I've got a situation where that sort of thing might be handy.  My
Amanda server covers an Oracle database (snapshotted on a NetApp) and
numerous individual servers.  
        For Oracle, a weekly full backup means grabbing the Oracle datafiles
and redologs, and a daily incremental means backing up the accumulated
archive logs.  Amanda doesn't understand the distinction, so I put the full
backup into its own rotation on a dedicated changer.  The archive logs are
picked up every day by the normal daily rotation, which also backs up the
other servers.
        Also, I occasionally run an offsite archival rotation from the same
changer as the daily rotation.  When I do that I have to be careful not to
get the two changer configs confused about which tape is really in the
drive.
        I've only had this up for a couple of months, so I may be missing a
better solution for my needs.  For now, though, I'm wary of changing a setup
that is basically working.  What I'd really like is for Amanda to allow me
to customize dump behavior so that the Oracle dumps could all be handled by
one rotation.  And it would be nice to have multiple media sets per
configuration so that offsite and GFS-style backups could be handled with
minimal effort.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joshua Baker-LePain [mailto:jlb17 AT duke DOT edu]
> Sent: Monday, June 09, 2003 1:03 PM
> To: Daniel Bentley
> Cc: amanda-users AT amanda DOT org
> Subject: Re: Multiple backup groups
> 
> 
> On Mon, 9 Jun 2003 at 1:49pm, Daniel Bentley wrote
> 
> > I'm fairly new to Amanda, having set up hardware 
> configurations, some 
> > small test backups (including some samba mounts), and 
> generally getting 
> > things ready for a full transfer over to Amanda (getting 
> away from a bunch 
> > of custom-made scripts kludged together 4 or so years ago). 
>  Hardware is 
> > configured and working, backups work, only thing remaining 
> is to get the 
> > actual backup scheduling hammered out.  Here's what I would 
> like to do:
> > 
> > Groups: A, B, C
> > Schedule: Mon - Grp. A, Tues - Grp. B, Wed - Grp. C, Thurs 
> - Grp. A, Fri - 
> > Grp. B, Sat - Grp. C
> 
> The canonical question regarding this sort of request is... 
> why?  It's 
> *much* easier to let amanda set the schedule, although it 
> does require you 
> to wrap your head around how amanda does that.
> 
> Amanda does a very good job of scheduling backups.  Unless 
> you have a very 
> compelling reason, it's best to let it do it's job.
> 
> -- 
> Joshua Baker-LePain
> Department of Biomedical Engineering
> Duke University
>