Plan for backup and recovery (Search Server 2008)

  • Article

Applies To: Microsoft Search Server 2008

 

Topic Last Modified: 2009-08-26

Note

Unless otherwise noted, the information in this article applies to both Microsoft Search Server 2008 and Microsoft Search Server 2008 Express.

In this article:

  • Disaster Recovery

  • Migrating Data

  • Choosing what to protect

  • Choosing backup and recovery tools

The most common business scenarios supported by data backup and recovery are as follows:

  • Disaster Recovery — that is, recovering from an unexpected failure or disaster.

  • Migrating Data between installations as part of a staging process.

Determine which scenarios your business requires you to address, and then determine how you will address each one.

Disaster Recovery

Disaster recovery, which includes planning and preparing for how to restore your Microsoft Search Server 2008 implementation after a failure or disaster, is a key part of business continuance planning and risk management.

When you plan for how you will use backup and recovery for disaster recovery, consider common events, failures, and errors, and also local and regional emergencies.

Common events, failures, and errors

Common events, failures, and errors that require you to back up or recover sites include the following:

Circumstances that take a Search Server site offline are best dealt with by setting up a system with redundant components that fails over gracefully. For more information, see Plan for redundancy (Search Server 2008). Moreover, recovering from common failures often involves a combination of redundancy, availability, and backup and recovery techniques.

Local emergencies

Depending on your need for availability, you might want to have redundant farms within your region to which the system can fail over. If you do not have redundant farms, we recommend that you store recent backups offsite so that you can quickly obtain equipment, rebuild, and restore your farm in the event of a fire, flood, or other catastrophic event. A farm-level backup is often appropriate for this purpose.

Regional Emergencies

To prepare contingencies for regional emergencies, you might want to put contracts in place for emergency server rentals in another region. We recommend that you store recent backups outside of your region so that you can quickly obtain equipment, rebuild, and restore your farm. As with local emergencies, a farm-level backup is appropriate for this purpose.

Migrating Data

You can use backups to move data to a different server.

Move Data to a different server

Using backup and recovery to move data to a new server is a common process. When you plan to move content between servers, consider the following:

  • Is this a one-time or recurring action? If it is a one-time action, perform the backup and recovery manually. On the other hand, if you want regularly to move data between servers, plan for an automated and scheduled process, taking into consideration the potential disruption to end-users.

  • Is this a temporary or a permanent move? If you are moving your content permanently to a new server, review the planning information at Plan for performance and capacity (Search Server 2008).

For more information, see Move and migrate servers and server farms (Search Server 2008).

Choosing what to protect

Within a farm, there are many components that require protection:

  • Content stored in SQL Server databases

  • Content stored in external storage devices

  • Shared services, such as the search service database and index

  • Configuration settings for Microsoft Search Server 2008 that are stored in IIS and the configuration database

  • Customizations

  • Binary files for both the operating system and Microsoft Search Server 2008

Protecting content databases

Search Server 2008 content is stored in Microsoft SQL Server databases. We recommend that you back up all content databases by using one of the following tools:

  • Search Server built-in tools

  • SQL Server tools

  • Third-party tools that are built on supported Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and SharePoint Products and Technologies, such as the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS).

Your backup and recovery strategy should address each of these components on the servers in the system.

Protecting content stored in external data sources

An external storage API is available for Search Server 2008. The external storage API lets you store documents or files on an external storage application other than Microsoft SQL Server. You cannot use the backup and recovery tools built in to Search Server 2008 to back up data that is stored in external data sources. However, you can use the Stsadm export and import operations. For more information about export and import, see:

Search content for Microsoft Search Server 2008 is stored in both the [Shared Services Provider name]_Search_DB database and in the search index file. Because search data in the database and index must be synchronized, you should only back up search using SharePoint Products and Technologies tools such as the Stsadm command-line tool, or Central Administration backup and recovery, or tools that are based on the SharePoint VSS, such as Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007. These tools synchronize the database backup with the search index file backup, and both can be restored together. For more information about these tools, see Choosing backup and recovery tools later in this article.

We do not recommend that you back up the search databases by using SQL Server, because the search indexes are not stored in SQL Server and cannot be synchronized with the search database after a database-only backup. If you must restore a search database backed up with SQL Server tools, Search Server must re-create the index and perform a full crawl of the content.

