[posted and Cc'ed]

On Thu, Feb 27, 2003 at 02:09:33PM -0800, bao wrote:
> Now, for testing, I set the dumpcycle 0 days, runspercycle 0 days, so 
> that every time I call amdump, it will do a full dump.
> In someone's post and even in the amanda doc, it says Amanda will choose 
> when it will do a full or inc. dump due to load balancing.
> 
> 1. If I want to do a full dump of the entire selected folder every week, 
> and incremental dumps every other days (1 full, 6 inc. per week), does 
> it mean I have to rely on amanda in choosing what to do with load 
> balancing??

You *should* let Amanda do it, but you don't have to.  To let Amanda do
it, just set:

dumpcycle       7 days          # at least 1 full dump/week.
runspercycle    7               # run amdump 7 days/week

Assuming you're using 1 tape/run, you should have at least
14 tapes on hands and set:

tapecycle       14

> 2. I read somewhere (which I can't find where and can't remember 
> exactly) that for full dumps or for tapeless backup, holding disk should 
> be set to no.

Dunno about tapeless, but that is bad advice for full dumps, IMO.
You want holdingdisk at least as big as the single biggest dump,'
and (preferably) as big as the biggest combined full run you expect
to see.  This lets the actual dump/tar runs complete as quickly
as possible, potentially in parallel if circumstances allow, and
then taper can feed the tape drive at full speed.

-- 
Jay Lessert                               jay_lessert AT accelerant DOT net
Accelerant Networks Inc.                       (voice)1.503.439.3461
Beaverton OR, USA                                (fax)1.503.466.9472