workspace affect an organization's ability to preserve and restore the workspace as required. It examines the ways in which a desktop recovery solution can help in the process of maintaining the workspace, improving performance, and helping user data and productivity remain secure. Software tends to be more volatile than hardware. As the desktop changes, the system needs to respond to protect that system and maintain the security of the environment. A well-designed system can help enhance performance at the desktop level and ensure corporate compliance. By examining all elements of the life cycle, from planning through execution, management can devise a system that eases changes and helps keep user data secure and downtime to a minimum. The chapter addresses a group of topics to bring light to this approach: • Planning the Software Life Cycle—This section addresses the changes in the OS and applications distributed to the users. By understanding the underlying causes that drive change, management can plan and project the infrastructure that will be required to provide adequate protection for the user desktops. The desktop restoration system can be integrated into the life cycle to make changes transition smoothly. • Changing Applications—This section discusses the affect of changes to applications and the rollout of upgrades and patches to the desktop. It helps define the risks involved and how the desktop recovery system can help mitigate those risks and accelerate the process. • OS Upgrades—This section examines the process of upgrading the basic software on which the entire desktop rests. It looks at ways the restoration solution can help make this a safer, faster, more reliable process. • Managing the Software Life Cycle—This section treats the oversight of the policies, processes, personnel, and products that help this system move forward. It explores how integrating desktop restoration deep within the software maintenance plan can provide improvements in safety, productivity, and efficiency. 48 Chapter 3 Figure 3.1: Integrating the software life cycle with desktop restoration can reduce risk and costs. Planning the Software Life Cycle The software everyone uses is constantly in flux. New versions arrive with new features that can improve productivity and reduce frustration. Improvements are developed for the current version of the application and require service packs and patches. People change jobs and need different applications. Corporations enter different licensing arrangements and require users to change applications. The software on the desktop is an ever-changing sea that users long to remain calm. Because software changes can affect so many users (often simultaneously, if the change is made en masse), many companies have carefully planned deployment systems. Companies that take a more cavalier approach to installing new applications or upgrading software frequently find themselves in crisis mode, trying to repair a poor upgrade, losing data, and leaving users without the ability to work while the crisis is overcome. As in all endeavors, a little prudent planning can go a long way toward making changes as smooth, efficient, and painless as possible. With regard to software changes, understanding the reasons for change can help predict the changes that will occur and indicate where the greatest risks lurk. By planning the change in conjunction with the desktop restoration solution, the risk of lost productivity, lost data, and disenchanted users can be more easily controlled. The integration of the desktop restoration solution can protect the investments in files and time and help ease user apprehension. By monitoring the processes and incorporating lessons learned, the solution can be leveraged to provide the maximum benefit for the lowest expended effort. 49 Chapter 3 Figure 3.2: Planning can leverage the full potential of the desktop restoration solution. Predicting Software Change The software on a person's desktop may change for many reasons. Some are not predictable, others can be planned. The ability to foresee and quantify these changes will help IT budget and plan. The more accurate the model for change, the better the resources can be allocated to maximize their benefit to the organization. This type of model can also be used to forecast and mitigate risk. The risk of changing from version 8.0 to 8.1 of Adobe Reader is not likely to be as great as moving from Windows 2000 to Windows Vista. By categorizing the severity of the risk and the potential cost to the organization, good decisions can be made regarding how much time, money, and effort will be expended to protect the resources that are at risk. The steps in such a process can be thought out as • Identifying Reasons for Change • Quantifying Risks in Change • Developing Mitigations to Risk 50 Chapter 3 Identifying Reasons for Change The software installed on a desktop can change for a wide variety of reasons. Some are more predictable than others. Role Changes As people move from one role to another in the organization, their need for various applications changes. If there is a base set of applications installed on the desktop, the easiest way to make the change is to add the new applications and remove the deprecated software (and free the license it represents). A major change in job role, however, may only mean a minor change in the composition of the desktop. If the new applications can be added, and unnecessary applications removed, the employee can remain more productive during the transition. People sometimes move from one physical location to another. The physical transfer of a piece of hardware from one location to another is a task that ranges from simply packing the unit with the person's other personal effects to nigh on impossible. If a person's desktop can be moved from one location to another without moving the hardware, the change can be much simpler (see Chapter 2 for details concerning moving desktops between hardware platforms). As discussed in previous chapters, a desktop restoration system that provides automated scripted installations and preserves the individual personalization for the user makes these types of moves safe and simple. Some changes to software are more subtle, such as enabling or disabling features within a given application. These changes may only exist within a configuration file or registry setting. Thus, preserving those changes becomes most important. In this chapter, a "scripted" restoration system uses a flexible system that automates the process of installing OS components and files rather that simply copying an existing hard drive image. These types of systems typically work closely with the IT staff to build the "scripts" without programming or writing scripts manually. A scripted restoration system can restore existing portions of the desktop as well as install new software and drivers and reconfigure the OS components automatically. 51 Chapter 3 Corporate Standards Corporations may also make changes. For example, a company may choose to replace their enterprise email system. This change can trigger a reconfiguration of the desktop mail client or may involve a replacement of the client. It could also trigger changes in connection information, all of which must be tested and then preserved against future loss. Once again, a scripted installation system can greatly facilitate these types of changes. Some corporate changes are more subtle but have no less impact. A new Web application may be installed. The common belief is that Web applications leave no footprint on the client, and little planning is performed when such applications are employed. However, after the new application is installed, employees must find the new Web site and place it in their favorites. They log in and cache their credentials (quickly forgetting their user name and password). They download an Active X Control (often referred to as an OCX) or add-in that facilitates the use of the site. This installation is often unrecorded and undocumented. They begin a session that writes a set of cookies on their machines. Their machine then crashes and they lose their personal custom configuration. Although all of it can be rebuilt, the user is idled (and often frustrated) while they struggle to find someone who can help them find the URL, recover their user name and password, download the parts and re-build the session they began but lost when the cookies were lost. If the customized elements of this "footprintless" Web application were preserved in a backup, the original restoration would return the user to full productivity. Desktop backups that automate the tracking of these cookies, OCXs, and favorites can protect the user and minimize downtime if a catastrophic loss of the system occurs. Corporate standards also need to be enforced. The organization must keep track of the licensed software installed on all their desktops. Unauthorized software installations may violate licensing agreements, interfere with the performance or operation of the desktop, or cause other support issues. A system that can bring a desktop into compliance while leaving users able to do their jobs is invaluable. 52 Chapter 3 Software Vendors Vendors often trigger software changes. From simple security patches to service packs to full version upgrades, they are constantly changing their software, trying to make it better. Some changes are eagerly anticipated by users; others are dreaded and avoided. The upgrade can modify data files, making them incompatible with older versions of the software (and reducing the ability of the users to collaborate). An upgrade may re-install the application, erasing the custom configuration data. It may not work as expected and need to be removed. Some software may drive moving the user form their existing computer to a more powerful unit. All this impacts the backup and restoration of the desktop and needs to be planned for. Fear of loss of productivity often prevents users from upgrading. Sometimes the upgrades are already purchased but not applied because of the potential loss of the desktop during and after an upgrade. A system that ensures smooth transitions and that the desktop can effectively be restored makes these upgrades much less stressful. Business Partners Business partners and market conditions can also lead to change. If a new customer requires the exchange of information (invoices, specifications, inventories, and so on) in a specific format, it may be necessary to deploy a new application or upgrade to a new version of an existing application. If online payments need to be processed, software to support those payments may be required on the desktop to continue to do business. As partners change, there may be artifacts of old software installations left on the desktop. These files, or even running systems, consume resources and denigrate the performance of the desktop. A desktop restoration solution that could help keep the desktop running at its peak level can help maintain productivity throughout the organization. Regulatory Compliance Regulatory compliance can also force change. Legislation such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Public Company Reform and Investor Protection Act of 2002 (the Sarbanes-Oxley Act), and others may drive the need to change software. This can force upgrades and even the replacement of applications. Some of these regulations may directly affect the manner in which corporate data is secured. A desktop restoration system must adapt to these changes. Many systems help track the changes made to the desktop and can assist in validating that the desktop meets with corporate-mandated standards. 