Project Name
Document Version 1.0
Prepared by Jane Doe, ITS
Last Edited July 23, 2016
PLAN
REQUIREMENTS
SOLUTION
ANALYSIS
DESIGN
BUILD
TEST
TRAIN/DEPLOY MAINTENANCE
TO THE DOCUMENT OWNER: This template is provided as a guideline and resource. The structure and instructions
give detail about what might go into a completed document. Only you and your team, however, know what will
best fit the needs of your specific effort, and you are encouraged to adapt the template as appropriate to meet
those needs.
Disaster Recovery Plan
The Disaster Recovery (DR) Plan documents the detailed design and processes that support disaster
recovery for a critical system. With the system design fully documented in the Design Blueprint, including
elements which will be utilized in disaster recovery, the Disaster Recovery Plan refers to the Design
Blueprint as appropriate and builds on it to document the elements and dependencies that will be
impacted during a disaster scenario. The plan describes the state of the system and its dependent
services in various disaster situations and details the response for each. The Disaster Recovery Plan will
be used in the review and communication of the technical design for DR, the procedures to be followed
for recovery, the impact upon system users, and required coordination with other university groups.
Executive Summary
Summarize the scope of disaster scenarios which are covered by the plan and the high-level plan for
maintaining or recovering service in this type of situation.
Disaster Recovery Scope
List the types of disaster scenarios which the plan is intended to cover, such as server failure within a
single site, full campus power or internet connectivity outage, loss of all university IT resources,
restoration of data or configurations from back-up copies, etc. Include a list of the services which depend
upon yours, and describe the impact of the loss of your system on each the dependent systems.
Disaster recovery planning for your system will depend in part upon the DR plan for any services on
which your system depends. Using the documentation of these dependencies in the Design Blueprint,
discuss the high-level DR plans for services on which your system depends with the service owners. This
may inform the scope of your DR planning and raise design issues for consideration.
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Scenario 1: Loss of UDC-C
Document the state of the environment in this scenario, including the status of all services upon which
the system depends. Include whether dependent and other related services are available, the timeframe
in which each will be restored, and whether each will be performing in a normal or degraded state.
Describe any other likely impacts, such as availability of staff or limited communication mechanisms.
Scenario 2: [Another Disaster]
Disaster Recovery Overview
Describe the system strategy for recovery following a disaster. What is the system's recovery time
objective (RTO)? At a high level, describe the manner in which the system is designed to be recovered.
Refer to the Design Blueprint as necessary and copy figures where appropriate.
Post-Disaster Status and Recovery
For each disaster scenario, detail the state of the system immediately following the disaster; include the
state in normal operating conditions, as well, for reference. For each scenario, list the actions that will
be required to return the system to an operational state, including areas of coordination across
departments. Document the expected performance of the system after recovery; will it be fully
functional or degraded? If the latter, what revised performance targets should be met? Will all elements
of the system be operational, or will some data, interfaces, functions be unavailable?
Normal Operations
Scenario 1: Loss of UDC-C
Scenario 2: [Another Disaster]
Disaster Recovery Issues
Document any limitations or unresolved issues with the design, such as storage limits or the inability to
provide critical functionality due to dependency upon an external system. For any issues, provide
mitigation plans.
Disaster Recovery Playbook
In the Build phase, document the detailed steps, technical and otherwise, that will be taken to restore
the system following a disaster. This may include different steps for different situations. This
information should be used as the script during disaster recovery testing and updated as necessary based
on this experience.
Disaster Recovery Plan
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Project Name
Document Version 1.0
Revision History
Identify changes to the document.
Version
Date
Updater Name
Description
Signatures
Formal written signoff is preferred for larger, more complex projects.
Name
Role
Disaster Recovery Plan
Signature
Date
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