I bestow upon you... KNOWLEDGE.

[dangeris]

I seem to recall something about assumptions earlier.

Tell you what Dangeris. Since I'm getting a vibe that you already know the answer to your own question, I'll answer that question for a trade, in order to prove this process mutually beneficial, since it's now become obvious to me that we're both working professionals for the DoD.

Say, for example, you have a program with a feature (known henceforth as "the backup service") that is designed to backup information to an external source (in this case, the external source is irrelevant.) The program is designed to create SEVERAL (and I capitalized that because SEVERAL = @$$load) XML files, put them into a zip file, and then ship them off. For some inexplicable reason, the program's backup service just stops working. The user has tried workarounds such as wiping the machine and reimaging it, which have only worked temporarily. The program works like a champ for a few backup cycles, and then reverts back to the failed state where the backup service just stops. What is causing the backup service to stop?

I wouldn't ask you how to implement a fix for this for several reasons, one of which being because I wouldn't want to bore you with something I do everyday.

For me to answer that question I need to know what OS is this software running on. I run all my backups via cron job on a solaris10 server and I have NEVER had an issue (knock on wood), thus your problem leads me to believe that you are running it on a Microshaft platform. I can't begin to count how many times a backup job will go smoothly for a couple of cycles and all of a sudden *Poof* It stops working. If this is on a MS platform, experience has taught me to look first at permissions. Is the BU being ran with the proper permissions levels? If that checks out, registry under HK Local machine. You mentioned that the person dealing with this has tried wiping the PC and reinstalling a new image. Is this from scratch or BU tape. Performing the latter will only re-install what was wrong in the first place. If it is from scratch, such as a new server image, then I would have to ask about the backup s/w itself. Is it home grown or COTS product. For it to stop working all of a sudden sounds like bad code. However another avenue to check is how is the backup being ran...via manually or schedule. I had a Veritas Backup Exec running on a 03 server and all of a sudden it stopped working. If I ran it manually, it would complete without a hitch. However, if I schedule it via schedule task, it would die as you are experiencing. I was able to fix it by saving off all of the backup data, unistalling the S/W (including registry settings), creating a new user with administrative rights, re-installing the S/w and assigning the new user the proper permissions.

Hope that made sense and that we didn't haze people eyes over with this...

[dangeris]

"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!"

ROFL and I did not google that.

Correct! Awesome movie!

[RicerX]

For me to answer that question I need to know what OS is this software running on. I run all my backups via cron job on a solaris10 server and I have NEVER had an issue (knock on wood), thus your problem leads me to believe that you are running it on a Microshaft platform. I can't begin to count how many times a backup job will go smoothly for a couple of cycles and all of a sudden *Poof* It stops working. If this is on a MS platform, experience has taught me to look first at permissions. Is the BU being ran with the proper permissions levels? If that checks out, registry under HK Local machine. You mentioned that the person dealing with this has tried wiping the PC and reinstalling a new image. Is this from scratch or BU tape. Performing the latter will only re-install what was wrong in the first place. If it is from scratch, such as a new server image, then I would have to ask about the backup s/w itself. Is it home grown or COTS product. For it to stop working all of a sudden sounds like bad code. However another avenue to check is how is the backup being ran...via manually or schedule. I had a Veritas Backup Exec running on a 03 server and all of a sudden it stopped working. If I ran it manually, it would complete without a hitch. However, if I schedule it via schedule task, it would die as you are experiencing. I was able to fix it by saving off all of the backup data, unistalling the S/W (including registry settings), creating a new user with administrative rights, re-installing the S/w and assigning the new user the proper permissions.

Hope that made sense and that we didn't haze people eyes over with this...

Fantastic.

Windows environment... home grown backup software technically. and you were totally barking up the right tree with admin priveleges to an extent. If you're totally curious, I'll finish up the solution in another post.

lol out of respect, I will concede and say I will have had to pull out my MIS 465 books to begin to answer your question. hahaha

[IBCoupe]

But the real answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything? Google.

Incorrect. The answer is properly given as "Forty-two." Better luck next time.http://poorly.ytmnd.com/

[dangeris]

Fantastic.

Windows environment... home grown backup software technically. and you were totally barking up the right tree with admin priveleges to an extent. If you're totally curious, I'll finish up the solution in another post.

lol out of respect, I will concede and say I will have had to pull out my MIS 465 books to begin to answer your question. hahaha

Well at least i was barking up the right tree..in the right forest..get it forest..windows domain..nevermind

No need to pull out the MIS books. I already know the answer as you already suspected. I'm a Network Engineer by trade and although I do have my CCIE in Routing and Switching and Internet Security, I also have my MCSE (NT4, 2K and 03) and MCP+I. I'll be taking the CISSP exam shortly as this is needed if one is to be working on government networks.

Just out of curiosity, are you running a network Backup? a good work around is to write a good ftp script to do an mget and dump it to a folder that will be backed up. You could always retrieve the data with another source if need be. Just throwing it out there...

[Deanerjr]

ill let this answer your question:

omfg. where the hell did you get that sticker? ai needz MOAR.

[RicerX]

Well at least i was barking up the right tree..in the right forest..get it forest..windows domain..nevermind

No need to pull out the MIS books. I already know the answer as you already suspected. I'm a Network Engineer by trade and although I do have my CCIE in Routing and Switching and Internet Security, I also have my MCSE (NT4, 2K and 03) and MCP+I. I'll be taking the CISSP exam shortly as this is needed if one is to be working on government networks.

Just out of curiosity, are you running a network Backup? a good work around is to write a good ftp script to do an mget and dump it to a folder that will be backed up. You could always retrieve the data with another source if need be. Just throwing it out there...

At the time (before I came on board), the backup was written in house because of the need to fully customize it (some detailed requirements I can't go into). There are more efficient ways to do it, but that's way above my head. haha I'm sure you know how that goes.

[DaCoupe]

12/12/12