Filed under: Knowledge | Tags: business continuity, business continuity software, business disaster, business impact analysis, Continuity of Operations, COOP, disaster preparation, disaster recovery, disaster recovery software, KingsBridge Disaster Recovery, Phoenix software, sharepoint
Welcome to another “Feature of the Week” update. Keeping up to date (pardon the pun) on the most current DRP/BCP plans for your organization is critically important. As we all know, keeping DRP/BCP plans current and accurate is an ongoing challenge. Ensuring that everyone involved in acting upon those updated plans when disaster strikes however is probably even more important, if not more challenging. Having a DRP/BCP Team Member working with out-dated recovery plans can do more damage than the disaster itself. Therefore keeping Team Members current on plan changes and providing them with access to the active plan it very important.
Phoenix for SharePoint leverages Microsoft SharePoint’s ability to send email notifications to Team Members whenever DRP/BCP plan documents are created, changed, or deleted.
How It Works
First, we have configured Phoenix for SharePoint to leverage the SharePoint Server’s Outgoing E-Mail Settings configuration. SharePoint uses the Internet Information Service’s Simple Mail Transfer Protocol feature, which needs to be configured first. Once the email SMTP service is configured on the SharePoint server then we configure SharePoint to support outgoing email in the Central Administration tool. This configuration is done by the SharePoint Farm Administrator.
Once this is configured we are ready to proceed from an Team Manager or Team Member perspective to receive immediate email notification whenever changes are made to active DRP/BCP plans. That’s right, a Team Manager can assign a Team Member to receive notification to plan updates.
In Phoenix for SharePoint the Plan Editor is used to edit and modify DRP/BCP plans. These plans are then published to a Published Plans Document Library. Team Members can subscribe to email notifications for a Document Library. The desire to receive plan update notifications is configured within any SharePoint Document Library or List and can be done by a Site Owner or Site Member.
The Team Member can decide what kind of Notifications they want to receive, the level of change detail the notices are based upon, the frequency in which the notifications are sent, and when they are sent. A Team Manager can also decide which Team Members should receive the notifications.
When an email is sent this is what the Team Member receives.
Notice that within the email is a direct link to “View” the new or updated document. In the image above the Team Member would simply click on the “View Team_Response.pdf” URL link to open the updated document. There are also other active URL links that will take the Team Member directly to the Phoenix for SharePoint solution site.
But wait a second….. not without security you don’t. That’s right. Just because a Team Member received an email notifying them to a new or updated DRP/BCP plan doesn’t give them direct access to the plan without proper security credentials. When the Team Member clicks on the email active URL they will be prompted for their secure login credentials.
Once the Team Member logs in securely they will then have access to the new or updated DRP/BCP plan.
With the DRP/BCP plan now open at the local client workstation it can of course be saved locally so that the Team Member has access to the most recent plan in the event that disaster does actually strike the next day.
Of course Phoenix for SharePoint supports other custom features that can be implemented such as Workflows that forward full copies of updated plans to off-site locations in order to ensure that Team Members always have access to current DRP/BCP plan documentation. Please feel free to ask us about additional customization that can be implemented to accomplish your specific requirements.
Phoenix for SharePoint Team
About KingsBridge
KingsBridge offers private businesses and government organizations a unique combination of industry knowledge and cost-effective disaster recovery / business continuity solutions. KingsBridge products and seminars provide the tools to assess possible threats and create tailored plans which mitigate risks and minimize losses in the event of a disruption to business. KingsBridge is headquartered in Ogdensburg, New York, with an office in Ottawa, Canada. For more information visit us at www.DisasterRecovery.com.
Leave a Comment so far
Leave a comment
