[sims] Restoring SIMS after complete Disaster recovery to new hardware?

[reggiep]

As part of our disaster recovery procedure I thought it would be a good idea to try to restore our SIMS server to another machine and document the process so that if we did, God forbid, have to recover for real, we would know what we were doing!

 

I have reinstall Server 2003 with ASR on to a workstation my SIMS server set up but I can't access the SQL Database.

SQL management studio will not connect to server\sims instance.

 

This is where I fall down as I have no SQL training and limited experience with it.

 

I'm not sure if I just need to restore the databases which have been backed up via script and then i should be able to connect or if I need to set up SQL itself first?

 

Can anyone suggest how they may have done this or how I could do it?

 

Thanks

[reggiep]

Have you opened up SQL for remote connections?

 

SQL Server Manager>Right-click your server>Properties>Connections>Allowremote connections should be ticked.

 

Next, if the taget backup server hasn't had a sniff of SIMS before, you'll need to install the SIMS server setup on it. Just go ahead and install a blank database (you can delete it later). This should prepare your SQL server for the SIMS databases when it comes to the restore.

 

I'm not sure if my original post made sense. I have restored a copy of my sims serv er to a new machine, which is not in any way connected to original SIMS server's network. The machine is a full restore of the original server, so SIMS is installed on it already.

 

I can't right click on my server as I can't connect to it!

[reggiep]

I'm a bit lost. When you say you restored the server what exactly did you do?

 

I used my ASR backups to restore the a new machine as a duplicate of my SIMS server. I then restored all files to all drives with my full backups. I would have thought that I would have then been able to just use the machine as if it was the original SIMS server but no!

 

When I go into SQL server management studio I browse to the local machine and try to connect to machinename\SIMS with the local sa user but the connection fails.

I am getting an error about target machine activley refusing connection but the target is the loacl machine!!

[reggiep]

No, that won't work. You should install SQL on the server by hand then run the SIMS server routines.

Then you'll be ready to try your SIMS restores.

 

Ok, So even though I have restored the server to a new machine I have to install SQl again!

Once I have done this I should install SIMS again?

I'll have to dig out the media and give it a go

[teejay]

I used my ASR backups to restore the a new machine as a duplicate of my SIMS server. I then restored all files to all drives with my full backups. I would have thought that I would have then been able to just use the machine as if it was the original SIMS server but no!

 

When I go into SQL server management studio I browse to the local machine and try to connect to machinename\SIMS with the local sa user but the connection fails.

I am getting an error about target machine activley refusing connection but the target is the loacl machine!!

 

If it's connected to the school network and the same name as your existing SIMS server you'll have a big problem as you'll have 2 machines with the same name and the dns lookup will point to the other machine, plus you'll have a conflict in AD with 2 machines with identical names. Make sure the machine you are doing the restore on is named differently to your existing SIMS server and rejoin it to active directory, plus make sure the dns entry is valid.

The other problem you may be having is if the sql database hasn't been backed up properly as the file will be in use, you would either have to stop the database service and backup the database then restart it or use backup software which has a proper SQL agent.

[reggiep]

If it's connected to the school network and the same name as your existing SIMS server you'll have a big problem as you'll have 2 machines with the same name and the dns lookup will point to the other machine, plus you'll have a conflict in AD with 2 machines with identical names. Make sure the machine you are doing the restore on is named differently to your existing SIMS server and rejoin it to active directory, plus make sure the dns entry is valid.

The other problem you may be having is if the sql database hasn't been backed up properly as the file will be in use, you would either have to stop the database service and backup the database then restart it or use backup software which has a proper SQL agent.

 

It's OK. The machine is not connected to the network at all!

This would be for if the whole school went up in flames and we needed to quickly access sims data away from school.

[teejay]

Make sure the machine has a record in its host file for the name and ip of the machine, otherwise it may not be resolving it's own name.

Also, try using dbattach to detach and reattach the database.

[webman]

What happens if you connect it to a lone hub/switch, so it's IP address is at least active? AS teejay said - it could just be an issue of not being able to connect to itself.

[reggiep]

Ok, I have taken the restored sims server off the domain and renamed it to sims.

I have connected it to the network so it has an IP address.

I have edited the hosts file to point 127.0.0.1 to sims and it's local ip to sims.

Still will not coonect to sql server management studio???

[teejay]

Are the SQL services running?

Try going to add/remove programs and doing a repair of SQL.

[reggiep]

Seriously, I'd start again.

 

It's had some weird stuff done to it, ASR restores, renamed; the poor thing is probably schizophrenic. If it lets you down when you need it, what then?

 

I might have done in a different sitiution BUT this is a practice for the real event if it ever happened. This is a bind but I need to try to do this so in the real event I could do it again!

 

Although I have made a few alterations I have kept notes for now and future reference.

 

I do appreciate everybody's help in this, honest!

[splattthecat]

A normal Widows backup will not back up open files on the server (including the SIMS SQL database files, and the SQL Master database) so it is normally neccessary to re-install SQL after a restore. These are some backup packages that do allow sql to be backed up while live.

 

When re-installing SQL I have found it is best to make sure that the server is named as you want it before installing SQL, as renaming the server after sql is installed has caused some problems in SIMS in the past.

[reggiep]

Well I'm further on now! I reinstalled SQL on to the server and that started to look more promising.

I then restored both my SIMS and FMS databases which all look fine within SQL management studio.

My final hurdle seems to be that neither SIMS or FMS will let me log in?

I am using the usersnames that were definately on the system when it was backed up but still no luck.

 

Can anyone help with this one?

 

Thanks

[reggiep]

OMG that worked. I bow down before you jinnantonnix!!

 

My question now, so many questions, is could I do something similar for FMS

[reggiep]

I don't use FMS, so no help there, I'm afraid.

 

Oh well it was worth a punt!

 

Thanks again for all you expertise. >_<

[matt40k]

FMS just loses passwords... I'm amazed when it actually remembers them. Why I backup the MASTER db.

[reggiep]

FMS just loses passwords... I'm amazed when it actually remembers them. Why I backup the MASTER db.

 

If I were to restore the MASETR db would that help me log in to FMS?

[reggiep]

Don't panic!!

I'm retoring databases left right and centre at the moment!

 

I am waiting for a suppossed master username and password from my Local Authority support!