53 Chapter 3 Mergers and Acquisitions Mergers and acquisitions add new software suites to company rosters. Sometimes these applications are integrated into the corporate ecology; sometimes they must be replaced wholesale. It also requires ensuring that the desktop restoration can properly protect the data and applications found in the newly added desktop systems. These changes are often at the root of the most radical desktop changes. A merger can cause wholesale replacement of applications and upgrades (or even downgrades) of the OS to meet the common corporate standard. This can cause a great deal of change to a large number of desktops in a short period of time, so the risk to productivity is quite high. Leveraging the desktop restoration solution to minimize the risk and speed the conversion is quite prudent. Planning for Desktop Changes An examination of the historical reasons for software changes for an organization can show patterns of why software changes in that organization. Using that as a basis for planning future change can provide the management team the proper areas to watch so that they can proactively prepare, budget, and train for the inevitable evolution of the desktop. Once reasons for change have been identified, the likelihood of them occurring as well as their impact and risk should be quantified. This provides a framework for determining the investments that should be made to assure the transitions and upgrades go smoothly with a minimum of disruption to the business. Impact of changes is relatively subjective in foresight, but very real and potentially costly in hindsight. Anyone who has upgraded an accounting package that corrupted the files during the upgrade and found themselves in a position that they cannot move forward with the upgrade nor back to the old system understands the potential risk. Examine the following areas for change and consider their relative risk and the mitigation for each. Service Pack and Security Patches Typically, service pack and security patches provide little impact on the client. Most service packs are well tested before they are issued to the customer. Both the issuing software vendor and most organizations test before they deploy. They often make minor modifications to the application. As a result, users feel confident applying them. Some users rush to install service packs before they are certified, which can create their own set of issues. It can result in incompatible versions of data files that cannot be shared among users. If there is an unidentified incompatibility, it can break the application or other portions of the desktop. There can be a need to restore the desktop to the previous version when this occurs. There is a danger in assuming that all service packs are good. Some companies have been known, inadvertently, to rush a service patch out the door without sufficient testing and validation. Although the process is certainly more reliable than it has been in the past, there are still instances of service patches doing more harm than good. 54 Chapter 3 The safest practice is to perform a comprehensive backup prior to installation. If something should go wrong, a restoration can provide fast return of services. An investment of a quick backup can save a great deal of downtime if the application must be uninstalled and re-installed on the client. Some service packs have more impact than others. Some companies effectively re-install their applications when a service patch is installed. Although most will preserve the user's configuration, some return it to the factory default settings. If the vendor does not preserve the user customizations, there is little the desktop restoration can do to re-assert them. All service packs and patches should be tested in advance and their behavior noted before they are employed. Users should be notified of what to expect during the process. Version Upgrades Eventually, most software will be upgraded. After all, software companies continue to improve their products and provide users with reasons to invest more in the product to receive the increased value. The improvements often take full advantage of enhancements in the OS or underlying hardware. They meet the changing needs of users and organizations. With every change there is risk. Although most software versions upgrade smoothly, there are always those that do not. Testing before performing the upgrade mitigates that risk, but many companies have rolled out upgrades only to discover incompatibilities or unexpected side effects after deployment. Many version upgrades require extensive changes to the desktop (as least in regard to the application) and rollback can at times be challenging. They may make changes to registry keys. They may alter the manner in which personalization information is stored. They may move or delete cached credentials. Most application upgrades do not include a rollback. If the installation needs to be undone, the application must be removed entirely and re-installed as the previous version. A fresh installation means a loss of the previous personalization settings. The desktop restoration system provides a boon when an upgrade must be rolled back. A scripted system can automatically re-install the old application and then selectively re-apply the personalized information. The system can be automated to perform the re-installation quickly and reduce downtime. The mitigation of risk and protection of productivity provided by these solutions makes version upgrades much less worrisome. 55 Chapter 3 Protecting the Investments The cost of applications is often measured in licensing fees. It is simple to quantify those costs, but they do not paint the entire picture. Although most analysts agree that total cost of ownership (TCO) is a better metric, it is very difficult to quantify. The real measure of an application is the means by which it enhances the productivity of the individual users within an organization and helps optimize the manner in which they work together. Ultimately, this drives the underlying reason for software changes. The real investment is not actually in the software itself but rather in the work the user does with the software. Whether it is Microsoft Office files, data stored in application servers, or graphics generated in Adobe Photoshop, the work users do with their applications represents the artifact of their productivity. A strong desktop restoration solution seeks to preserve that work. Protecting User Productivity The desktop restoration solution can preserve that investment in several dimensions: • Much of the work done by individuals is manifest as files. The files can be preserved through backups. By preserving the files, the work of the users that produce them is preserved and protected. • To use software, a great deal of effort is expended to configure the applications. It may be in setting credentials. It may be in establishing connections to application servers. It may be in finding paths to data files. All these personalizations take time. And because they are not done repeatedly, they can be difficult to remember when they need to be re- created. The desktop restoration solution can preserve this information. A scripted system can also apply the personalization on demand to different hardware, making it portable. This protects one of the most valuable assets of an organization—the productivity of its workers. • Desktops become like homes. People place things in the corners and only get it out when they need it. As the desktop changes, it can be easy to discard items of great value because one does not remember that they were there. A desktop restoration solution can preserve those changes and restore them on demand. When old software is removed, it can be restored to use those files and perform that work on demand. 56 Chapter 3 Protecting Desktop Performance Another way desktop restoration can help protect assets is to provide a cleanup of the desktop. As most users discover after using the same desktop for a number of months or years, performance begins to suffer. The degradation comes as the system sustains change after change. The disks become full of unused files. Registries become bloated with unused keys. Applications are uninstalled but only partially removed. Over time, the operation of the computer becomes slower and slower. One of the easiest means of correcting this degradation is to perform a re-installation. Of course, a re-installation puts at risk all the personalizations that make the desktop more productive. A scripted re-installation system can re-install the system fresh. It installs only the current version of each OS element, application, and service pack. The solution can then reapply the personalizations it preserved in the backup. Once completed, the desktop operates cleanly. The automation protects many personalizations that are easy for a technician to miss if they perform the backup and restoration manually. Protecting Desktop Integrity Although counter-intuitive on the surface, sometimes software breaks. Software developers address repeatable errors, but sometimes an application just does not work in a given installation on a specific desktop. When that occurs, the first step in correcting it is to re-install the application. When individual applications need to be re-installed, a scripted desktop restoration solution greatly simplifies the process. A technician who is troubleshooting a problematic application can begin with system backup. The system can be restored its present condition, so he or she is free to make the necessary changes. Applications can freely be uninstalled and re-installed. The desktop restoration solution provides the means for restoring the personalizations without the technician breaching security to obtain passwords and credentials. A scripted restoration system can be used to surgically remove and restore applications in a smooth and secure operation. The key is to return the desktop to working order as quickly as possible. The desktop restoration system should provide protection so that the technician cannot make things worse than they are when the process begins. It should provide tools to allow the technician to rapidly change applications, un-installing and re-installing without fear of loss of personalization information. It should help distribute the individual components of the desktop readily on demand. By making the technician more productive, it preserves the productivity of the user who awaits the return of his or her computer to service. The corporation also needs to protect themselves. Enthusiastic users may install unlicensed software on their computers. They may download add-ins to their browser, install software from home, add shareware—install any number of bits of software to their desktop. This creates a number of problems. The organization can be held liable for any license violations. The downloaded and installed software may violate the security of the desktop. It can create performance problems for the user. It can also create support issues. Having the ability to bring a desktop back into compliance without losing personalization information can help reduce these risks and keep users working at top efficiency. 