Jon Clausen wrote:
It's also a very good opportunity to test your backup strategy.
My bakkah-stratahwhatnow?
Just something to keep the users/powers-that-be from lynching you. (^-^)
Thanks a bunch. That looks very much like what I needed to know.
I still would like for cyradm to be able to pull contents from another server, but either I'm missing something or else it's just not been implemented yet.
Unfortunately this is something most server applications tend to neglect: How to backup/restore your configuration/data.
In any event Sandy's got a good point in 'learn how to recover'.
Only consideration left is this;
Circumstances dictated that I offlined the old server and onlined the new simultaneously. Also I needed immediate access to some of the folders, which I copied over using Mutt.
I am afraid that was a big mistake. I prefer to test and check the migration with a test system and a small database, then use the real data to check, if there is a hidden bug and see how much time is needed. I then double the time to have space for the inevitable bugs that occur in the real migration. Then I set an offline window and tell the users to store mails needed in the mean-time in off-line folders. That way they don't bug me when I need my concentration and nerves for the actual migration. First rule is always: Don't let yourself be talked into things that you simply can not guarantee. Rather find ways around to solve the immediate problem and then proceed according to plan.
As a consequence I now have a number of folders which are severely out of sync (between "old" and "new"). Question;
If I do a complete backup of everything on old-server and "restore" that on new-server, will it
1) only overwrite "old" content present on new-server leaving "new" content intact?
Tha depends on how you "restore" the data. If you overwrite the files on the new system you will definitely destroy the new databases, so all new mailboxes, folders and permissions on these are lost with the restore, even if the folders and mails are physically still present. One hare-brained way to get them back might be to export the mailbox.db on the old system and the new system, merge these files and then use unique to delete double entries. This might work, but I have never tried something that reckless. (^-^) PLEASE backup your mailbox.db incl. the text export to recover if that doesn't work!! All the databases are practically useless, at least I don't know any tool to merge the seen dbs, the deliver.db (not absolutely critical) If both servers are still functional you might be better off to tell all users to login to both servers at once and then copy the content they want to keep. Sandy PS: if you use sieve-scripts, please don't forget to copy those as well. (^-^) -- List replies only please! Please address PMs to: news-reply (@) japantest (.) homelinux (.) com