Thanks for getting back to me...
I've put my replies below...
On Mon, Jul 20, 2009 at 8:59 PM, Matthias Meyer
<matthias.meyer AT gmx DOT li> wrote:
Vetch wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I have a question...
>
> I tried restoring a backup to my system - it kept on failing with aborted
> by signal=PIPE.
> I have a feeling it may have been related to corrupt files within the
> hardlinks, since when I tried restoring using tar, the tar files were not
> readable, and the zip files didn't have as many files in as I would have
> expected...
>
> I didn't seem to be able to resolve that, so I wiped the system (keeping
> the home directory in tact), and rebuilt the server.
Which system? Your BackupPC server or your backup client?
My backup client - the backuppc server is still as was...
The client was running as (among other things) a samba file server with all data stored in the home directory...
> Now, unfortunately, the software I use to run the file server decided to
> delete my home directories when I restored the configuration...
> Go figure...
> So now, I'm really worried because I think that I will have lost about
> 100GB of data that I believed was backed up...
> Anyway, I'm trying to restore now, but the tar files are still coming up
> as unreadable...
>
> I guess if there are problems with the data, there's probably nothing that
> can be done?
Probably not much :-(
Ok - I tried direct restores back into the original directories over the network - and it came up with successful restores for all the home directories...
Does this mean that the data has been fully successfully restored?
I think I have about 1000 files missing (out of about 35000)...
Now, this wouldn't be the end of the world, but I'd be interested to know if when it reports success, it has definitely brought back the entire dataset...
... and if so... do you have any suggestions as to why I may have different numbers of files?
>
> How does backuppc check the consistency of the data once it's been added
> to the pool?
> I know that it only backs up the data once, but how does it make sure that
> the data is in a valid state?
> Is it checksums? If so, then I guess it can't be a corruption error...
> ... but I don't get why I would be finding directories of 3000 files
> showing only 1500 in a full backup...
I didn't believe that backuppc will check data consistency. That is the job
of a filesystem. e2fsck will do that for ext2/3 file systems. You should
run it regulary.
Ok... (see below)...
>
> Can anyone help? Any support would be greatly appreciated...
> I've got all the coursework from a Masters and a PhD on there!
>
> Jx
I assume you are running BackupPC on Linux and use ext3 as filesystem.
So I would advise:
1) make a image backup (e.g. partimage) of your /var/lib/backuppc or
wherever your __TOPDIR__ resides.
2) try to open some files (select files which are importend for you) from
the BackupPC GUI (use your backup client, open http:\\<your
server>/backuppc, login, left hand menu, Browse Backups, click on a file
and say open)
3) run e2fsck on the device where /var/lib/backuppc located (unmount the
device first) and expect to lost data if e2fsck find file system errors.
You should run e2fsck as soon as possible. Elsewere filesystem errors can
grows and destroy more data then necessary.
I've just tried this - I booted to a live CD and e2fsck-ed the device...
On first scan, it reported clean... I'm now running a e2fsck -f to force it to check, but assuming that it reports the device as clean, then can I assume that the backups are not corrupted?
In which case, I have to wonder about the missing files...
Am I just worrying unneccessarily?
I have had a similiar problem 7 month ago. A lot of file system errors and I
lost most of my backups. Fortunately I didn't lost data on my backup
clients at the same time.
Heh - yes, it's always a little concerning when your backup solution starts playing up at exactly the same time that you lose all your data ;)
Luckily, I'm feeling fairly happy, because even if I've lost a couple of files, it's definitely a lot lot better than it could have been!
Thanks for your help!
Jx
br
Matthias
--
Don't Panic
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