57 Chapter 3 Perfecting the Process The process of maintaining applications on the desktop can be a source of great frustration and risk for the organization. An upgrade to a Web browser that stops the sales force from using their CRM system or a flaw in an antivirus system that prevents a department from logging onto the network until the flaw is patched are examples of how significantly software maintenance can impact the organization. The process of software maintenance can be planned to reduce risk and preserve the productivity of the users who depend of the software. So much is at risk in this cycle, so the process deserves time to plan and ensure a smooth transition. Part of the testing of a software upgrade or service pack should include the testing of a rollback. By assuring the desktop restoration solution can quickly reverse the changes and that the staff is prepared to enact a rollback, any unforeseen difficulties can be addressed judiciously. The staff should also learn to leverage the desktop restoration solution to reinstall software applications. Different solutions will require different procedures to restore an application and its configuration information. It is also useful to know the specific procedures for uninstalling specific applications. Some things are removed more cleanly than others. By tracking the lessons learned from re-installation, the entire technical team can benefit. Software maintenance should be a reliable process with minimal risks. By integrating a desktop restoration solution that allows scripted installs of individual applications, the solution can mitigate risks, improve productivity, and protect the work invested by the users who ply these applications day by day. The proper product can simplify the installation of applications and free technicians from the burden of needing to know how to install and configure dozens of different applications (and eliminates the need of maintaining complex installation instructions). It also provides a centralized location for obtaining software installations. Changing Applications Desktops evolve to meet the needs of their users. Driven by the aforementioned reasons, the changes are inevitable. By leveraging the desktop restoration solutions, these changes can be made more securely and repeatedly. As the risk is reduced, there is a return in productivity because workers spend less time unable to utilize their desktops. Whether adding new applications, removing obsolete applications, or replacing one application with another, the key to success is making the transition safe and fast. The desktop restoration solution often provides the means of distributing applications in an automated manner. A scripted restoration solution can be used to help publish applications to the designated desktops quickly and efficiently. It also protects the desktop from unplanned disruption if the introduction of a new application prevents the user from being productive. 58 Chapter 3 Figure 3.3: The desktop restoration solution can help make changing applications safer and faster. Adding Applications Applications are added because the needs of the organization change or the role of the user changes. The application may add functionality or security or improve productivity for the user. They may help maintain regulatory compliance, improve collaboration, or bridge the gap between departments, divisions, or business partners. As the needs of the organization change, or the responsibilities of the individual user changes, the need for new applications becomes manifest. When adding applications, there are two primary scenarios to address: adding an application to a single desktop or rolling out an application to a multitude of applications. 59 Chapter 3 Single Desktop Installations When a single user needs an application they did not use before, it can be installed on their desktop manually or through an automated rollout. Desktop restoration solutions that provide scripted point installations of individual applications may provide this capability. The application is new, so there are no personalized settings to preserve. There may be configurations to set. These configurations may need to be set manually or may be scripted and preserved for use later. The desktop restoration solution can play two other key roles in deploying the application to a single desktop. First, sometime adding an application to a desktop can add unexpected instabilities to the desktop environment. The affect can be as simple as an inability to install the application to making other incumbent applications unstable to the dreaded Blue Screen of Death. By making a backup of the application, any untoward effects can be reversed by re-installing the desktop software. This provides a security net for the existing desktop and may help the technician if he or she needs to experiment with the application. A scripted desktop restoration has the added benefit of "normalizing" the desktop. As programs are added and removed, they often leave artifacts behind, from registry changes to older versions of dynamic link libraries (DLLs). Performing a scripted re-installation of the desktop installs all the software cleanly, removing those stray artifacts. The clean install may not suffer the same adverse affect of installing the application. The other issue to consider when installing a new application is to ensure that, once placed in use, its data is saved and unique configuration is captured and can be restored. Once the application is installed, configured, and tested, the desktop should be backed up. The retention policy will determine for how long the previous version of the desktop should be preserved. A desktop restoration solution that stores the requisite information for each application individually will store this additional information in a most efficient manner. Multiple Desktop Installations The real difference between single desktop installations and multiple desktop installations is a matter of scale. When rolling out an application to multiple desktops, it becomes prudent to test the application rollout on the prototypical desktop to detect any problems that may be encountered commonly on all desktops. The primary role that a desktop restoration solution plays in a mass rollout is to provide a means of rolling back the installation in the event of an unforeseen difficulty. Little causes more disruption than stopping all the desktops in a department because of trouble invoked when a new application installation goes awry. 60 Chapter 3 A scripted desktop restoration solution may also provide the means of distributing the new application installation. A comprehensive system that installs and restores installations can leverage a single configuration to place the application on the desktops and restore as required in the future. Many of these systems will also provide the means of updating the desktop software inventory system. This helps ensure corporate policy compliance and control licensing. It is not uncommon for an application to install smoothly on dozens, even hundreds of corporate desktops, and yet fail on a handful of desktops. As mentioned in single desktop installation, each desktop becomes, over time, a unique ecosphere of DLLs and registry settings. The desktop restoration solution may help these individual desktops by returning them to their pre-installation condition. Scripted restoration solutions can help by reinstalling the desktop from the ground up, thus resetting that ecosphere to the expected norm, without losing the individualized settings for that desktop. Removing Software For the same reasons that applications are added to desktops, they are also removed. A person who transfers from accounting to marketing no longer needs a copy of the accounting software. The company completes the merger of a new subsidiary and needs to remove their incumbent software once the new corporate software is installed. A relationship with a trading partner is discontinued, removing the need for a specific application used for collaboration. For a wide variety of reasons, software needs to be removed from time to time. When software is removed, there are two primary considerations. Unless the software is removed cleanly, it may interfere with the performance or stability of the desktop. Also, it is not uncommon to need to re-install the application to retrieve data from the obsolete application. Removing Applications Most modern applications include the means to uninstall themselves. Most of the time, the application removes itself just as it should. But there are times when the removal fails. There are a variety of reasons for a software removal to go awry, for example: • They attempt to remove DLLs that are locked by other applications • A DLL is moved or deleted and the un-installation program cannot compensate for the missing file • Registry corruption provides the wrong information Even when a software removal goes well, it may leave artifacts—everything from registry keys to DLLs to data files; the un-installation may not be clean. It may add inefficiencies to the operation of the desktop. A scripted desktop restoration solution can provide a solution to these potential difficulties. If the desktop can be reinstalled cleanly and quickly without any loss of personalization information, it can be scripted to re-install without the application that has become obsolete. A clean installation provides benefits such as improved performance and compliance with corporate standards. 61 Chapter 3 Retrieving Obsolete Applications When an application is obsolete, most organizations believe they no longer need the data the application managed. Frequently, however, organizations learn that they need to open that data once again and use it. Sometimes the decision is made to re-install the application and use it again. In some instances, an application is seasonal and can be removed when required (particularly if the same person is not likely to be the one to use it). The desktop restoration solution can mitigate the risk of re-installing and using applications that have been retired. First, the system can preserve the old data. By preserving the data and making it easy to locate, IT can quickly locate and return the data to the designated desktop. A scripted desktop restoration system can re-install the application as required. Past personalization can be saved and returned to the desktop. This will help the user return to productive use without spending hours configuring the application. Replacing Software When a piece of software is replaced by another piece of software from another vendor (or open source software), it introduces some interesting challenges. Although a new rendition of the software may offer many advantages (lower licensing fees, new functionality, enhanced productivity), there remains the need to protect the work performed with the old software. The desktop restoration solution can be used to ensure that the working product is protected while the new application takes hold and can help archive the data for future use. Data Format Conversion Mail programs support individual mailboxes and contact lists. A spreadsheet program may support reading the data file of another program. Eventually, these changes lead to converting files or data from the format in which they were originally converted to a new format. Often, the application handles the conversion itself. For instance, Open Office software can read files created by Microsoft Word. This works unless the files contain exotic formatting or are saved in a newer format than the program can read (for example, Microsoft Word 2007 .docx files). Microsoft Outlook files can be exported to common formats, such as .csv files, that can be read by other programs. Conversely, Outlook can read the more common file formats to import messages or contact lists. When moving data from one program to another, there are two principle means by way a desktop restoration solution can help. The solution can preserve the original files. In many cases, the conversion is made directly on the file itself. Such conversions should always be made on a copy, but things happen and sometimes the only copy of the files is used. The desktop restoration solution can protect a copy of the file. It also will routinely back up files in less common locations, such as Outlook post office files. If a conversion goes bad, the file can be easily restored and the conversion attempted a second time. Sometimes the source program is required to convert the file to a neutral format. A scripted restoration solution can restore the original application and allow the data to be converted. Then the application can be removed. The role of the desktop restoration system is to mitigate risk. By protecting files and providing ready access to the old programs, it provides assurance against unforeseen problems and errors in data conversion. 