Search consists of the following services:

  • Office SharePoint Server Search. Enables searching of content that is defined as searchable.

  • Windows SharePoint Services Help Search (optional). Enables searching of the Help system that is built into Search Server 2008.

Each service is used to crawl, index, and query content, and each service uses a separate index.

You must back up the search databases and indexes in the system to be able to restore search.

Protecting SSP databases

Configuration information for Search Server 2008 SSPs is stored in Microsoft SQL Server databases. We recommend that you back up all SSP databases, except Search databases by using any of the following tools:

  • Office SharePoint Server built-in tools

  • SQL Server tools

  • Third-party tools that are built on supported APIs and SharePoint Products and Technologies, such as the VSS.

The tool that you select to back up your SSP databases determines the granularity with which you can restore objects from a database. For more information about choosing tools, see Choosing backup and recovery tools later in this article.

Protecting configuration settings

To make sure that you can restore your configuration after a disaster, you must protect IIS configuration settings and configuration settings for Search Server 2008.

Protecting and recovering IIS configuration settings

You can set IIS configurations in IIS Manager or on the Central Administration Web site. IIS configurations are stored in the IIS metabase on each front-end Web server in the system.

You can also set IIS configurations on any front-end Web computers that are running Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services.

IIS configurations include the following:

  • Application pool settings, including service accounts

  • HTTP compression settings

  • Time-out settings

  • Custom Internet Server Application Programming Interface (ISAPI) filters

  • Computer domain membership

  • Internet Protocol security (IPsec) settings

  • Network load balancing settings

  • Host header entries

  • Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates

  • Dedicated IP address settings

We recommend that you document all IIS configurations for each front-end Web server, if you can do this, by using a tool that provides Desired Configuration Monitoring (DCM).

Protecting and recovering the configuration database and the Central Administration content database

Configurations in Search Server 2008 are set in Central Administration and stored in the configuration database.

Important

Although the configuration database and the Central Administration content database can be backed up, restoring backups of the configuration database and Central Administration content database taken from a running farm by using the tools built in to SharePoint Products and Technologies or SQL Server is not supported.
This is because data in these databases may not be synchronized with data in other Search Server 2008 or Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 databases. If this data is not synchronized, users might experience various random errors. Therefore, the tools built in to SharePoint Products and Technologies do not recover these databases during a farm-level restore operation.

You can recover a farm, including the configuration database and Central Administration content database, in the following ways:

If the configuration and Central Administration content databases of a farm become unsynchronized, you must re-create both databases by using the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard or the Psconfig command-line tool.

To protect the configuration database and Central Administration content database:

We strongly recommend that you document all configuration settings and all the customizations so that you can correctly re-create the configuration and Central Administration content databases.

Configuration settings in Search Server 2008 that you should document include the following:

  • Application pool settings, including service accounts (all accounts that run as Web applications, including the crawler account and the search account)

  • Alternate access mapping settings

  • Farm-level search settings

  • External service connection settings

  • Workflow management settings

  • E-mail settings

  • Antivirus settings

  • Usage analysis processing settings

  • Diagnostic logging settings

  • Timer job settings

  • HTML viewer settings

  • Recycle Bin settings and other Web application general settings

  • Administrator-deployed form templates

  • Default quota templates

  • Database names and locations

  • Web application names and databases. Be sure to document the content database names associated with each Web application

  • Crawler impact rules

  • Activated features

  • Blocked file types

Protecting Customizations

Customizations to sites can include the following:

  • Master pages, page layouts and cascading style sheets; these objects are stored in the content database for a Web application.

  • Web Parts, site or list definitions, custom columns, new content types, custom fields, custom actions, coded workflows, or workflow activities and conditions.

  • Third-party solutions and their associated binary files and registry keys, such as IFilters.

  • Changes to standard XML files.

  • Custom site definitions (Webtemp.xml).

Protecting solution packages

We recommend that you use solution packages when possible to deploy site customizations. A solution is a container for one or more customizations. Solutions can contain features, Web Parts, security policy changes, and other files, together with a detailed guide that allows the automated deployment to the file system by the deployment mechanisms in SharePoint Products and Technologies. Solutions include IFilters. Features are parts of solutions that can be enabled by the server administrator against the farm, a specific Web application, a specific site collection, or a specific Web site. For more information about solutions, see: Solutions Overview.

