In a high availability setup, what does 'failover' refer to?

In a high availability setup, 'failover' refers to the process of switching to a backup system when the primary system fails. This is a critical component of maintaining service continuity and minimizing downtime. When a failure occurs—such as a server crash, power outage, or a significant hardware malfunction—the system automatically or manually transitions operational tasks to a redundant server or a backup system, ensuring that users experience little to no interruption in service.

This process is essential in environments where uptime is crucial, such as in data centers or enterprise applications. It facilitates business continuity and enhances reliability by providing a seamless experience, even in the event of hardware or software failures.

The other options relate to different concepts in server management. Balancing load across multiple servers focuses on distributing workload evenly to optimize performance and prevent any single server from becoming overwhelmed. Executing automatic backups is concerned with data preservation rather than immediate service restoration during a failure. Providing a single point of failure is typically considered detrimental to system design as it describes a scenario where a single failure would cause complete system failure, which high availability setups aim to avoid through strategies like failover.