62 Chapter 3 Application Interoperability Application rollouts do not necessarily happen all in a day. It takes time for users to learn to utilize the new applications. They need to remain productive during the conversion process. The desktop restoration solution can play a role in helping the organization remain productive during the conversion process. If the conversion is going slowly and work needs to be performed, the desktop restoration solution can be used to restore the old application on selected desktops. A scripted restoration solution can be used to restore the application without otherwise disrupting the desktop. The solution stores the personalizations of the user, so it can be pressed back into productive use with little notice or configuration. OS Upgrades The OS provides the foundation on which the desktop is built. As OSs have advanced over the decades, more basic computing services are moved into the OS. As applications change, the OS continues to host them. The registry provides the location of application files and data files. The network subsystem supports network and Internet connectivity. The system secures the data and access to applications. There is a great deal of risk involved in migrating from one OS to another. The upgrade process for moving from one version of an OS to another has become smoother from one generation to another, but it still can prove problematic. Nothing reveals the individual nature of each desktop as does OS upgrades. Three systems will upgrade without incident and then a desktop will encounter an unexpected problem. The desktop restoration solution can mitigate the risk of moving between OSs. It can secure the functioning desktop so that a failure to upgrade does not disable the user. It can provide a clean installation that offers the maximum performance from the new desktop. It can preserve two configurations of the applications as they move from one OS host to another. 63 Chapter 3 Figure 3.4: The role of the desktop restoration solution in OS upgrades. Securing the Existing OS The obvious role in the upgrade of the OS is to ensure that, should something go amiss, the desktop can be restored to its original state. There is a variety of means to achieve this, but providing a backup of the desktop with a proven means to restore it is the simplest and most cost effective. Some organizations perform in-place upgrades of the OS. The applications remain intact and the OS is responsible for maintaining the application configuration and personalization settings. This approach works well, but if something goes wrong during the upgrade, it can result in an unstable or non-functioning desktop. OS upgrades invariably come with a warning that the desktop should be archived before the upgrade is performed in case something should go wrong. Some organizations purchase new hardware and transfer the data from the old hardware and old desktop to the new hardware on a new desktop. If the transfer goes badly, the old desktop remains available. This approach offers some logistical challenges. The user may be forced to juggle two distinct computers. If the transfer is accomplished over the course of days, it becomes difficult to keep the desktops synchronized. It forces some duplication of hardware throughout the organization. Unless a tool such as the easy transfer wizard is used, the application will not preserve their configurations or personalization information. Much of what is valued in the old desktop will be lost. A desktop restoration solution that can restore the old OS or any of the selected component applications and their configuration provides the greatest flexibility and security for upgrade. It can restore the applications and their individual configuration information into an OS. 64 Chapter 3 Replacing the OS There is more than one reason to replace an OS: • Hard drives fail and the desktop must be restored on a new drive or an entirely new system • OSs become unstable and the easiest means (perhaps the only means) of returning to functionality is a reinstallation • The result for an upgrade is to install the new OS fresh and then re-install the applications A scripted desktop restoration solution can provide the proper platform to re-build the desktop with a new OS. The desktop restoration solution can be used to perform a fresh installation of the operating system. This provides a clean slate on which the applications can be installed. The newly constructed registry will not carry any of the burdens from legacy installations or any confusing keys that serve as artifacts from an upgrade. Typically, clean installations provide better OS performance. Next, a scripted desktop restoration system can re-install the applications. Once again, these are fresh installations of the current version of the application. This can help clean up any previous upgrade artifacts and provide clear register keys for the installation. By installing the applications fresh, the desktop can be brought into compliance with the corporate standard, eliminating any unauthorized or unintentional software installations. Without these extraneous applications consuming system resources or disk space, the system will perform at its peak level. Also, the desktop can be re-certified and become compliant, hosting only corporate-approved and licensed software. Preserving the Personality of the Desktop The real key to maintaining productivity through an upgrade or OS replacement is to maintain the personalizations placed in the desktop to make it specifically useful to the user. The primary reason people fear re-installation of the OS is the loss of this personalization and configuration information. It often leaves users trapped in their OSs, suffering from poor performance and unwillingness to take advantage of the productivity enhancements a new OS can provide. A desktop restoration solution that cannot selectively reinstall applications, Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) drivers, Internet favorites, connections to corporate servers, and other personalized information can provide partial protection. It does, however, sacrifice many of the benefits that a scripted solution has to offer. The ability to restore not only data and applications but also custom configuration information, credentials, personal user preferences, and a wide variety of individual configuration data regardless of whether it is located in the registry, configuration files, or some other mechanism, makes a scripted desktop restoration system the best tool for moving a desktop to a new OS. Data, the key work product of the computer user, must be preserved and placed where users can find it. Access to server-hosted applications must be preserved. Unless users can be given a stable, familiar desktop environment in which to work, the loss of productivity will have a serious impact on the organization's bottom line. A well-designed desktop restoration solution can place that data and those connections where they belong quickly and efficiently, minimizing disruption and downtime for the users. 65 Chapter 3 Managing the Software Life Cycle All desktops change over time. Applications are added, upgraded, replaced, and removed. OSs are patched, upgraded, and replaced. During all these changes, a user still depends on the desktop to do their daily work. The task at hand is to provide a comprehensive solution that protects the ability of the users to perform their tasks. It should support changes to the desktop, making them secure and reversible. They should help the performance of the desktop without endangering the personalizations that make the desktop environment productive. A sound solution should include policies, processes, personnel, and products that help mitigate risk, protect productivity, and make the process of change safe and predictable. Figure 3.5: The desktop restoration solution requires policies, processes, personnel, and products to be successful. 66 Chapter 3 Policy There are key policy issues that deal directly with the support that the desktop restoration solution provides to desktop application evolution. The foremost is the retention policy. The length of time an old configuration is retained must be a balance between the resources used to store the desktop and the risk of deleting the data and settings. The decision becomes more complex when a large rollout occurs and many desktops have old versions of OSs, applications, and data files. Scripted restoration systems simplify the decision. The individual components of the desktop— the applications, data, and OS are distinct entities—so the amount of data retained is smaller. Only one item at a time is likely to change, so there is less data to choose to reserve with each individual change. The policy should also address the archiving of obsolete data files. As applications are removed from general use, their data can still be required. A scripted desktop restoration solution can restore the application and its data on demand, relieving the desktop of the burden of hosting them. One consideration is compatibility. As the OS changes and other applications are added to the desktop, they may become incompatible with the older application. All these elements must be elements in the decision of the retention policy. Most organizations license software and must track how many licenses are installed and in use throughout their organization. It is a matter of policy to determine who should have what software and where it is employed. A scripted desktop restoration solution will only re-install the authorized software for each desktop. This helps enforce compliance with the policy and control the distribution of the software licenses. It also ensures that users do not employ unauthorized software. Process To leverage the value of the desktop restoration solution when changing applications on the desktop, appropriate procedures must be enacted. Technicians may not be familiar with using the desktop restoration solution to help in the alteration of the desktop. Clearly defined processes will ensure the maximum potential of the solution while minimizing the risk of lost information and productivity. Each desktop change should be preceded with a clean backup. Doing so protects the assets of the desktop and provides a means of swift rollback in the event of an unplanned difficulty. When using a scripted desktop restoration solution, consider using re-installation as the means of deploying new software. There are several distinct advantages to a clean installation: • Clean installations do not move forward artifacts from previous installations that can affect desktop performance • A clean installation validates the software installed on the desktop and helps assure compliance with corporate policy • Clean installations may have fewer difficulties than upgrades, software removals, or other means of changing desktop software applications 67 Chapter 3 Troubleshooting applications can also be enhanced by using the desktop restoration solution. A scripted solution can restore a single application. It stores the personalization information for the application and can often correct problems through the restoration. It is also important to perform a backup after the change to the desktop. This protects the time invested making the changes. The retention policy will dictate how to