What is the first action that should be taken to prepare for a failback to the primary system after a disaster recovery?

Enabling reverse replication is the essential first action when preparing for a failback to the primary system after a disaster recovery scenario. This process ensures that any changes made to the data during the period of failover to the recovery site are captured and replicated back to the primary system. The goal is to synchronize data so that the primary system has all the up-to-date information before it becomes the active system again.

Initiating a failover would occur later in the process; it’s focused on switching operations back to the primary system, but that can only happen effectively once the data has been synchronized. Shutting down all recovery virtual machines comes after ensuring data integrity and readiness of the primary system. Running scripts to deploy web tiers is also a subsequent step that would typically follow enabling reverse replication and preparing the actual environment for the transition.

In this context, enabling reverse replication lays the groundwork for a successful and seamless transition back to the primary system, making it a critical first step.