> database I tought it was a common practice, once in a while to

backup & restore.

Think of it like a Spring cleaning. The frequency you do it depends on
how tidy you keep your database. If you manage your transactions well
and perform a nightly backup (allowing garbage collection) and aren't
in the habit of purging masses of records, it is quite a rare thing.

We have a few production databases that haven't had a backup-restore
cycle in several years. They would probably benefit from one by now,
but it is not like users are terribly suffering.

> I just wander how the experimented Firebird people does it... I seem

to remember

> that I read somewhere that could be dangerous (database corruption)

to copying

> or rename a database. But I'm not sure about this. Probably I

misread some

> article long time ago...
>

You are correct in thinking it is unsafe to copy a database file while
Firebird is running. At the very best, you will probably end up with a
corrupt destination file because the TIP will be out of date compared
to the data pages, and the indices will probably not match the data
pages either.

Renaming however will fail if the database is in use, so it is a good
way to determine whether everyone really is logged out first, and it
is also a good way of preventing client applications from locating the
database (presuming you use aliases) until the backup-restore is complete.

Adam