balance preservation of the desktop before and after the changes have been made. Personnel The processes are only as good as the people who implement them. Many technicians have their own ways of doing things and may not be used to using a desktop restoration solution to help them. It may take time to help them adjust to using the tools. Once the technicians see the value of using a tool, they typically embrace it enthusiastically. The art of developing solid processes is to work with the technicians and determine how the tools really help. Modify the processes and policies based on their input so that, ultimately, the desktop receives the best protection and can be restored as quickly as possible. Some technicians will work better with the processes than others. Try to leverage their expertise by using them as mentors to help the rest of the technical staff embrace the best practices for a given organization. Product Throughout this chapter, there has been discussion of using the desktop restoration solution to help mitigate the risk of lost productivity when modifying user desktops. Any product that can back up a desktop provides a level of protection that changes made to that desktop can be rolled back. A desktop restoration solution that can provide scripted installation of applications and personalization information provides a great deal more protection. When troubleshooting applications, a scripted solution that provides point restorations can allow the application to be re-installed without loss of configuration or personalization. When an application is removed, the application and its data can be preserved and restored as required. When OSs are replaced, the scripted system can re-apply applications and their personalization data to a new OS. The entire desktop can be restored to its highest levels of performance and corporate compliance by performing a clean restoration. 68 Chapter 3 Summary The software on the desktop changes. From serving the changing needs of users, organizations, and other entities, the desktop must adapt to remain useful and secure. Those changes can put at risk the work performed by the users. The risk to produced work and the continuing productivity of the user can be protected by prudent use of the desktop restoration solution. A scripted solution that provides flexibility makes the solution more able to serve these needs. The previous two chapters have helped define the process of predictable changes in hardware and software and show how to leverage the desktop restoration solution to make these changes easier and mitigate the risks of lost work and productivity. The final chapter considers the role of the solution when things do not go as planned, and helps organizations plan for disasters of an individual or wide-scale scope. 69 Chapter 4 Chapter 4: Managing the Disaster Recovery Process When many people think of desktop recovery, it is in association with disaster recovery. The previous chapter explored how to lay the groundwork to use a robust, well-designed desktop recovery system to provide much more than disaster recovery. These systems can be integral in improving security, performance, regulatory and corporate compliance, and other aspects of hardware and software life cycle management. There is little question, however, that the desktop extends and enhances the ability of each employee to perform his or her individual tasks. The desktop preserves the work product of the employees, with files that can represent hundreds of hours of labor. That work space is housed in a set of hardware that can fail. It can be lost. It can be corrupted or erased. The customizations and configurations that make the desktop so productive for an individual is slightly more complex than bytes stored in the right place on the hard drive. All this investment is worthy of protection. This chapter will address the role that desktop restoration solutions play in disaster recovery. As with other chapters, it will look at the policies, processes, personnel, and products that help combine to ensure that, should a desktop become inoperable, it can be quickly restored. By protecting the work product and productivity of an organization's staff, the desktop restoration solution is the core of keeping the organization up and running: • Plan for disaster—This section will delve into the topics that an organization must consider when planning a disaster recovery system. By foreseeing the conditions that may be encountered and determining their potential disruption and cost, an organization can determine the level of risk they can endure and how much they can invest to manage that risk. • Administrate the solution—Many organizations who fail to recover from disaster fail to do so because they do not plan how to execute the restoration. This section will address establishing policies and procedures that ensure the system designed can fulfill its role. • Implement the solution—This section examines the steps typical in building out a desktop restoration solution. By examining a typical solution, it will illustrate the process of establishing the solution within an organization. • Leverage the solution—This section considers the process of maintaining a desktop restoration solution. It seeks to show how the process of regular maintenance of user desktops can be combined with disaster recovery to provide a solution that benefits the organization every day. 70 Chapter 4 Figure 4.1: Using the desktop restoration solution to protect the organization. Planning for Disaster For the purposes of this chapter, disaster recovery encompasses unplanned events that make a desktop unavailable for a user. To properly plan for such events, the types of unplanned events that may be encountered must be identified. For each level of problem, there must be a mitigation strategy that will return the desktop to service. There must then be planned activities to ensure that the data is secured and that it can be restored in a timely manner. Finally, the plan must include feedback so that the processes can be refined and the system continually improved. 71 Chapter 4 Figure 4.2: By planning for disaster, risks can be minimized. Identifying the Risks There are a variety of threats that place the desktop at risk. Their occurrence is unlikely but must be addressed or the productivity and work product hosted by the desktop can be lost. The desktop consists of parts. Each desktop is also part of the organization. By considering the components and their individual exposure, one can classify the risks to the desktop and better plan to protect them. Consider Figure 4.3 for how the various desktop components contribute to the desktop. 72 Chapter 4 Figure 4.3: By thinking of the area of risks, mitigations can be designed. File-Level Risks Files represent the fruits of the labor of an organization's associates. There are several ways that files can be put at risk and that the desktop restoration solution can be used to help. For the examination of this risk, the assumption is that the desktop is operating normally. The file is in some manner damaged or lost. Perhaps it was saved incorrectly. It may have even been saved in a location that the author cannot identify. Perhaps it was inadvertently deleted. Sometimes files are altered when they should not be. Perhaps the file was opened in a newer version of an application and saved in a format that is incompatible with the previous version. Perhaps changes were made that were unauthorized or inappropriate. An application may have been decommissioned, then a need to access the data discovered at a later date. The risk is that the loss of the file is the loss of the labor invested to create it. A virus or worm may have corrupted or deleted the files. Some of these risks are mitigated by document management systems, such as Windows SharePoint Services, FileNet, or Documentum. However, most users keep a number of files on their personal hard drives that never get stored in the document repository. Local desktop backup protects these files from loss without depending on the user to store them properly. 73 Chapter 4 Software-Level Risks There are a number of software risks for a desktop: • OS can experience difficulties. This can be due to lost or damaged executables or errors or conflicts when applications or service patches are installed. • Applications can be damaged in many of the same ways. Software patches can occasionally corrupt them and sometimes binary files are deleted or damaged. • OS patches can sometimes adversely affect applications. • Profiles can become damaged. Damage of a profile can do anything from making desktop shortcuts disappear from the desktop to making application files fail to operate correctly. • Security files can be corrupted. This can be encryption keys and certificates or cached credentials. Any of these losses can hinder the productivity of the desktop user. For more information about software risks, see Chapter 3. Hardware-Level Risks The hardware components in a personal computer or laptop can become defective. Sometimes their replacement is practical and the system can be left intact to continue to host the desktop. Sometimes not, such as in the case of a defective hard drive. Sometimes the more practical approach is hardware platform replacement. Other times the hardware itself may be lost. With the increasing popularity of laptop and notebook computers, the desktop is on the road where it is at risk of being lost, stolen, or damaged. The interface of the hardware to the rest of the desktop is driver software. Sometimes these drivers are deleted or damaged. Sometimes applying the wrong driver to a piece of hardware makes the desktop environment unstable. For more information about hardware risks, see Chapter 2. Site-Level Risks On occasion, natural or man-made disasters can destroy the physical location where the personal computer hardware that hosts the desktops is located. When this happens, all the work stored on a large number of desktops is endangered. Even if the site is intact but the machines cannot be accessed, the work that could be performed on those desktops is lost. 74 Chapter 4 Mitigating Desktop Disaster Risks As there are a variety of risks, there are a variety of mitigation strategies to reduce those risks. The desktop recovery solution should be designed to address the particular challenge of each level of the risk and respond quickly and effectively. Mitigating File-Level Risks The risk of losing files is easily mitigated by keeping copies of the files in a secure location. The type of desktop recovery solution will directly determine how quickly and easily this protection can be effected. A system that categorizes user data files and makes them quick to locate and restore makes restoration of lost files a minor issue. By simplifying the process of locating and restoring the file, the time lost while the file is unavailable is minimized. A system that minimizes the time spent by the technical staff to restore the file also reduces the cost of protecting the user's work. When designing the system and choosing the appropriate tools, consideration should be given to how long such a restoration will typically take and the cost of the time expended while the file is unavailable. Mitigating Software-Level Risks The most common solution for software issues is re-installation. The application must be removed (not always an easy or straightforward process). Then the current software patches must be re-applied. In some cases, an older version o the software must be installed and then a full version upgrade applied. Once re-installed, the software must go through re-configuration and personalization. Although this process can be managed manually by a service technician, it can be time consuming—costing the organization not only the time expended by the technician but the lost productivity of the employee who is denied use of his or her desktop. If the application is re- installed, any customizations made to the application for the sake of the user may be lost. More productivity will be lost as the application is reconfigured to serve the needs of the user. A desktop restoration solution can be devised that automates the re-installation of any application. Systems that use configured installs can minimize time spent by the technical staff. The consistency of a proven automated system can make things operate much more smoothly. A system that automatically stores the customizations made by the user—configuration files, credentials, preferences, and so on—and that can re-apply them on demand will further refine the process, saving time and reducing the frustration of the user whose desktop has been damaged. If a malicious piece of software has damaged the system (or some other event has made the OS unstable), the system may need to be restored from scratch. Again, a desktop restoration solution that can cleanly re-install the authorized and validated components that should be on the system is invaluable. Such a restoration eliminates unauthorized software that should not be installed in the desktop (and may have caused the original instability). A clean re-installation can also have the added benefit of improving performance. 