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2.5 Availability
03. Multiple Level Policy
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2.5.03 Multiple Level Policy:
High availability is one of the burning isses that the ASP diligently works on every day.   This does not come easy as many of the traditional IT methods of working focus on a central computer with several single points of failure.   Continual improvements means that step by step, the ASP has made extrodinary investments to maximise availability and eliminate downtime.

Multiple Level Policy:
Continual evolution has created a culture whee every single point of failure is analysed and eliminated.   It is totally unacceptable to our business and the business of our customers to have aany downtime, to have any application failure or to not achieve continual availability.
The very biggest corporations have all reported computer system failures, all competitors such as Microsoft and Amazon have all experienced equipment failures that means systems are down for many hours at a time.   The ASP continually monitors such activities, analyses the reason why and does what it takes to eliminate the possibility of it happening.   The ASP cannot say that an application interuption will not happen, the ASP can only say that with care and dedication, applications have operated without interuption for more than ten years.

High Availability by Design:
Multi-Authentication.
Multi-Session.
Multi-Data-Centers.
Multi-Database.
Multi-Encryption.
Multi-Power.
Multi-Internet.
Multi-Tenancy.

Down For Maintenance:
More than ten years ago, the ASP changed its policies so no application service ever needs to be taken down for maintenance.   While competitors continue to struggle with maintenance issues, the ASP is able to apply maintenance improvements during the working day while people are working.   Where a person deserves an application improvement today, it can be applied and the business can benefit from that improvement the same day.
It takes a special level of diligence to make improvements, to test those improvements and to make those improvements to people while they are doing their daily online work.   Very few competitors have become so professional as to be able to offer such high levels of availability during the working day.

Multi-Authentication:
While competitors have simplistic login passwords the ASP chooses to operate with up to ten levels of sign-in authentication.
Competitors are vulnerable to passwords being stolen, but the ASP uses strong pass-phrases as only one part of the sign-in procedure.
The theft of a pass-phrase would not have any impact on the application service as many other authentication parts are mandated to sign-in.
No single point of failure such as a password remains.

Multi-Session:
While competitors use standard session identities the ASP chooses to operate with up to ten levels of session variable identities.
Competitors are vulnerable to a session identity being stolen, but the ASP uses many session variable identity factors where the theft of all these factors is very unlikely.
The theft of a session identity would not have any impact on the application service as many other session identity parts are in use.
No single point of failure such as a session identity remains.

Multi-Data-Centers:
While competitors have an in-house data center the ASP chooses to operate from up to ten remote secure data centers that form part of the Internet backbone.
Competitors are vulnerable to physical attacks on their data center and equipment failure in the data center, but the ASP uses many distributed secure data centers so a failure of any one data center would not impact on all other data centers.
The loss of one data center would cause the other data centers to continue to provide application services to its users with no significant difference.
No single point of failure such as one data center remains.

Multi-Databases:
While competitors have a central database for all data the ASP chooses to replicate data to up to ten remote databases.
Competitors are vulnerable to a failure of their central database, but the ASP has its data replicated to many remote databases so it is not likely to loose a copy of any data.
The loss of one database would be invisible to its users are other databases with replicated data contrinue to provide service availability.
No single point of failure such as one database remains.

Multi-Encryption:
While competitors have an encryption method the ASP chooses to implement up to ten encryption methods.
Competitors are vulnerable to inevative cracking of their one encryption method, but the ASP has its data encrypted to many layers so the cracking of any one layer of encryption enables the other layers of encryption to continue to protect its data.
The cracking of one encryption method such as RSA would be an invisible to its users as many other layers of encryption continue to keep all data safe and secure.
No single point of failure such as one encryption method remains.

Multi-Power:
While competitors have a UPS for each rack of servers the ASP chooses to continually operate all servers from batteries.
Competitors are vulnerable to power suppply failures and hope that diesel generators will provide backup power, but the ASP deploys a large number of low power servers that run from battery power that are charged each day from free solar PV panels.
Servers designed to run on 24 volts are designed to run from sealed gel batteries that have a life of 20 years and slowly deteriate rather than totally fail.
No single point of failure such as one power supply remains.

Multi-Internet:
While competitors pay for an expensive leased Internet connection the ASP chooses to rent server space in the data centers that provide the Internet backbone.
Competitors are vulnerable to Internet connection failures, but the ASP has direct connection to multiple Internet routers.
By using the Internet backbone data centers, the possibility of an Internet connection failure is not likely.
No single point of failure such as one Internet connection remains.