[opensuse] Disaster Recovery Options
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers. They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring. Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery. On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore. I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there. Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...? One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help. These Servers don't have any "IT" people on staff, but I'd like them to be as in dependant as possible in a crisis. I'm open to both built in tools (dump/restore rsync, etc.), although I'm not that familiar with them, and commercial.. All these systems have DVD Writers and the Backup is to DDS-4 DAT Drives -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
IMO it's a bootable DVD with the configured base system and then they
can recover their data that they are backing up daily to the tape
drive.
On Sun, May 4, 2008 at 5:08 PM, William Hammond
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers.
They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring.
Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery.
On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore.
I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there.
Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...?
One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help.
These Servers don't have any "IT" people on staff, but I'd like them to be as in dependant as possible in a crisis. I'm open to both built in tools (dump/restore rsync, etc.), although I'm not that familiar with them, and commercial..
All these systems have DVD Writers and the Backup is to DDS-4 DAT Drives
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
William Hammond wrote:
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers.
They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring.
Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery.
That's not proper backup software -- that's archiving software being (mis-)used as backup software. For example: HP Legato is an archiver. HP OmniBack is a backup solution.
On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore.
I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there.
Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...?
Any software from which a "baremetal" recovery involves only these three steps: 1: reinstall OS in vanilla configuration 2: install recovery software 3: run recovery software using NOTHING more than the backup media (i.e. no having to provide magic numbers from on-system records files or typing in by hand like HP Legato requires, etc.)
One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help.
Dump is still very reliable. And you don't even have to do step #2 above. However, instead of specifying dump device -f /dev/mt, I would specify the dump device to be a USB disk, -f /dev/sdwhatever, or even autmounting the USB disk, and using -f /backupdisk/$DATE.$FS where $DATE=`date +%F` and $FS=`echo $FILESYSTEM | tr / _` for example: root filesystem would be dumped into: 2008-05-04._ /home filesystem would be dumped into: 2008-05-04._home /usr/local would be dumped into: 2008-05-04._usr_local
These Servers don't have any "IT" people on staff, but I'd like them to be as independant as possible in a crisis. I'm open to both built in tools (dump/restore rsync, etc.), although I'm not that familiar with them, and commercial..
Dump commands can be put into a script (shell script or tcl/tk, which is runnable by creating an icon on the desktop with "create link to app" on the desktop,
All these systems have DVD Writers and the Backup is to DDS-4 DAT Drives
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
William Hammond pecked at the keyboard and wrote:
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers.
They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring.
Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery.
On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore.
I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there.
Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...?
One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help.
These Servers don't have any "IT" people on staff, but I'd like them to be as in dependant as possible in a crisis. I'm open to both built in tools (dump/restore rsync, etc.), although I'm not that familiar with them, and commercial..
All these systems have DVD Writers and the Backup is to DDS-4 DAT Drives
Before I retired I used BackUpEdge for disaster recovery and backup. Worked great for both functions. The bare metal restore was great as the backup software could creat either a boot tape or DVD for restoring the partition table and data with a minimum of fuss. http://www.microlite.com/BackupEDGE_Products/backupedge_products.html And their pricing is pretty good as well. Support is top notch. -- Ken Schneider SuSe since Version 5.2, June 1998 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
At 02:46 PM 5/4/2008, you wrote:
William Hammond pecked at the keyboard and wrote:
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers. They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring. Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery. On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore. I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there. Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...? One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help. These Servers don't have any "IT" people on staff, but I'd like them to be as in dependant as possible in a crisis. I'm open to both built in tools (dump/restore rsync, etc.), although I'm not that familiar with them, and commercial.. All these systems have DVD Writers and the Backup is to DDS-4 DAT Drives
Before I retired I used BackUpEdge for disaster recovery and backup. Worked great for both functions. The bare metal restore was great as the backup software could creat either a boot tape or DVD for restoring the partition table and data with a minimum of fuss.
http://www.microlite.com/BackupEDGE_Products/backupedge_products.html
And their pricing is pretty good as well. Support is top notch.
Thanks, Ken I'm going to check it out....
-- Ken Schneider SuSe since Version 5.2, June 1998 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
William Hammond wrote:
I have a number of small OpenSuSE 10.3 Samba File Servers.
They have commercial software that does a good job of backing up. but, like most, not such a good job of restoring.
Especially if you need to do a bare metal recovery.
On some of these systems I keep an identical drive already set up so that if needed I can plug it in and do a data only restore.
I don't use or believe that strongly in mirroring or duplexing so I don't want to go there.
Question is: What are the easiest/best solutions for Disaster Recovery...?
One that a "Shop Owner" could perform with a little help.
As a shop owner, I can tell you that rsync, or the tools built on it like rsnapshot, are the only way to go in my opinion. If you don't mind writing a 1-5 line bash script containing the rsync command and adding the script to crontab, then do it that way. If you don't like the command line, then grab a copy of rsnapshot and just configure the package for your system. (it will then set up the rsync script and add the cron entry for you) Whatever you use, just keep a daily backup handy, either on a second machine (and offsite in case of fire). In the event of disaster, data restoration is a one button or one command deal. You can get rsnapshot and get the docs for it at: http://www.rsnapshot.org/ -- David C. Rankin, J.D., P.E. Rankin Law Firm, PLLC 510 Ochiltree Street Nacogdoches, Texas 75961 Telephone: (936) 715-9333 Facsimile: (936) 715-9339 www.rankinlawfirm.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
participants (5)
-
Andreas van dem Helge -
David C. Rankin -
Ken Schneider -
Sam Clemens -
William Hammond