On Wed, 29 Dec 1999, Ramon Diaz-Uriarte wrote:
dump -0u -B 600000 -f /the-second-hard-drive/file-name /dev/the-system
This is *by far* the most intelligent method of backing up a system I've seen in a long time. One could simply take this file, include an ElTorito image of LOAF or a similar single-floppy Linux and restore directly from the bootable CD. Unfortunately, Ramon, I only have more questions and no answers :(. I wonder about the limits of this method. I've never seen a CD-ROM filled `to the gills' with data, and therfor have nothing to study. What is the size limit on a standard 640MB CD-R or a 700MB for that matter? In other words, if you only have a single file, the allocation table, and another file (=< 1440k) on the disk, how big can that large file be? Simple algebra, I know, but *where* does one start to find information on the ISO9660 file system? According to the CD-R HOWTO, 620MB is an acceptable size, but those of you who know me know that I like to push the limits sometimes :]. Another question that I have is whether or not there is a way to compress the data that dump processes/generates. Using file limits in the dump command itself (above) is pointless if you'll simply compress the file afterwards. I once used dd to read a partition, and then compressed the image with bzip2. It was a 2gb partition with ~600MB of data on it. The process from start to finish (dd; bzip) took around 2 hours. Using dd, the resulting image was exactly 2 gigs (I assumed that much), but I was shocked to see that the *compressed* file was well over 1 gig in size! I thought that surely bzip2 was more intelligent than that, but I was wrong. Using dump makes a lot more sense, to say the least. -- -=|JP|=- Jon Pennington | Atipa Linux Solutions -o) jpennington@atipa.com | http://www.atipa.com /\\ Kansas City, MO, USA | 816-241-2641 _\_V -- To unsubscribe send e-mail to suse-linux-e-unsubscribe@suse.com For additional commands send e-mail to suse-linux-e-help@suse.com Also check the FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/