75 Chapter 4 Mitigating Hardware-Level Risks If hardware is damaged, it can be repaired or replaced. The desktop restoration solution can be designed to help in a variety of ways. A desktop restoration solution can be used to distribute the appropriate hardware drivers to personal computers when changes are made to the installed hardware. They can also distribute drivers if the existing driver is damaged. If the hard drive is lost, or if it is determined that the hardware platform should be replaced, the desktop restoration solution can help migrate the existing desktop to the new hardware without loss of personalization information. A configured desktop restoration solution can re-install the OS and applications, making adjustments to the new platform during the installation. This can make the process of moving between two dissimilar systems more reliable and faster. One option is to migrate the desktop to a different, proven personal computer to get a working system back into the hands of a user as quickly as possible. Once they have the new system, the old system can be taken in for more detailed diagnosis and repair without imperiling the productivity of the user. Once the system is reconditioned, it can be used for the next user who has a system in need of repair. Mitigating Site-Level Risks All desktop restoration solutions ultimately store the data on the user's desktop in an alternative file storage location, typically attached to a server. If that server is stored in a different physical location than the personal computers it protects, it can be used to restore the desktops at a different location. If all the desktops are lost, they can be restored once new hardware is located. If they are merely inaccessible, critical desktops can be restored to minimize the impact of lost productivity. Designing a Solution The design of a desktop restoration solution involves considering the risks and their mitigations as stated earlier. There are multiple solutions to each of the discussed risks. Differing mitigation strategies have differing associated costs. An effective desktop restoration solution must balance the cost of the system with an estimated return on investment (ROI). Although the value of the desktop restoration solution beyond disaster recovery has been explored in the previous chapters, there is a point at which the solution should be reviewed as an insurance policy. The cost of the system must be balanced against the economic loss should a disaster occur. 76 Chapter 4 Evaluating the Risks Different organizations will have different levels of risk associated with their desktops. For instance, if an organization has a firmly established discipline of using a document repository to store the work product of its workers, file-levels risks may not be as important. If an organization issues primarily laptops as the personal computers used to host desktops, that organization's hardware risks may be elevated. The first step in the design of the solution, then, is to determine the requirements. By denoting the risks particular to a specific organization, as assigning a relative number to the risk, they can be prioritized. One approach is to list the risks, assign them a likelihood factor of 1 (very unlikely) to 10 (virtually assured). Then assign a similar factor for cost of 1 (very little cost to recover) to 10 (very expensive to recover). Multiply the two factors to determine the overall threat value of the risk. Then sort the list in descending order. The following spreadsheet shows how this might be accomplished. Figure 4.4: Threat modeling helps design the requirements for the desktop restoration solution. This example is relatively coarse and simplistic. A more detailed breakdown of specific risks should be undertaken to provide more specific requirements. Once the requirements have been listed and prioritized, the solution can begin to take shape. 77 Chapter 4 Choosing Mitigation Strategies With a list of risks and their relative priorities in hand, the available solutions can be evaluated. Each solution should be evaluated based on its ability to meet the risks at hand. One may be better at handling file backup, another at support for desktop migration. With an understanding of the likelihood and cost of each risk, it becomes easier to qualify which solutions best handle each scenario. The problem becomes more difficult when considering the cost of the solution, however. One restoration solution may cost only $20 per system on average, where another may cost $35. If the second can help in more areas of risk and reduce the time in which the systems it protects can be restored, it may well be worth the extra $15. The total cost to keep the desktop safe and workers productive will impact the bottom line of the entire organization. The next step is to consider the value of other services that the restoration solution can offer. If the restoration system can provide value in other areas of the organization beyond disaster recovery, this added value should be considered. If the restoration solution can be used to help troubleshoot desktop problems, help identify hardware or software for obsolescence, and help maintain corporate compliance on the desktop, these additional services should also be considered when making the choice of the proper solution. It is often difficult to quantify the value of the desktop solution. Most reputable vendors will have invested in case studies and development of objective evidence that shows the value of their solution. Third parties may provide studies that validate the claims of the vendor. Trade publications often provide evaluations and customer testimony as to the value of a solution. Often, current users of the system can be contacted to discover whether the system preformed as advertised. All these inputs help determine which solution is best for a specific organization. A checklist of the solutions available should include the following considerations: • The ability of the solution to mitigate the risks to the organization • The total cost of ownership (TCO) of the system, weighted by the risks involved • The added benefits offered by the system • The quality of the solution, as validated by third parties and solutions users Refining the Solution The best solutions often come from a clear understanding of the entire solution—the policies, processes, personnel, and products that will be implemented to create and operate the solution. Before committing to a solution, a clear understanding of the entire scope of the solution should be drafted. Preliminary plans for policies that need to be implemented; processes that will need to be monitored; personnel that needs to be hired, trained, and retained; and the ongoing costs of the products should be carefully examined. This step of mapping out all the elements of the solution serves as a double check before the solution is purchased. By thinking out the other portions of the solution beyond the purchase of the tools, management can better grasp the total scope of the solution they plan to craft. The key, prior to purchase, should be no surprises. 78 Chapter 4 Implementing the Solution Once the system is selected, it must be implemented. Although each individual system will have its own variations, there are some common factors that accompany all solutions. The processes used by the solution will impact the IT operational infrastructure. There are things that will happen on a daily basis that must be arranged so that they do not hinder existing activities. The solution should provide the full range of services as designed. Consider the steps necessary to put the desktop restoration solution in place and make it functional within the organization: • Building a solution infrastructure • Implementing the desktop backup processes • Planning the desktop restoration processes • Taking full advantage of the solution Figure 4.5: A well-executed implementation helps reap the full benefits from the desktop restoration solution. 79 Chapter 4 Desktop Restoration Infrastructure The desktop restoration solution will require an infrastructure on which it can operate. Each solution may use different methods, but there are common resources that will be implemented. Servers The solution will be required to store the data collected from the desktops. That typically requires a server and storage. There are several solution-specific considerations with the servers. Some solutions require dedicated servers on which to run. Using a dedicated server may increase the TCO—not only the expense of purchasing the hardware for this use but also in terms of operating and maintaining additional servers. The use of the servers must be considered in the solution. For many organizations, the servers will see their heaviest use during non-peak hours when users are not actively using their desktops and the desktops are backing up their data. This is often a time when application servers are less busy because the users are not actively using them. A multi-purpose server that serves the applications during the day and desktop backup at night may be cost effective. The location of the server is also relevant. If the servers are located at the same site as the desktop they back up, there is less protection for a site-level threat. Servers housed in a different site than the assets they protect can help mitigate additional risks. Storage Another consideration is disk storage. Backup of many individual desktops can take a considerable amount of space. The nature of the restoration solution will somewhat dictate this need. Some solutions make a complete copy of the hard drive. The amount of space and network bandwidth to execute such a solution can be prohibitive. The desktop restoration's ability to optimize storage is a key factor in its ability to contain the TCO. The files should be stored as efficiently as possible. The other consideration is the ability to retrieve only the files required to execute a particular restoration activity, such as the re- installation of an application and re-application of its configuration. Network The backup and restoration of data from the individual desktops to the server will require network bandwidth. The use of this bandwidth must be carefully planned to avoid interruption of normal activities within the organization. Most of the bandwidth used by the solution will be used for backup. It is best to perform backup when the process does not compete with the user for resources and when fewer files are open. For organizations that maintain typical business hours, this means backups will occur during non-working hours (typically at night). This also tends to be a time when less bandwidth is required, so it is good use of resources. Organizations that run 24-hour operations must carefully plan the use of the network to ensure that the backup of one set of desktops does not hinder another set of desktops from performing their tasks. If the backup of data is to a remote site, the affect on the wide area network (WAN) connections must also be considered. Different backup systems will require different levels of data transfer. A system that requires only the backup of new files or files that change will use less bandwidth than systems that require wholesale backup of the data on the drive. 80 Chapter 4 For organizations that have many diverse locations, consideration should be given to the placement of servers. If multiple servers can be placed at key locations throughout the organization, it may minimize WAN traffic, and thus reduce congestion and cost. Packages If the solution is a configured, installation-based solution, the individual components that comprise the desktop installation must be packaged. This requirement provides the restoration solution with the capability of installing distinct applications. In addition to allowing systems to be restored, it allows the distribution of new or updated software, and provides for future clean installs of the authorized software that composes the desktop. If the restoration system is based on copying drive images, this step of the implementation is unnecessary. Image backups can only replace a copy of the hard disk data; they cannot flexibly install only the required portions of the desktop on demand. The process of building the packages will vary depending on the tool chosen. It can be as simple as installing the application on a clean reference machine. The tool can monitor the changes made by the installation and automate the process of building a package that can install the application on any target machine. The packages can be used not only to perform clean restorations of the applications but also to build entirely new desktops as required. By performing a single installation, and recording the results, the tool any be able to reproduce that installation on any targeted system. Agents Most desktop restoration solutions will require the installation of an agent on the target desktop. The agents, once installed, will handle the scheduling of the backups of the individual desktops. The agents may also serve other purposes. The agents will inventory the resources of the desktop. By keeping accurate track of the hardware and software within the desktop, they have the potential of maintaining an accurate inventory of both. This can serve to track assets and validate regulatory compliance. The information can be used to help troubleshoot systems and keep up-to-date on the system changes without maintaining excessive paperwork. And the agents can help ensure that the software licenses are accounted for and placed where they belong. For most tools, deployment of the agent will be automated. Some tools will require that a list of machines be built in a database. Others will be able to query Active Directory (AD—or other directory listings of active computers on the network) for a list of the machines on the network. Almost all tools will have a provision for installing the agent manually on a machine. An organization will need to determine the most efficient means of distributing agents for the initial installation. Once installed, the agents will be used to help inventory the system and manage the process of scheduled backups for the targeted desktops. 81 Chapter 4 Desktop Backup The protection of a given desktop is only as good as the last backup. Backup requires the cooperation of the users in concert with the careful scheduling of resource utilization to ensure that data is protected with as little disruption as possible. User Policy Scheduling is a two-faceted issue. First, the users must be cognizant of the scheduling policy. Although the collection of data can easily be scheduled to happen automatically, if the computer is turned off, the scheduled event will not occur. If the data collection attempt happens when the user is in the middle of work, the user may well cancel the event to prevent any deterioration in the performance of the desktop. There will always be some users who resist, and there must be a clear policy in place to help them succeed in protecting their data and workspace. The issue becomes more complex with mobile computing hardware. Laptops and notebooks may not be connected to the network on a regularly scheduled basis. This may make scheduling the backup difficult. If users seldom connect, during the times of connection, they may object to devoting resources from their desktop to performing backups. They may not desire to stay connected long enough to complete the backup. If the users are remote and accessing the corporate network through a virtual private network (VPN) or lower-bandwidth connection, backups may take a considerable amount of time. Consideration should be given to the restoration to determine how it can be used to minimize the time required for a backup, especially if the backup must be performed while users are performing other tasks. There is also a point at which, by policy, users should be required to allow backup of their equipment to occur. Resource Utilization The other element to scheduling is the use of shared resources. The servers that perform the backup, if they are not dedicated to this purpose, should cooperate with the other workload managed by the server. Most servers will use a storage area network (SAN) to store the data. Most SAN arrays are shared among servers and must meet the needs of multiple workloads. Backups should be planned to work cooperatively with the SAN and place load on the SAN during times when the impact on other services will be minimized. Again, restoration solutions that minimize the amount of data stored and retrieved each night will help ease the competition for resources. The other major resource to consider is the network. If the backups clog the network and prevent users from being productive, the backup will add expense to the organization. This can be more critical if the backups are moved across limited, higher-cost WAN links. Solutions that can run automatically during non-peak times, and solutions that minimize the amount of data transferred, will help ease many of these issues. 82 Chapter 4 Archive Policy As backups accrue, so does the space they consume. Even using configured desktop backup solutions, the size of user data will continue to grow. A policy must be established to determine how long copies of data will be kept, and how many version of the files will be retained. As users re-organize and "keep up" their desktops, they move and delete files. To most desktop restorations solutions, deleted files can be marked in the system but are not deleted from the backup copy. An image-based backup system will not preserve deleted files, as these files are no longer part of the hard drive. Thus, if a file is accidentally deleted and the backup image replaced, the file is lost. IT must work with the tool to determine how to handle deleted files. The files can be deleted from the archive to save space or they can be retained for a period of time. They can also be archived to long-term storage. This policy must be established so that the process of dealing with deleted files can be configured within the system. Restoring the Desktop The process of restoration is somewhat dependent on the type of desktop restoration system implemented. If the system is dependent on the restoration of a complete drive image, there is little flexibility to be had. In the event of a disaster, the entire drive must be restored. If, however, a configured desktop restoration solution has been implemented, several restoration scenarios open up. These expanded restoration options allow a more flexible approach to restoring the desktop, especially if the entire system or hard drive is not lost. File Restoration If all that is lost is a single file or folder, certain desktop restoration solutions allow the restoration of just the missing files. This is expedient and helps protect users from inadvertently deleting valuable work artifacts. It can also protect from files becoming accidentally damaged or altered. 83 Chapter 4 Application Re-Installation If the only issue with a desktop is an errant application, the application can be re-installed by a configured desktop restoration solution. The re-install will replace the application binaries and restore the configuration and customizations associated with the application. Application patches can be applied in a similar manner. If an application patch or upgrade goes awry, the new software can be uninstalled and the previous version reinstalled using the previous installation package. This helps protect the desktop from losing the application. And sometimes a clean re-installation of the older version of the application paves the way for a clean patch installation or upgrade. Hardware Changes If the restoration of the desktop requires the modification of hardware, there are drivers and support applications that will need to follow the change. A configured desktop restoration solution can make that software readily available to the technical staff. It makes the changes go swiftly and minimizes human error. Administrate the Solution Most organizations carefully consider the cost of purchasing a desktop restoration solution. They count the price of the software, servers, storage, and other bits of hardware they will need. Many organizations will capitalize such expenses, and thus want to minimize them so that they appear to have less impact on the bottom line of the organization. But the real value and cost of the solution lies in how it is used day-to-day. Many backup solutions are purchased and then left to languish because there is no staff to maintain the system or ensure that it is operational and doing its job. Some lower-cost solutions cut corners on initial cost by moving burden to the individual users to be disciplined to perform their own backups and monitor their success or failure. Still other organizations surrender the value of the solution by not being able to effectively perform restorations as required, even if the backups exist. A well-designed solution should be simple to monitor, easy to use for restorations, and flexible when changes occur within the organization. If the solution cannot be operated and maintained easily, it will soon lose its value to the organization. 