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The new BE 2012 requires too many clicks

GregOfBE
Level 4
Employee

One of the more frequent refrains that we have heard from our users is that the new UI requires significantly more clicks to operate the same functions when compared to BE 2010.  
Among those who chimed in were Bulbous; Christopher Joles & Alv. Inf. Services.  We have listened to your comments and request and taken the following steps to address them.

  • The job monitor is returning.
  • Users will be able to fully customize selections for each server even when selecting multiple servers for backup
  • We have returned the ability to initiate restore from backup sets or tapes
  • Users will once again have the ability to put multiple servers into a single backup
13 REPLIES 13

Nigel_the_Nerd
Level 3

When will that be available?

GregOfBE
Level 4
Employee

We can't make specific date commitments as a matter of policy but we wanted you to know that we have heard the feedback and are working hard to make changes needed by our customers. If you'd like to participate in the beta program, see the post at https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-beta-program-backup-exec-2012-r2.  Or if you'd like to participate in individual usability studies, please send an email to beusability@symantec.com.

SeanRegan
Level 3
Employee

As a public company we are restricted from promising dates here.  But, it is a top priority and we've got the full focus of the team working on the feedback from this forum. 

Best, 

Sean 

@seanjregan

WoCom
Level 4
Partner Accredited

Hi,

What is also a shortcoming for me, that I'm unable to name scheduled inventory-jobs, import/export jobs.  The jobs are generated with a none-saying automatically assigned name like Inventory 0066.  Is there a way to change this?

gr.

Wouter

Corelianer
Level 2

I just say yay!

I'm happy that you do listen to the feedback we are giving.

You should do the same as Microsoft, they failed with Windows Vista and then listened to the user-feedback and then created the best Windows ever, Windows 7.

We had BE 2010 and I upgraded to BE 2012 because the new BE was normally always better (maybe subjective). But my upgrade was a mistake. It more complicated, the jobs I had to recreate because the migration failed. So I downgraded and are now happy again. So I spend like a week to change all back with the help of the Symantec support.

Feedback to the UI 2012:

I think the statistics on the home-screen with the pie-chart of percentage failed or success should be optional, but shouldn't be default. Looks fancy when the designer draws it on the scatchboard, but as an admin we want directly the hard reallity, we are workers and no managers in the first place. So we want to see that server X was successfull but file X was in use and could not be backuped.

The job monitor should be the main screen, because the reason why I go on the server is 99% because I want to check the job history and to see what jobs are running and when they where done, or how long they took to finish.

Maybe in 1%, I add new servers or have a look to the Treadcon level.
And I don't care if my Backup Exec is not up-to date as long as all is running fine, so I don't want to be remembered every time on the home-screen and giving me a bad feeling cause I'm not up-to date. Don't touch a running System is still an old but still true phrase.
Again, this could be on the second but not on the first screen.

Feedback of compatibility between New and Old Versions:

What you should learn by this liddle disaster (in my point of view) is to test a downgrade to the last product before you release the product. Until now (according to Symantec support) it's not possible to downgrade the upgraded SQL Database from 2012 to 2010. So because of that another half day is gone to create all Backup Jobs, Selection List's, Policies, Backup Sets and Media Location.

Elizabeth_Teffn
Level 4
Employee

Corelianer -   I'm a usability engineer for BE. Thanks for leaving the feedback!  It's very helpful.

We are currently working hard on the next release of BE, and one area that we are concentrating on is upgrades. I've been gathering feedback from customers who are still on previous version of BE, but in the near future I'll be gathering feedback from our customers who have upgraded to 2012.  I'd love to see if you'd like to participate.

I'd also love to talk with you about what your losses were in the upgrade and what you needed to do to get 2012 running for your environment.  If your interested in talking with me - please click here to see if there is a time that works in your schedule.

 

 

Hard_Rock_Class
Not applicable
Partner Accredited

How does one check to see if an update is available?

Nigel_the_Nerd
Level 3

Click on the big yellow button on the top left of the Backup exec screen, go to "installation and licensing", "live update". Running that will tell you if there are any updates available, provided, of course, that you allow your backup server to communicate with Symantec's live update site through your corporate firewall.

Cheers

c_anderson77
Not applicable

Absolute worst possible GUI interface ever.  Symantec is well known for creating useless changes in their UI to make their products appear 'new' -- but now they have taken the presumption that enterprise backup software is apparently managed by ?? I don't know, I'm trying to think of anyone who would find the new "interface" useful, this is totally unacceptable, awful, unusable... i've been using BE since Seagate owned it for god's sakes and now I have to go look for online help on how to inventory a tape drive, in fact, on every single thing I've tried to do-- it's just gone, every function I was used to for 10+ years, just gone... why?

 

Please show us ANY evidence whatsoever that users were demanding a new UI for Backup Exec.  Any at all.

 

Nigel_the_Nerd
Level 3

Hey GregofBE, you said, in July last year, "We have returned the ability to initiate restore from backup sets or tapes". In my calculation, that is 10 months ago. When should we expect to see that feature actually released? As far as I can tell, we still have to follow the incredibily convoluted route of firstly catalogging the tape set to determine which tape the data we want lies on, then, if it is a decommissioned server, we have to create a new on of the same name, so we can then select it to create a restore job, which we then have to specify the date rate that encopasses the tape, so we can then select the data we want, and start the restore.

I am desperately waiting to be able to select the dataset, on the tape, and then select a "restore" function, and recover the data i need.

Any idea of an ETA? Or is it already there, but been rolled into some hidden menu option that I have not discovered yet?

 

Corelianer
Level 2

Hi Elisabeth

I'm the only IT admin here, so I'm not having mutch time for long usability meetings.

But my problem was that I upgraded from 2010 to 2012 and then when I realized the upgrade was successfull I ran the 2012 version for 2 weeks and then I the SQL Database was in the new format.

I had the old databases deleted because the upgrade was successfull. Then I needed to downgrade because I couldn't get the job done with the new UI.

So I lost all the things that where in the SQL Database:
- Backup Jobs
- Backup History
- Media Location
- Backup Selection List (worst part)

So in my case it would have helped if there would have been a downgrade procedure from the new back to the old SQL Database fomat. Or an import/export function to export the settings above in a (XML) format that are interchangable between the different Backup Exec Versions.

Corelianer

Clive_Hunt
Level 3

latest updates don't seem to have improved anything IMHO.

CraigV
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited

They aren't intended to improve anything. They are to address support for Windows 2012 (only RAWS) amongst others). The GUI upgrades/improvements will come sometime towards the end of the year.

Thanks!