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we have couple of sharepoint 2013/2016 farms, and they all shared these architecture :-

  1. one sharepoint application server which have sharepoint server installed.
  2. one database server which have the sharepoint databases installed.

Now as part of our backup policy, we do the following:-

  1. we perform a backup on the sharepoint databases.
  2. our database backups will be beneficial to us, in-case the database server got sever damage and we were not able to recover it back.
  3. but what about the case if our sharepoint application server crashed. then our database server and our database backups will not be beneficial to us.

now someone might say that i can build a new sharepoint application server, and configure it to run on existing database. but the problem in sharepoint , that the sharepoint application server need to have the same patch level as in the crashed server. by patch level, i mean all the sharepoint patches that are installed as part of windows updates (those updates can be found inside the control panel).

so my question is how we can backup those sharepoint patches?, in a way that can allow us to automatically install them in any new sharepoint server? till i find a way to do so, i am currently taking a screenshot of our control panel, which includes the sharepoint updates we have, something as follow, this can allow us to know what are the updates that we need to install in-case we faced a situation that our current SharePoint server got sever damage and we want to build a new sharepoint server (of course i update this list after any patching we do on the server). enter image description here

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2 Answers2

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Have a look at the documentation (which you should do anyway, because updating SharePoint is definitely not as straightforward as other products).

For SharePoint 2013, updates have been cumulative since Service Pack 1, thus you only need to keep track of the last update you install. If/when you need to build a replacement server, just apply SP1, then the same update as the originale server; you don't need to apply all the ones before.

The situation is quite more complex for SharePoint 2016, as there have been several non-cumulative updates; only after KB4011127 updates have started replacing previous ones. So you need to at least get there before installing the same update that was installed on the original server.

Massimo
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Another answer for a different approach to the problem: why don't you just backup the whole server?

If it's a virtual machine (most servers are, nowadays) it should be really easy to take a backup, or even to make a clone, after applying an update. But even if it's a physical server, there are solutions for that.

Restoring a backup is much quicker than building a replacement server.

Massimo
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