Douglas A. Tutty wrote:
Don't understand all the bandwidth used in your search for a backup solution. You've been given a number of tape scenarios, cd, and dvd backup. 2 used DLT and DDS drives backup (and restore) all of my everyday stuff using only tar commands (which could be scheduled from a cron job if I wasn't so lazy)Could those of you who use tape (DDS, DLT, Ultrium) for backup or archive tell me what format and software you have found most helpful? I only have a couple of boxes to backup. Right now, they each run their own script and create a tarball that then the main box rsyncs to its raid1 array (and the main box rsyncs its most important data (small set) to the other boxes. I'm going to be transitioning to tape for long-term archiving. I could just pass the existing tarballs out to tapes and keep a manual log of what is where. I could use a different format. I could use some other software. Re format: since some things (e.g. CD.iso's to protect existing CDs from scratches) are intended for long-term storage, I would like the file format to be very portable. I know that nobody knows for sure what formats will be able to be read in 20 years, but what would be a good bet (to avoid having to copy the tape just to change formats)? For this reason, I don't want just dump tapes since they're filesystem (and OS?) specific. I don't need the complexity of Amanda or Baccula. I'm not sure I needany complexity at all.Thanks for your POLL results and your feedback. Doug.
http://gentoo-wiki.com/TIP_Backup_using_cron_(simple)I recently downloaded Lone-Tar - http://www.cactus.com/index.php?p=press43. It looks promising and appears worth paying for.
CD's take care of anything I feel is REALLY important. http://cd-utils.sourceforge.net/ http://www.linux-backup.net/App/ http://www.willowsoft.com/backup/index.htmlI've also got more files stored on cheap flash media, than I'll ever be able to figure out what I needed them for. I've got a couple of older laptops with pcmcia slots that still read/write 8 year old media just fine. I'm also looking at a pile of 9 and 12 GB hard drives (formatted ext3) which hold who knows what, but will seek and access as soon as I plug them in to a spare drive case I rigged for testing. So, I've archived to tape (DLT, DDS, floppy tape, Travan) flash, pcmcia media, zip, CD, DVD (usb HP unit), hard disk, and a pile of floppies. All have saved my bacon during new installs gone wrong or utility power interruptions. Tape rules if only for the quantity and efficiency of data storage.
Are you archiving for posterity? Michael