IT Tips & Tricks

29 March 2021

The Cost of Loss: Data Over Diamonds

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Your IT department may be a hive of activity, with people talking to one another or on their phones, water-cooler conversation happening over in the corner and perhaps some low-key chuckles as Bob and Bill exchange a joke. However, barely whisper the words, “data loss,” and you’d probably have the wary attention of every IT guy in the room (and the hair rising on the forearms of some). Data loss is simply a nasty specter that nobody loves.

If your significant other loses a treasured diamond ring, well, much as we hope you didn’t cheap out in the first place, it’s either replaceable out-of-pocket or your insurance guy is getting a call. But losing data at work?

Hand over heart, that’s a whole other level of loss (and not just because it isn’t covered by your personal insurance). In fact, regardless of how you feel about your significant other losing the diamond ring, losing data at work is worse — far worse. We’d opt to save the data over the diamonds any day. But that’s just us.

What’s on Your List?

For starters, unlike the ring, data loss affects more than just you, personally. Second, it can cause downtime and massive financial loss to an organization, which perhaps puts it at the top of the “Avoid at All Costs” list.

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Avoiding data loss means avoiding downtime, financial loss, unhappy end-users, grumpy bosses and potential impact on your career.

The next item on the “Avoid at All Costs” list is, undoubtedly, not wanting to see your job on the line. Careers have ended over less, but we don’t need to remind you of that, so we’re moving right along.

… 83 percent of data migrations fail or exceed their budgets and schedules.

Probably the next item on your “Avoid” list is the hordes of unhappy end-users that inundate the IT department with complaints until you’re literally buried in a storm of open service tickets.

The list could probably go on and on, but why bother when the point’s already been made? Data loss can be devastating, and no organization is immune.

Does Your Data Get Going When the Going Gets Tough?

One of the most pervasive causes of data loss occurs during a data migration when file links get broken. What qualifies as a data migration? Here are several types of data migrations and similar situations that cause file links to break:

  • Moving files and folders into Microsoft’s SharePoint, either when initially moving into SharePoint or when upgrading from an older to a newer version of SharePoint.
  • Migrations due to upgrading or adding new computer hardware — for example, moving data (files and folders) from a legacy hardware system to a new one.
  • Changing the Operating System (OS) on the organization’s network servers — for example, from Linux to Windows (or vice versa).
  • Moving data from the production network into Network Attached Storage (NAS) or Storage Area Network (SAN).
  • Data Migration into a Document Management System (DMS), such as OpenText or Box.
  • Implementing Distributed File System (DFS), which manages files and folders across multiple computers.
  • Folder restructuring, renaming folders or moving folders to new locations.
  • Repathing files or folders. This occurs when someone moves files or folders without realizing that many of those files are being pointed to by links in other files somewhere on the system, thus inadvertently breaking links, causing data to be missing from the files containing the links.

Use Protection

An Experian white paper states, “Data migrations can be tricky. These projects hold many challenges, and according to Gartner, 83 percent of data migrations fail or exceed their budgets and schedules.” Compounding this problem is the fact the data migration issues often arise because a company’s IT staff have to conduct migrations with software that offers little to no protection against broken file links. Apart from the above-mentioned issues such as financial loss and downtime when a migration has failed to some degree, there are other considerations too.

Depending on the size of the organization and the extent to which the organization’s data is link dependent, the cost of fixing broken links manually could potentially exceed $1 million — a large chunk of cash out of anyone’s budget.

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Future IT guy says preserving file links prior to migration is the most intelligent choice.

Additionally, the organization also runs the risk of non-compliance with regulatory agencies, plus financial reporting issues. Preserving links prior to a data migration is therefore the most intelligent choice, protecting against lost data, reduced productivity and exorbitant costs.

But how can you do this?

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LinkFixer Advanced protects (and repairs) links so that they can stand the test of time (and data migrations).

Helping You Be the Hero

LinkTek is the international leader in data migration software that automates the management and repair of file links, filling the need for a safeguarding during data migrations in the form of LinkFixer Advanced™, the world’s first patented software that automatically finds and fixes broken links and, more importantly, the only application that can preserve links in advance of a migration or file-system reorg.

LinkFixer Advanced supports today’s most common file types and automatically fixes broken links in batch — in any number of files at a time — while also offering the tools to virtually eliminate this type of risk in the future.

The software itself consists of several automated functions that find, fix and maintain links, as follows:

  1. The “Inoculate” function protects all the links prior to a data migration, setting them up so that they can quickly be auto-repaired when they get broken. Next, having completed your migration, the “Cure” function can automatically fix all the previously inoculated broken links, and it does it fast.
  2. If the migration was completed before you had an opportunity to inoculate the links, leaving you with thousands (or millions) of broken links, it’s not too late. The “Modify Links” function can fix any links that are broken faster than any other method you could dream up. This process is akin to disaster recovery mode.
  3. Finally, the software also offers a “Move/Rename” function that moves or renames files and folders while automatically handling your links so that they remain fully functional when the migration is complete.

All said and done, LinkFixer Advanced offers a remarkably intelligent approach and solution to a common problem that plagues IT departments around the globe. For further information, visit www.LinkTek.com or speak to a friendly Service Consultant at 727-442-1822 for more information

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