Mail processing computer automatic recovery system and method
View Patent ↗An improved method and system to return a mail processing control computer back into operation after a hard drive failure. A first phase is a back-up process for the primary drive of the mail processing computer. A second phase is the recovery process when a primary hard drive failure occurs. The back-up process includes copying the primary drive to be protected to a spare backup drive. The data copied to the backup drive reflects data of the primary drive at a particular point in time. Once the backup drive is installed, the machine returns to normal operation. In the course of normal operation, incremental changes to the primary hard drive are recorded to a backup computer. When there is a failure of the primary drive, a new primary drive is installed in its place. An image of the backup drive is then copied to the new primary drive, thereby causing the new primary drive to reflect the original primary drive at the particular point in time. Next, the incremental changes recorded in the backup computer are updated to the primary drive from the backup computer.
1. A recovery method in a mail processing system for recovering from a failure of a primary drive of a mail processing computer, the method comprising:
copying the primary drive to a backup drive, said copying reflecting data of the primary drive at a particular point in time;
recording incremental changes of the primary hard drive to a backup computer;
upon failure of the primary drive, replacing the primary drive with a new primary drive;
copying the backup drive to the new primary drive;
updating the recorded incremental changes from the backup computer to the new primary drive;
installing and maintaining the backup drive in the mail processing computer;
disconnecting power and data cables from the backup drive after the step of copying the primary drive to the backup computer, and
reconnecting power and data cables prior to copying the backup drive to the new primary drive.
2. The recovery method of claim 1 further including a step of rebooting the mail processing computer from a floppy drive after installing the backup drive, the floppy drive including a memory device having software for copying one disk drive to another.
3. The recovery method of claim 1 including a step of rebooting the mail processing computer from a floppy drive after installing the new primary drive, the floppy drive including a memory device having software for copying one disk drive to another.
4. The recovery method of claim 1 further including installing incremental backup software on the primary drive prior to copying to the backup drive, and configuring the incremental backup software to backup incremental data to the backup computer.
5. The recovery method of claim 4 , after replacing the primary drive with the new primary drive, and copying the backup drive to the new primary drive, invoking a copy of the incremental backup software on the new primary drive to initiate incremental update of data on the new primary drive from the backup computer.
6. The recovery method of claim 1 wherein the step of updating incremental changes includes updating data recorded by the backup computer from the particular point in time until data recorded just prior to failure of the primary drive.
7. The recovery method of claim 1 wherein the step of recording incremental changes includes recording incremental changes for a plurality of networked mail processing computers to the backup computer.