On Thu, May 22, 2003 at 03:06:36PM -0500, Rebecca Pakish Crum wrote:
> > Yes, but what would happen if I never ran amflush? (Just for the sake 
> > of argument? :)
> 
> Then your holding disk would stay full forever, and you would lose that
> functionality of amanda. You wouldn't have to run amflush. If you really
> didn't want those backups, you could always just rm -rf *.* in that
> directory. Then you would recover the space and regain the holding disk.
> > 
> > >>
> > >> 2) If there is a week long holiday, does the operator have 
> > to flush 
> > >> onto 5 more tapes?
> > >
> > > No, you can choose to flush them all to one tape if it will 
> > fit. But 
> > > since you are a school, and no data would be changing during that 
> > > vacation time (*unless you have teachers who are gluttons for 
> > > punishment, I guess*), wouldn't you just turn off that cron job for 
> > > that week??
> > 
> > Yeah. But I'm trying to develop a "least path of resistance" 
> > method of 
> > administration. :) I.e. if I don't HAVE to remove it from the 
> > cron job, 
> > I see no reason why.
> 
> Exactly...I am a big fan of this as well. I will admit that I am guilty
> of letting a level1 dump sit on my holding disk for 2 weeks without
> flushing it and then just deleting it. That tape would have been
> overwritten at that time anyway! Don't look at me like that ~ I'm sure
> I'm not the only one who's ever done it...I'm not proud of it *sniff*...
> 
> ;)

I've done it, and I _am_ proud of it /:))

Data, like everything else, has a lifetime.  It is born, ages, and dies.
Once it's dead, it should be buried/cremated/whatever, so that the 
underlying medium can be returned to the medium pool for reuse.

Thanks for playing "Modern Backup & Restore Philosopy and Diversionary
Tactics".


--Steve Lane               /"\
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