You can NOT backup just the Emerald.dat file and have something useful
if you have to rebuild your SQL Server. The Emerald.dat file ONLY
contains
the DATA for your Emerald database. The structural information is
contained in the master.dat file and the Emerald.dat file is useless
without that.
The *ONLY* way you should *EVER* backup your database is by using
the backup option in SQL Server (the dump database). A dump file
is much different than the Emerald.dat and can be restored back
into a new SQL Server.
PLEASE do a backup (dump) regularly just before your nightly
backup (yes, you are doing nightly backups, aren't you?).
The easiset way to do this is to have SQL Executive run a task
every night before you bakup. Create a dump device in Enterprise
manager to a drive that is getting backed up. Then, for the task,
select SQL command and use:
DUMP Database Emerald to Dump_DEV With INIT
where dump_dev is the dump service you created.
-- Dale E. Reed Jr. (daler@iea.com)_________________________________________________________________ IEA Software, Inc. | RadiusNT, Emerald, and NT FAQs Internet Solutions for Today | http://www.emerald.iea.com