Cloud or on-site server: what happens when the power goes out

When the power goes out in a hotel, two things happen: the screens go dark and someone asks whether the system “still works”. The answer depends on where that system lives. And the comparison between an on-site server and a cloud system is usually done badly, because every vendor describes the other one’s worst case and its own best case. This article tries to do it properly.

What an on-site server implies

An on-site server is a computer, in a room of the hotel, where the point of sale database lives. The tablets and registers connect to it through the internal network. The advantage that gets sold is obvious: if the internet connection drops, the internal network keeps going and the restaurant keeps collecting. What does not get sold as clearly is everything that computer needs to stay alive:

• Power. If the electricity goes, the server shuts down just like the tablets. Without a battery backup sized for the server, the network switch and at least one payment station, the internal network advantage disappears at the same instant as the connection.
• Backups. The database lives on a disk that can fail, get wet or get stolen. Someone has to make copies, verify they can be restored and keep them off site. A backup that was never tested is not a backup.
• Patches. The server’s operating system, the database and the point of sale receive security updates. Someone has to apply them, at a time the restaurant will not notice, and know what to do if something stops working afterwards.
• Hardware with an expiration date. Disks, power supplies and fans fail. When the server dies on a Saturday night, the restaurant closes until someone finds another one and restores the backup.
• A person who knows it. In an independent hotel, that person is usually an outside vendor or an employee who already left. The day they are needed, they are not there.

None of this is impossible. It is work, cost and risk the property takes on without it appearing on the quote. An on-site server is not free just because it sits on site.

What a cloud system implies

In a cloud system, the database lives in the provider’s data centers, with redundant power, automatic backups, patches applied by the provider and hardware replaced without the property ever knowing. The property’s tablets and computers connect over the internet, and any device with a browser will do: a tablet of any brand, a phone, the old computer at the front desk. There is no specific hardware to buy and nothing to install on it.

There is a technical detail that matters more than it seems: modern tablets and phones run on ARM processors, different from those in a traditional desktop computer. A point of sale installed as a program has to exist in a version for every processor and operating system, and it does not always exist. A system that lives in the browser neither knows nor cares: it runs on what you already have.

The dependency is a single one, and it is an honest one: the internet connection. If it drops, the cloud system does not respond. That is the question that has to be answered clearly.

What happens when the power goes out

The row that generates the most debate is the third: internet down with power on. It is real, and it is the only situation where the on-site server wins. What is worth asking is how many times a year it happens at your property, how long it lasts, and what it costs to mitigate compared with what it costs to maintain a server the other three hundred and sixty days.

How an internet outage is mitigated

1. A second connection from a different provider, with a router that switches over on its own when the first one fails. It is the measure with the best ratio of cost to peace of mind.
2. Mobile data as a fallback: a phone or a modem with a SIM card. The tablets connect to that hotspot in a minute.
3. A battery backup for the modem and the router. It is smaller and simpler to maintain than one for a server, and it covers most short power cuts.
4. A paper procedure for the worst case: handwritten tickets with time and table, entered when the connection returns. It is the same thing an on-site server would do when its battery runs out.

The honest answer about operating without internet

Inn Restaurant does not operate without an internet connection today. If your connection drops, the screens will not respond until it comes back. Offline operation is on the roadmap, and when it is released it will be announced with a date and a scope, not before. We would rather say it this way than say “yes, of course” in the demo and have you find out on a Saturday.

What does exist today is what makes the outage hurt less: any device with a browser signs in, so a server’s phone on mobile data is an emergency payment station; there is nothing installed that can get corrupted; and when the connection returns there is nothing to “sync”, because the database never stopped being a single one. And if operating without internet is your number one problem, today we are not your best option. We lose one sale and earn the next.

What the power does not change

There is a part of this discussion that does not depend on where the server lives: who calculates the money. If the price, the tax and the total are calculated on the server’s device, every tablet on a different version produces different totals, with or without power. If they are calculated on the server, on site or in the cloud, there is a single answer. Ask that too. It is less dramatic than an internet outage and it affects the close every single day.

You can review the technical foundations of Inn Restaurant on the technology page (/tecnologia) and what we do with your data on the security page (/seguridad). And the question worth asking any vendor, us included: when the power goes out, what shuts down, what keeps going, and who told you before you signed?