If you are like most IT professionals, you either cannot live without your handheld device or are supporting users who feel the same way. Handheld devices have rapidly become an extension of our everyday work lives and so it’s no surprise that data backup is a critical exercise.

Within the confines of a company’s network, data stored on desktops and network devices are generally backed up routinely, but how do you guarantee the ever-changing data stored on the multitude of mobile handhelds you are supporting is getting backed up?

Ongoing education is necessary to ensure that users understand how volatile their mobile information is and how regular backups will help guarantee that sensitive or critical data is not lost.

 The first step

While the old adage of backing up data to a tape drive or additional hard drives is still a tried and proven technique, it does not fully address handheld devices and our need for more mobility with our networks.

Without a wireless connection, handheld devices are not directly connected to the standard "backup" system (see Figure A) and can be lost in the overall scheme.

Figure A

This is the standard backup approach in which data from a desktop is saved to a network server and typically onto a tape drive.

The standard "backup location" for handheld devices is a user’s local hard drive. Yet this creates a problem when data is swapped back and forth from the desktop to handheld devices. If it was not for the standard "syncing" program that most handhelds feature even the basic address book and calendar information might never get properly saved.

The problem lies in the storing of applications and data files on handhelds, which may not be covered by the standard sync programs, and the data being stored only on the user’s local PC. Remember—in the world of handhelds—your backup information is only as good as the last time you synchronized it. An even greater challenge is the syncing and backing up of users who are away from the office for extended periods of time.