The situation
A multi-million-dollar investment partnership had an active data set on a failing Windows 7 system. The operating system was old, but the information remained part of the business’s working environment.
First, protect the data
I was engaged as an independent technology contractor to recover the active legacy data. My first step was to back it up so that a hardware failure would not put the only copy at risk. I then moved it somewhere it could be accessed and used.
Restore the way it was used
Having the files was only part of the recovery. The business needed to use the data as it had before. I recreated the legacy environment in a virtual machine (VM), allowing the existing software and data to work together without depending on the failing physical system.
Make the recovery maintainable
I backed up the VM and put updating checkpoints in place. This gave the recovered environment a way to return to an earlier state as work continued.
Move beyond the legacy environment
The final step was to phase out use of the VM and move the legacy data to a new format. The work progressed from immediate data protection, to restored usability, to a transition away from the old environment.