On Tue, Sep 01, 2009 at 01:29:45PM -0400, Steve wrote:

> >  > >  > Is there a parameter that sets priority of once backup over another,
> >  > >  > or do all the BackupPC_dump processes start at the same level? 
> >  Maybe
> >  > >  > that would be a $Conf that could be added...
> >  > >  > evets
> >  > >
> >  > > That sounds like an interesting suggestion.
> >  > >
> >  > > But for your purposes where it seems like you want to de-prioritize
> >  > > all dumps relative to BackupPC_nightly, maybe just alias the relevant
> >  > > commands in _InstallDir/bin to include the nice.
> >  > >
> >  >
> >  > I don't think priorities will make much difference.  This is much more
> >  > about disk head position than CPU timeslices.  If the nightly process
> >  > runs at all it's going to keep yanking the head away from where the
> >  > backup runs want it to be.
> >  >
> >
> > Well, then you could always wrap Backup_nightly in a script that
> > renices priorities of dump prices to 20 - but that is a certainly not
> > pretty and also that assumes that you are running nightly outside of
> > your backup window so that no new dumps start...
> 
> Upon reflection, I think Les' point is the most valid - any
> competition is going to slow things down and the nice level won't help
> a lot.  So maybe the $Conf could be a "suspend backups until nightly
> admin completed"; that way you wouldn't have to guess a length of
> "dark" time; backups would just suspend themselves (leaving partials)
> when the admin started, and then resume when it finished...  You could
> still specify the time of the admins as we do now for the slowest time
> of day.

IMO the easiest approach would be:
- if BackupPC_nightly starts, it acquires a lock, then waits for backups
  to complete
- no new backups start until BackupPC_nightly finished

This should be rather easy since it could be implemented at the central
scheduling code - actually BackupPC_nightly wouldn't be started, just
the flag would be set that it wants to.

I would like such automatism (configurable, of course) as well since it
just sucks to guess backup periods and to keep some time reserved for
nightly maintenance.

Tino.

-- 
"What we nourish flourishes." - "Was wir nähren erblüht."

www.lichtkreis-chemnitz.de
www.craniosacralzentrum.de

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