The subject of creating tape backups is very important. In the case of an emergency, tape backups may be the only way to recover your data.
As a bare minimum, you should create a tape backup of your computer system each day. You should use a fresh tape each night - never use the same tape two nights in a row.
Make sure that both your software vendor and your management are comfortable with your backup strategy. You can gauge your strategy by asking questions such as "How much data can I afford to lose?".
UNIX offers several standard UNIX utilities for creating tape backups, including the "tar" and "cpio" commands. If you are working with a software vendor, they will usually provide a custom utility that is created for your system.
SCO’s backup utility that is provided with the System Administration Shell ("sysadmsh") is introduced. The critical importance of creating Emergency Boot Diskettes is also discussed.