You can use solution packages to simplify the backup and recovery process. Back up each solution package, both onsite and offsite, and then, in the event of a disaster, redeploy the solution to the appropriate servers.

Protecting customizations that are not packaged as solutions

For systems in which customizations are not or cannot be packaged as solutions, backing up and restoring customizations is a more complex process. The following table lists the locations where customizations are often stored on front-end Web servers.

Location Description

%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Shared\Web server extensions\12

Commonly updated files, custom assemblies, custom templates, and custom site definitions. In particular, the Web.config file is often modified.

Inetpub

Location of IIS virtual directories.

C:\WINNT\assembly

Global assembly cache (GAC). The GAC is a protected operating system location where .NET Framework code assemblies are installed to provide full system access.

Consult with your development team or customization vendor to determine whether your customizations involve additional add-in software or files in other locations. We recommend that you back up these directories by using the Windows Server backup utility.

Protecting binary files

In the event that you must restore a system, we recommend that you reinstall the operating system, Search Server 2008, and software updates. Keep copies of all the operating system, software, and software update media both onsite and offsite.

Choosing backup and recovery tools

The tools that you decide to use for backing up and recovering the system are based on your needs, constraints, and on the service level agreements (SLAs) that you have with your customers.

Key things to consider in determining which tools to use include the following:

  • Backup type supported (full, differential, incremental)

  • Completeness of recovery and types of objects that can be recovered

  • Complexity of managing the solution

  • Ability of the solution to adapt to your maintenance window and database size

In some business situations, you may be able to use a high-availability solution, such as database clustering, log shipping, or mirroring—to meet your data protection and recovery needs. For more information about planning for high-availability solutions, see Plan for availability (Search Server 2008).

Available tools

The following table lists Microsoft tools that you can use for disaster recovery.

Tool Source of tool User Interface Backup type Level of backup and recovery Notes

Search Server 2008 Central Administration

Built-in

Graphical

Full and differential

Farm

Web application

Shared Services Providers (SSPs), including Search database and Search index

Content database

Cannot be used to schedule backups.

As part of a farm backup, can back up the configuration database and the Central Administration content database, but will not restore them. For more information, see Restore a farm after a configuration database problem (Search Server 2008).

Cannot back up directly to tape.

Search Server 2008: Stsadm.exe backup and recovery operations

Built-in

Command line

Full and differential

Farm

Web application SSPs, including Search database and Search index

Content database

Site collection

Can be used with Windows Task Scheduler to schedule backup jobs.

Can back up the configuration database and the Central Administration content database, but will not restore them. For more information, see Restore a farm after a configuration database problem (Search Server 2008).

Cannot back up directly to tape.

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Backup and Recovery

  

Graphical

Full and differential

Content database

Configuration database and Central Administration content database

Can be used to schedule backups.

Can back up the configuration database and Central Administration content database, but restoring is not supported. For more information, see Restore a farm after a configuration database problem (Search Server 2008).

Not recommended for use with search, because indexes are not stored in SQL Server. If used for search, requires a full crawl on recovery.

Can back up directly to tape.

Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007

    

Incremental

Farm

Database

SSP, including search database and search index

Site

Content item

Can be used to schedule backups.

Can back up files and folders containing customizations.

Can back up directly to tape.

Can back up the configuration database and Central Administration content database, and restore as part of a farm recovery. For more information, see Restore a farm after a configuration database problem (Search Server 2008).

Windows Server 2003 Backup tool (Ntbackup.exe)

  

Graphical

Full

Specified folder and file

Can be used to schedule backups.

Can back up files and folders containing customizations.

Windows Server 2008 Backup

  

Graphical

Full

Specified folder and file

You must configure specific registry keys for Windows Server Backup to work. For more information, see Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 does not appear in the list of the components that can be backed up when you use Windows Server Backup in Windows Server 2008 in the Microsoft Knowledge Base.

Built-in backup and recovery tools

Search Server 2008 provides two built-in backup and recovery tools: Central Administration and the Stsadm command-line tool.

