BackupPC-users

Re: [BackupPC-users] Newbie setup questions

2011-03-11 09:03:32
Subject: Re: [BackupPC-users] Newbie setup questions
From: "Jeffrey J. Kosowsky" <backuppc AT kosowsky DOT org>
To: "General list for user discussion, questions and support" <backuppc-users AT lists.sourceforge DOT net>
Date: Fri, 11 Mar 2011 09:01:54 -0500
Rob Poe wrote at about 21:56:52 -0600 on Thursday, March 10, 2011:
 > I'm using RSYNC to do backups of 2 BPC servers.  It works swimmingly, 
 > you plug the USB drive into the BPC server, it auto-mounts, emails that 
 > it's starting, does an RSYNC dump (with delete), flushes the buffers, 
 > dismounts and emails.

I assume you are using the -H flag, right?
How big is your pool? (though I imagine if you are backing it all up
to a USB drive then you probably don't have that big a pool)
How much memory do you have?

> 
 > On 3/10/2011 8:35 PM, hansbkk AT gmail DOT com wrote:
 > > On Fri, Mar 11, 2011 at 3:46 AM, Michael Conner<mdc1952 AT gmail DOT com>  
 > > wrote:
 > >> That is good to know. Actually things are a little better than I thought, 
 > >> the spare machine is Dell Dimension 2400 with a  Pentium 4, max 2 gb 
 > >> memory. So I guess I could slap a new bigger drive into it and use it. My 
 > >> basic plan is to get backups going to one machine and then dupe those to 
 > >> an NAS elsewhere in the building. While we have a small staff, our 
 > >> building is 62,000 sq ft with three floors, so I can get them physically 
 > >> separated even if not really off site. For the web server, we have a two 
 > >> drive raid set up with two spare drive bays. Besides backing up with BPC, 
 > >> I would also dupe the drive on a schedule and take off site.
 > >
 > > To expand on Jeffrey's comment below - the idea of "duping" your
 > > backups is fraught with issues when the BPC filesystem gets past a
 > > certain size.
 > >
 > > To handle the creation of a redundant backup, I would advise one of
 > > the following:
 > >
 > > A - Periodically use BPC to run a full backup set to a different
 > > target filesystem - this is simplest and quite likely the fastest, and
 > > only becomes an issue if you have a limited time window - in which
 > > case LVM snapshotting can help as Jeffrey mentioned.
 > >
 > > B - use a block-level cloning process (like DD or its derivatives, or
 > > Ghost-like COTS programs if that's more comfortable for you, to do
 > > partition copying to a removable drive. Some use temporary RAID1
 > > mirrors, but I don't recommend it.
 > >
 > > C - a script included with BPC called BackupPC_tarPCCopy, designed to
 > > do exactly this process.
 > >
 > > Where you run into problems is trying to copy the hardlinked BPC
 > > filesystem over at the **file level** - even rsync will choke when
 > > you've got millions and millions of hardlinks to the same inodes to
 > > keep track of.
 > >
 > > BTW even if you don't do snapshots, you should use LVM from the
 > > beginning as the basis for your new BPC target filesystem, gives you
 > > future flexibility to avoid having to do the above any more than
 > > necessary.
 > >
 > > Hope this helps. . .
 > >
 > > On Fri, Mar 11, 2011 at 5:04 AM, Jeffrey J. Kosowsky
 > > <backuppc AT kosowsky DOT org>  wrote:
 > >> Keep in mind the point that Les made regarding backing up BackupPC
 > >> archives. Due to the hard link structure, the fastest way to back up
 > >> any reasonably large backup is at the partition level. This also makes
 > >> it hard to enlarge your archive space should you outgrow your
 > >> disk. One good solution is to use lvm since you can
 > >> enlarge/expand/move partitions across multiple disks. You can also use
 > >> lvm to create partition snapshots that can then be replicated as backups.
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 > 
 > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 > Colocation vs. Managed Hosting
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Colocation vs. Managed Hosting
A question and answer guide to determining the best fit
for your organization - today and in the future.
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