Networker

Re: [Networker] Merits of cloning versus dual backups?

2003-04-17 11:39:22
Subject: Re: [Networker] Merits of cloning versus dual backups?
From: Tim Mooney <mooney AT DOGBERT.CC.NDSU.NODAK DOT EDU>
To: NETWORKER AT LISTMAIL.TEMPLE DOT EDU
Date: Thu, 17 Apr 2003 10:39:20 -0500
In regard to: Re: [Networker] Merits of cloning versus dual backups?,...:

>You make an excellent point! I guess I can see that cloning would be
>reasonably efficient if you were dealing with incrementals or small
>savesets, but when we run fulls, we're talking about a lot of savesets,
>some rather large, for a total of maybe 200 savesets or more across as
>many as 6 tapes. Now, how on earth would I have time to wait for
>NetWorker to read through each of those savesets and clone each one?
>Granted, you're not dealing with the network, so you've eliminated that
>bottleneck, but still, I mean in a 4 drive box, Networker could only
>clone savesets from two different tapes at a time, which would still
>leave two more to go.

That's correct, assuming you're backing up directly to tape.  If, however,
you use file devices for backup, you could clone from your file device(s) to
tape utilizing all your drives for writing clones.

As you can see, optimizing the cloning process can take a fair amount of
work, and how you do it depends on the needs of your environment.

>Is there some way to clone more than one saveset on the same tape at a
>time? I don't see how since NetWorker can only read one at a time from
>the same tape.

Not using any kind of tape technology I've ever seen.

Tim
--
Tim Mooney                              mooney AT dogbert.cc.ndsu.NoDak DOT edu
Information Technology Services         (701) 231-1076 (Voice)
Room 242-J6, IACC Building              (701) 231-8541 (Fax)
North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164

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