blackvoid Active Backup for Microsoft 365 and DR scenarios

DISCLAIMER: In the interest of full disclosure, O365 subscription as well as all the HW/SW mentioned in this article has been bought with my own funds, all of the opinions you are about to read are my own, nobody is paying for this review, and nobody has reviewed or approved this content before it was posted.

A little over a year ago I wrote about Synology's Active Backup tool, Active Backup for Business. Their lineup of AB packages includes a total of three options. Microsoft/Office 365, Gdrive, and Business.

In this article, which was a while on the back burner, I will focus on Active Backup for Microsoft 365 (also known as Office 365 up until a while ago). With more and more users and businesses focusing on their work using the "cloud" providers such as Microsoft with their Office 365, and the COVID-19 pushing more and more people from on-premise to their homes, it is no wonder that O365 packages are becoming more interesting.

However, saying this, are you aware that O365 does not include a backup strategy? Some models do include some sort of versioning that could imply some sort of backup, but a good old fashion, off-site backup, no.

If you want to protect your business and content generated with O365 you should also consider its backup. With Active Backup, this is a matter of minutes.

Continue reading...

 

[Jheroen]

Great and very helpful, thank you @Rusty

 

[tekguru]

This possibly needs updating... If you look to add a task you are now presented with the following:

I was running the backup but it broke after the last upgrade and I was prompted with the above.

If you go to the listed tutorial and look at the 'before you start' section it states 'You need to use Windows 10 or Windows Server 2016 or later as the operating system to run the PowerShell script provided by Synology.'

As I'm an Apple Mac user that knocks this completely out of use for me

 

[Rusty]

This possibly needs updating... If you look to add a task you are now presented with the following:
View attachment 2449
I was running the backup but it broke after the last upgrade and I was prompted with the above.

If you go to the listed tutorial and look at the 'before you start' section it states 'You need to use Windows 10 or Windows Server 2016 or later as the operating system to run the PowerShell script provided by Synology.'

As I'm an Apple Mac user that knocks this completely out of use for me

No update needed. The tutorial is running a new upcoming beta version of Active Backup for business. In the later part of the tutorial, there is a section about failover to the current version in the relink scenario, so this step from the image is not needed.

Also, you can install Powershell on a mac.

 

[tekguru]

Looks like I'll have to hold of until the upcoming version comes out as with the current version you can't get past the 'Create Application screen.
You are right you, can indeed install Powershell but it looks a very messy process so I'l skip

 

[Jheroen]

Looks like I'll have to hold of until the upcoming version comes out as with the current version you can't get past the 'Create Application screen.
You are right you, can indeed install Powershell but it looks a very messy process so I'l skip

I did the process few days ago and it's really straight forward as long as you take every step with caution and exactly as described

 

[tekguru]

I'll take another look at it when I have a bit of time....

 

[tekguru]

I did the process few days ago and it's really straight forward as long as you take every step with caution and exactly as described

Well I gave it another go today. PowerShell, .Net, Homebrew and installed on the Mac. Script files downloaded. I obtained the application ID, Directory and Object ID. Those parts went okay.


Only two problems:
1) When running the certificate generator script only the keycredentials.txt file was created, the Certificate.pfx was listed as being created but it wasn't. I'm wondering it this is because I don't have an official certificate loaded on the O35 site.
2) Half the options that the Synology 'how to' wants setting up in the Azure portal (Office 365 web etc) do not exist (or if they did have removed.

So I'm giving up on it again....

 

[tekguru]

And later..... I decided to give it a go via the Windows Workstation. All finished and up running within 5 minutes. It just goes to show things are easer at times on a PC. Now to see if I can remove all the flipping apps I installed on the Mac! Grrr