[Date Prev][Date Next] [Thread Prev][Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

RE: Does anyone use ZIP disks to backup/restore their system? How?



I would definitely be interested in the web page !  Something else I use
Disk Image.  It creates a complete image of your HD saving all partitions to
a file on another hard drive.  This file can be restored later and presto,
you have a complete system the way you left it :)  This was intended for
commercial outfits like Dell.  They configure a system once and then
duplicate the HD.

If you do, any disk will work as a secondary disk and the whole program fits
on one floppy !  You still need a boot floppy.  I burned a CDROM and have a
boot floppy that will boot almost any system (in DOS) and give a menu of
most all the available CDROM drivers.  I then put CDROM in and restore the
saved image.

This is probably not practical for routine backups.

paul

-----Original Message-----
From: John Miskinis [mailto:miskinis@hotmail.com]
Sent: Wednesday, November 03, 1999 6:03 AM
To: debian-user@lists.debian.org
Subject: Re: Does anyone use ZIP disks to backup/restore their system?
How?


Hi,

   Thanks for the replies, it's really nice to know how others
deal with the "backup" issue(s).

   I'm really hoping to implement a backup strategy that will allow
me to backup/restore my entire linux system.  Over the last 10
hours or so, I have been researching "taper" as a means.  I checked
out a couple others, but one needed libc5 libraries, and I wasn't
sure if the other would work with multiple volumes.

   Taper seems to be quite slick.  I did a full backup, which only
spanned 2 volumes, instead of 3 with kbackup.  Unfortunately I
can't seem to fit "taper" on my rescue disk.  It has library
dependencies (curses? forms?) but allows static building.  But
the static binaries become QUITE large.

   I tried pruning down my rescue system as small as possible, but
I think I need to start from scratch again.  I use "zdisk" which
is also quite slick.  It copies a specified kernel (mine!) and an
MSDOS filed filesystem (compressed).  The MSDOS file system actually
includes an ext2 filed filesystem (compressed) and syslinux.  It was a
little trickly to figure it out, but I did, and am impressed.  BUT, I think
my MSDOS filed filesystem is not compressing as small as it
should, because I have changed it REPEATEDLY.

   I remember seeing some notes somewhere about this (bootkit?) and
why the /dev/zero is used as the input file when creating a file
to be used as a loop device.

   I think it may actually be possible to use zdisk to create a 1
floppy boot/root disk, that will allow a taper restore to happen.
My brain is a little fried after the last 10 hours or so on this
project, but I will be persuing this again in the near future.

   I may have to resort to having the "taper" and "bg_restore"
binaries on a seperate floppy.

   If I ever get this working, I would be interested to know if
people would benefit from a web page on all of this stuff.  I
planned to have a linux on IBM Thinkpad 560 up at some point
anyway, as it's very tricky to get linux on this machine with
no network connectivity and no builtin CD!

John



>From: "E.L. Meijer \(Eric\)" <tgakem@sg10.chem.tue.nl>
>To: debian <debian-user@lists.debian.org>
>Subject: Re: Does anyone use ZIP disks to backup/restore their system? How?
>Date: Wed, 3 Nov 1999 09:37:07 +0100
>
>On Tue, Nov 02, 1999 at 06:29:45PM -0800, John Miskinis wrote:
> > Hi,
>
>[...]
>
> >     This leads me to ask if most people just backup their important
> > files on linux, and if they lose their system, they reinstall from
> > scratch, then restore just their important (user modified) files?
>
>Not even that.  I only safeguard my own products (TeX files, fractals,
>programs).  The rest I have on CD, and the second time I install
>something I usually configure things faster.  Sometimes it is nice to
>try some new settings.
>
> >     This is how I always worked on Windows 95.  If I had a builtin
> > CDROM, and linux was easier to install I might opt for this, but
> > on my Thinkpad 560, it took me 4-5 hours to get everything back.
>
>It probably would take me the same amount of time.  But then again, it
>doesn't happen a lot.
>
>Eric
>
>--
>  E.L. Meijer (tgakem@chem.tue.nl)
>  Eindhoven Univ. of Technology
>  Lab. for Catalysis and Inorg. Chem. (SKA)
>
>
>--
>Unsubscribe?  mail -s unsubscribe debian-user-request@lists.debian.org <
>/dev/null
>
>

______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com


--
Unsubscribe?  mail -s unsubscribe debian-user-request@lists.debian.org <
/dev/null



Reply to: