Server Backup

As with the majority of Washington University, our servers are backed up to tape on a daily basis. For most of Internal Medicine servers, this process starts at 6:00 p.m. on weekdays and all files changed within the previous 24 hours are backed up. On Friday nights, a complete backup is done on all servers and this continues throughout the weekend.

Both of the Internal Medicine e-mail servers are backed up between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. Monday through Friday. These two servers are perhaps the most used servers in Internal Medicine. Our reasoning behind this later start for these servers is because the backing up process does slow down access. Although the heaviest usage of e-mail is during the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., e-mail access certainly continues well into evening hours. The hours after midnight are the lightest periods for e-mail access and this is why this period was chosen. E-mail is still functional during this four-hour period, but access will be slower than normal.

Computing Support Services
Department of Medicine
Washington University School of Medicine