The tools included with your selected database platform or recommended by your database vendor are usually the best choice for diagnosing and solving database integrity problems. See the documentation available with your database platform for more information. InterAction does not provide any tools specifically designed to diagnose and correct database integrity errors.
This section provides guidelines for preventing data integrity problems and describes problems that may look like integrity errors, but are actually normal behavior.
Typically, data integrity errors only occur in the following unusual circumstances:
- The InterAction database has been modified to accommodate additional functionality.
- A disaster recovery process has been performed incorrectly.
Modifications to the Database
See the InterAction Customer Support & Services card for information about support policies in database modification situations.
InterAction has been developed using open standards. On occasion, it may seem necessary to write directly to our database to meet unique implementation requirements. Our business rules and data model are closely related.
We consider this collective information to be proprietary and therefore we do not distribute our data model or support changes to the database made outside of InterAction.
By writing directly to the database outside of InterAction, you may experience serious data integrity issues and lose data, for which LexisNexis InterAction cannot be held responsible.
Disaster Recovery
When working with a large-scale database containing valuable organization-wide contact data, a solid disaster recovery plan is essential. Disaster recovery for a database is typically far more complicated than disaster recovery for file systems.
If you recover a database incorrectly, you may lose valuable data and cause InterAction to report integrity errors.
For example, if you back up your data by dumping transaction logs, then attempt to restore the database from an incomplete set of transaction logs, the restore is incomplete.
The best way to avoid disaster recovery errors and protect your data is to:
- Include the disaster recovery plan in your overall implementation plan.
- Implement a strict backup plan according to your database vendor’s recommendations.
- Test the disaster recovery plan and monitor it regularly.
- Always back up your database before making any major changes, such as upgrading InterAction to a new version.