The following figure illustrates how built-in Search Server 2008 backup works. A backup is triggered from either Central Administration or the Stsadm command-line tool. The Central Administration application pool writes files to the specified file server and triggers a SQL Server database backup to the same file server. The path provided to the backup is the location of the folder created for the backup (spbr0000, spbr0001, and so on).

Illustration 1: Search Server 2008 built-in backup

Built-in back up and recovery tools

The following table compares the functionality available in the built-in backup and recovery tools.

Functionality Central Administration Stsadm command-line tool

Backup the server farm

Yes

Yes

Recover the server farm, except the configuration and Central Administration databases

Yes

Yes

Recover the configuration and Central Administration databases

No

No

Back up Web applications

Yes

Yes

Back up an SSP

Yes

Yes

Back up site collections

No

Yes

Back up content databases

Yes

Yes

Back up customizations

No

No

Schedule backups

No

Yes, if used with Windows Task Scheduler

Performance

Your hardware configuration and the size of the database, site collection, or Web application that you are working with can significantly affect the performance of the built-in backup and recovery tools.

Note

Search databases can become very large. One way to manage the size of your search backup is to ensure that the database index is defragmented. You may want to use the defragmentation script provided in the Microsoft Knowledge Base article How to defragment Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 databases and SharePoint Server 2007 databases (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=102795&clcid=0x409).

If your system exceeds the following limits, or if backing up your system exceeds the maintenance window that you have available, we recommend that you consider using external backup and recovery tools, such as Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Backup and Recovery or Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007.

  • Content databases larger than 100 gigabytes (GB)

  • Site collections that are larger than 15 GB that you want to back up by using the Stsadm command-line tool

Recovering the configuration database and Central Administration content database

Configurations are set in Central Administration and stored in the configuration database.

Important

Although the configuration database and the Central Administration content database can be backed up, restoring backups of the configuration database and Central Administration content database taken from a running farm by using the tools built in to SharePoint Products and Technologies or SQL Server is not supported.
This is because data in these databases may not be synchronized with data in other Search Server 2008 or Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 databases. If this data is not synchronized, users might experience various random errors. Therefore, the tools built in to SharePoint Products and Technologies do not recover these databases during a farm-level restore operation.

You can recover a farm, including the configuration database and Central Administration content database, in the following ways:

  • You can use farm-level backups of a running farm taken with System Center Data Protection Manager to recover an entire farm, including the configuration database and Central Administration content database. For more information, see How to Recover a Windows SharePoint Services Farm.

  • You can restore a backup of the configuration database and Central Administration content database taken from a fully stopped farm. For more information, see Move all databases (Search Server 2008).

If the configuration and Central Administration content databases of a farm become unsynchronized, you must re-create both databases by using the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard or the Psconfig command-line tool.

To protect the configuration database and Central Administration content database:

Central Administration

Central Administration provides an easy way to back up your Search Server 2008 system.

The processes that are running and the accounts that they are running as —the Central Administration application pool and the account that the SQL Server services is running as — must be granted permissions to write to the directory that you are backing up to. To perform a backup, you must be a member of the Farm Administrators group. To run a recovery operation, you must be a farm administrator and a member of the Administrators group on each front-end Web server. For a detailed overview of preparing to back up, see Prepare to back up and restore a farm (Search Server 2008).

You can back up and recover at various levels: The highest level is the entire farm and the lowest level is a content database. Full and differential backups are also available. The backup and recovery jobs for Central Administration are run by the SPTimer service.

Using Central Administration to back up and recover your system provides the following benefits:

  • Ability to back up and recover at the farm, Web application, SSP, and content database level

  • Restorable backups for Search

  • For backups that initially run 17 hours, the system automatically restarts the backup and allots an appropriate amount of time for the process (longer than 17 hours)

Using Central Administration to back up and recover your system has the following limitations:

  • As part of a farm backup, Central Administration backs up but cannot restore the configuration database or Central Administration content database. For more information, see Restore a farm after a configuration database problem (Search Server 2008).

  • Does not provide scheduling functionality.

  • Cannot back up directly to tape; the backup location must be a UNC path or local drive.

  • Does not automatically delete old backup files; you may want to use the backup file deletion script provided in Clean up backup files (Search Server 2008).