84 Chapter 4 Figure 4.6: The true cost and value from a solution are measured in its ongoing use. Monitoring Monitoring backups is a tedious task. It is easily overlooked. It really is not important until a disaster occurs and then it is discovered that the lost desktop has not has a recent backup. Monitoring also involves keeping track of the infrastructures components—in particular, the storage systems used to safeguard the desktop data. 85 Chapter 4 Desktop Backup Monitoring Monitoring must be overseen by someone who is empowered to take action to ensure that backups can be successfully captured. Those who monitor the solution should be able to discern the cause of the failures, whether it is technological, such as a bad backup agent or network connectivity issue, or whether it is a matter of user non-compliance. A missed backup here or there is likely not an issue. (Of course, Murphy prefers to throw his wrench into systems that have not been backed up.) A policy that clearly defines the organization's tolerance for missed backups and steps used to correct missed backups will help smooth operations. The quality of the desktop restoration tool also plays into this. The ability to remotely administer the agents located on the desktops and adjust schedules easily to match changes in conditions within an organization can help ensure that the data is backed up. Several steps can help reduce these hurdles: • Minimize the impact that the backup process has on users • Help users overcome difficulties they experience in complying with the backup policy • Ensure that no technology issues prevent the backup from occurring (firewalls, network bandwidth issues, and so on) The true cost of the solution, in this case, is impacted by the ease or difficulty in assuring the backups are secured. Policy must be created to ensure that the backups are collected. Most tools will make sure that a process exists to automate the process. People must be tasked to enforce the policy and oversee the process. And the product selected to perform the backups must be robust enough to meet the needs of the organization. Some organizations provide their users the ability to backup manually but do not enforce the backup policy. This has little cost until a restoration is requires and no backup exists (Murphy likes to choose the unprepared as his victim). The cost of this sort of restoration solution can only be measured in the lost work and productivity incurred from such a breach. Infrastructure Monitoring In addition to assuring that the individual desktops are backed up, the infrastructure components should also be monitored. This includes monitoring the servers, shared resources, and time to perform the entire backup 86 Chapter 4 Servers The servers must be kept operational for the backups to run. Although most restoration solution components are quite stable, they should not be ignored. The most common issue is a lack of drive space to store the backups. Drive space should be monitored on a regular basis and changes to the space considered. As will all things involving archives, the amount of space required and the space consumed will grow consistently. The growth of space will depend on the restoration solution employed. Systems that minimize redundant storage of data (such as OS and application binary files) will require less storage. The other step that will affect the total space used is the archive policy. The length of time that deleted files are kept online will determine how much space will be required for backup storage. If files are moved to offline storage, systems to track where the archived files are stored will depend on the tools and processes used by the solution. Shared Resources Some desktop restoration solutions can share servers with other applications. This is advantageous for reducing hardware and software licensing costs and making efficient use of IT resources. When this is the case, it is important to schedule backups during times when the other application services are in a period of limited demand. This will minimize the impact of the backup on the organization's application infrastructure. The key resource to consider is the network. By their nature, backups are best performed during times of reduced user activity (after business hours). When users are not actively using their desktops, there is typically more local bandwidth available and thus less business impact. The desktop restoration solution itself impacts this as well. Solutions that back up only the minimal daily changes made to the desktop will transmit less data and thus impact the shared resources in a reduced manner. For organizations that run 24 × 7, backups may be required while users are actively using their desktops. For such circumstances, solutions that minimize the time and resources spent copying changed data may be the only practical answer. Time The total time required to perform the backups may also come into play. For most organizations, there is a window of time during which the backups should be performed to minimize impact. If the time required to perform the backup exceeds that window, it will begin to impact other business activities. Many desktop restoration solutions can be distributed so that the backups can be performed in parallel. Particularly solutions that can use shared servers are attractive because more servers can be used to collect the backup data simultaneously. This shortens the total window. Distributing servers at key points within an organization's network infrastructure can also help contain network bottlenecks. Locating servers on key subnets can reduce network congestion and help control the utilization of WAN links. 87 Chapter 4 Organizational Changes Organizations change over time. They move from one facility to another. They open new facilities. They acquire companies and need to expand and integrate their operations. These changes can have a direct impact on the operation of the desktop restoration solution. A well- conceived solution will make expansion and reconfiguration to meet these changes smooth and efficient. There are several considerations that must be made to meet the requirements for changes in the organization. First, the software requirements are seldom constant. This will necessitate testing and configuring the system to accommodate different software. For a configured restoration solution, the ease at which packages for new software can be implemented plays a key role. Changes in site and network configuration should be assessed. If a new site is added to the organization, what is the impact of the changes to the solution? The cost of taking restoration management of a large number of desktops should be considered one of the costs if the organization is growing, opening, or acquiring new facilities or rapidly expanding staff needs. The solution should be dynamic and allow the addition of servers and collection points to facilitate the growth of sites. The overall capacity of the solution should be considered. The overall administration of the solution can come to play in this. How easily is the solution administered as it grows? Can multiple, independent locations be managed from a single location? The cost of personnel to oversee the solution and the level of automation it employs will strongly affect the value delivered by the system. Another consideration is the overhead of bringing a large number of new desktops into corporate compliance when an acquisition occurs. This can span obsolescing software packages, removing unauthorized or unlicensed software, and rapidly deploying new applications without destroying the personality encapsulated on the existing desktop. A solution that can inventory desktops and re-install corporate-compliant desktops can be a great boon to an organization that makes an acquisition. 88 Chapter 4 Leverage the Solution The key use of a desktop restoration solution is to protect the work artifacts and productivity of the users of those desktops. Although the solution should always protect those objectives, there are many other benefits that these solutions may offer. To receive the full benefits of the solution, the organization should consider these benefits and determine what value they may provide. The first step is to use the solution in the manner in which it is designed. When personnel change who do not know how to leverage the solution or who have their own means of accomplishing tasks, they may begin to shift away from using the solution. Perhaps as the solution is first rolled out, portions are not used (such as desktop re-platforming). When the time comes to use the solution in that manner, it may not be used because the technical staff is unfamiliar with the process. Diligence is required to demonstrate the value of the solution and use it to its fullest potential. Although each solution will vary in the benefits that it offers, there are some additional features that can add a great deal of value. These, and other benefits, should be considered as the solution is designed, implemented, and used each day. Figure 4.7: Leveraging all the value of the solution reduces its overall cost. 89 Chapter 4 Inventory Most organizations work to comply with software licensing laws. But it can be difficult to manage software assets. Systems are required to track licenses. There can be significant cost savings by re-allocating licenses removed from one desktop and then applied to another. A desktop restoration solution that manages the software on the desktop can detect unlicensed and unauthorized software installed on that desktop. It can be used to keep an accurate inventory of the licenses currently installed. It can also provide detection of unauthorized software installed on the desktop. Distribution A configured desktop restoration solution can be used as a tool to distribute OS patches and upgrades, application upgrades, and distribution of new applications. It may work in conjunction with the inventory system to track where those licensed are installed. The desktop restoration solution can be used to build new desktops by distributing the software used on them. This allows for flexible distribution of software when it is purchased or rapid re- configuration when companies are acquired and new desktops are added to the environment. It can be used to migrate desktops from one hardware platform to another (for more information about this, see Chapter 2). It allows the desktop to exist as a flexible collection of digital entities that can be materialized on any required platform with network access. Compliance A solution that tracks inventory and can distribute software can be used to ensure that desktops remain within corporate and regulatory compliance. The inventory can make sure that the software on the desktop is the software that is supposed to be there. A configured desktop restoration solution can also be used to return a system to compliance. It can be used to re-install the desktop software, including only those elements that are in compliance. This simplifies the process of keeping the desktops safe and the organization legal. Summary In the information age, much of the work performed by employees is stored on their personal computer desktops. The product of their work is often files that rest on the hard drive. Their ability to interact with other systems within the organization is a set of software applications, network access, credentials, and other elements of that desktop. If the desktop fails to serve the employee or the work files are lost, it has a direct impact on the employee's productivity and the bottom line of the organization. A desktop restoration solution that can capture and protect the work environment of the user can mitigate the risk of lost time and work for their workforce. A flexible, well-designed solution can go beyond the bounds of simple file protection and add value to the hardware and software life cycle management in the organization. The solution is a confluence of policy, processes, personnel, and products. When these are brought together through careful planning, implementation, administration, and ongoing improvement, they can protect the assets and productivity of the organization's workforce. 90 Chapter 4 Download Additional eBooks from Realtime Nexus! Realtime Nexus—The Digital Library provides world-class expert resources that IT professionals depend on to learn about the newest technologies. If you found this eBook to be informative, we encourage you to download more of our industry-leading technology eBooks and video guides at Realtime Nexus. Please visit http://nexus.realtimepublishers.com. 91
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