  • Does not back up any configuration changes, including:

    • IIS settings including host headers, dedicated IP addresses, and SSL certificates

    • Alternate access mappings

    • The inetpub directory

    • Application pool settings, including service accounts (all accounts that run as Web applications, including the crawler account and the search account)

    • Farm-level search settings

    • External service connection settings

    • Workflow management settings

    • E-mail settings

    • A/V settings

    • Usage analysis processing settings

    • Diagnostic logging settings

    • Timer job settings

    • HTML viewer settings.

    • Recycle Bin settings and other Web application general settings

  • Does not back up any customizations, including:

    • The %COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Shared\Web server extensions\12 directory

    • Any customizations made to the Web.config file

    • Default quota templates

    • Blocked file types

    • Administrator-deployed form templates

    • Database names and locations

    • Web application names and databases. Be sure to document the content database names associated with each Web application

    • Crawler impact rules

    • Activated features

  • If a backup or recovery job is not successful, the unsuccessful job must be manually deleted from the Timer job list on the Backup and Restore Status page. If the failed job is not deleted manually, subsequent backup or recovery jobs will fail.

For more information about using Central Administration, see the following resources:

Stsadm command-line tool

Search Server 2008 includes the Stsadm command-line tool for administration of servers and sites. You can use the Stsadm backup and restore operations to protect and recover your data.

The account that you use to run the Stsadm command-line tool must be a member of the Administrators group on the local computer, as well as a member of the dbowner fixed database role in SQL Server.

The Stsadm command-line tool has the following benefits:

  • Provides the ability to back up and restore at the farm level, Web application level, or site collection level.

  • Provides restorable backups for Search.

  • Can be used with Windows Task Scheduler to schedule backups.

  • For backups that initially run 17 hours, the system automatically restarts the backup and allots an appropriate amount of time for the process to perform (longer than 17 hours).

The Stsadm command-line tool has the following limitations:

  • As part of a farm backup, the Stsadm command-line tool backs up, but cannot restore the configuration database or Central Administration content database. For more information, see Recovering the configuration database and Central Administration content database.

  • Site collection backups affect performance and can cause access errors. They are not designed to be used when the server is under active load. Site collection backups can be slow when working with collections larger than 15 GB. We recommend that you use database backups if you are working with site collections larger than 15 GB.

    Note

    If you want to individually back up a site collection that is larger than 15 GB, we recommend that you move it to its own database, and then use a database backup.

  • Cannot back up directly to tape. The backup location must be a UNC path or local drive.

  • Does not provide automatic deletion of old backup files. You may want to use the backup file deletion script provided in Clean up backup files (Search Server 2008).

  • Does not back up any configuration changes, including:

    • IIS settings including host headers, dedicated IP addresses, and SSL certificates

    • Alternate access mappings

    • The inetpub directory

    • E-mail settings

    • Recycle Bin settings and other Web application general settings

    • A/V settings

    • Usage analysis processing settings

    • Diagnostic logging settings

    • Timer job settings

    • HTML viewer settings

  • Does not back up any customizations, including the following:

    • The %COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Shared\Web server extensions\12 directory

    • Any customizations made to the Web.config file

    • Default quota templates

    • Blocked file types

For more information about the Stsadm command-line tool, see the following resources:

External backup and recovery tools

You can protect Search Server 2008 by using other Microsoft backup and recovery tools. These include the following:

  • Microsoft SQL Server 2005

  • Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007

  • Windows Server Backup tool

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Backup and Recovery

The SQL Server databases used by Search Server 2008 contain site content and are therefore key components to protect. If your company has database administrators who back up other SQL Server databases, you may want to include the databases used by Search Server 2008 in your standard processes. The following list describes the benefits and limitations of using SQL Server backups.

Benefits:

  • Existing SQL Server data protection strategies can be re-used

  • Full and differential backups can be configured to have added verification

  • Can be faster than Search Server 2008 backups

  • Can back up directly to tape

Limitations:

  • Can back up running instances of the configuration database and Central Administration content database but restoring is not supported. For more information, see Recovering the configuration database and Central Administration content database.

  • Should not be used to back up the search database, because the search indexes are not stored in SQL Server and cannot be synchronized with the search database after a database-only backup.

  • Requires that you manually reattach your databases to Web applications after a recovery.

  • Cannot be used to recover at any level smaller than a database. Recovering a single item using a restored database can be complex.

  • Does not back up any configuration changes, including the following:

    • IIS settings including host headers, dedicated IP addresses, and SSL certificates

    • Alternate access mappings

    • The inetpub directory

    • E-mail settings

    • Recycle Bin settings and other Web application general settings

    • A/V settings

    • Usage analysis processing settings

    • Diagnostic logging settings

    • Timer job settings

    • HTML viewer settings

  • Does not back up any customizations, including the following:

    • The %COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Shared\Web server extensions\12 directory

    • Any customizations made to the Web.config file

    • Default quota templates

    • Blocked file types

For more information about how to use SQL Server backup and recovery, see the following resources:

Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007

Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager 2007 enables disk and tape-based data protection and recovery for servers in and across Active Directory directory service domains. System Center Data Protection Manager performs replication, synchronization, and recovery point creation for reliable protection and rapid recovery of data by both system administrators and by end-users.

System Center Data Protection Manager can be used to protect Search Server 2008 in addition to Office SharePoint Server 2007; Microsoft SQL Server 2000 SP4, SQL Server 2005 with Service Pack 1 (SP 1), SQL Server 2005 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) or SQL Server 2008; Exchange Server 2003 with SP2 and Exchange Server 2007; Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 with SP1 and its virtual machines; Windows Server 2008 operating system; files on workstations and laptops running Windows XP Professional with SP2 or SP3, and all Windows Vista editions except the Home Edition; files and application data on clustered servers; and the server system state.

The following list describes the benefits of this tool.

Benefits:

  • Provides the ability to back up and restore at the farm, database, Web application, site, or content item level.

  • Provides the ability to back up and restore directories that contain customizations.

  • Can be used to back up and recover the server system state, including IIS configuration settings.

  • Farm-level backups taken while the system is running can be used to recover a farm, including the configuration database and the Central Administration database. For more information, see Recovering the configuration database and Central Administration content database.

  • Can back up to tape.

  • Requires less processing on the server.

  • If System Center Data Protection Manager has not already been purchased for your environment, you may require additional funding and equipment.

  • Protecting search requires scripting. Consult the topics below for updated guidance.

For more information about installing, deploying, and configuring Data Protection Manager, see System Center Data Protection Manager 2007.

System Center Data Protection Manager can be used to recover content items, sites, Web applications, and farms. For more information, see the following resources:

Windows Server Backup

You can use the Windows Server Backup tool to back up your home directories, Web.config file, custom assemblies, customizations, site definitions, and list definitions.

Note

If you are using Windows Server 2008, you must configure specific registry keys for Windows Server Backup to work. For more information, see Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 does not appear in the list of the components that can be backed up when you use Windows Server Backup in Windows Server 2008 in the Microsoft Knowledge Base.

The Windows Server Backup tool has the following benefits:

  • Provides the ability to back up and restore directories that contain customizations; for more information, see Choosing what to protect.

  • Can back up to tape

The Windows Server Backup tool has the following limitation:

  • Cannot be used to back up databases, farms, Web applications, or Search

Third-party solutions and custom tools

Based on the needs of your business, you may want to choose a third-party solution or build a custom tool to meet your backup and recovery needs.

Third-party solutions

To find third-party solutions built by Microsoft partners on technologies supported by Microsoft, visit Solution Finder .

Solutions built on Volume Shadow Copy Service

The Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) was introduced in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. VSS is a framework that facilitates communication between applications, storage subsystems, and storage management applications (including backup applications). This framework enables you to define, persist, and use point-in-time copies of storage data. The Windows SharePoint Services VSS Writer enables a requestor to ask a front-end Web server to provide a VSS backup (full or differential), and Search Server 2008 then points the requestor to the SQL databases and the search index to be backed up by using VSS. For more information about VSS, see the Microsoft Developer Network article Volume Shadow Copy Service. You can download the Volume Shadow Copy Service SDK 7.2 from the Microsoft Download Center.

See Also

Concepts

Recommendations for data protection and recovery scenarios (Search Server 2008)