On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 11:49 AM, xpac <backuppc-fo...@backupcentral.com> wrote: > SO, I took this from their Wikipedia page "BackupPC is not a block-level > backup system like Ghost4Linux but performs file-based backup and restore. > Thus it is not suitable for backup of disk images or raw disk partitions" > > Hmmm, just thinking outloud here but is there something open source that is > better suited for server backups/restores/disaster recovery? > > Or do those that use this find that it is relatively easy in the event of a > disaster. Right now I'm working on implementing something into our small > production environment (consisting entirely of Centos servers) and I have > BackupPC up and running, just want to see if maybe I should reconsider before > we get too far along and switching to something else becomes much more > painful. > > Any/all opinions are welcomed :D
Basically you have to have partitions and filesystems created before you can restore from tar and then you have to make the system bootable afterwards. That isn't impossible, but not something I'd call 'relatively easy' or that you want to try for the first time during a disaster. In general the best approach for systems like Centos is to understand how to install a new 'minimal' version from scratch, add the backuppc keys and then restore your data on top of that. With that approach it is best to try to separate 'your' data from the system itself so you won't have trouble with slightly different hardware or newer software packages. On the other hand, if you want something to quickly put something back as close as possible as the last backup run on fairly similar hardware, look at clonezilla-live or the 'rear' package in the EPEL repository. Clonezilla will save/restore disk image backups but you have to shut down and boot into it to make the backup. ReaR will build you a bootable iso image with scripts to duplicate your system on bare metal and restore a backup on it. Several options can be used for the backup itself - tar to an NFS location is built in. I don't think it would be extremely difficult to let the Rear-generated iso/script get your system to the point where you could restore from the backuppc data but I haven't needed to do it yet myself. ReaR does have a point in the restore where you can edit the disk/filesystem layout which is handy for things like going from software raid to hardware, or moving a whole system to a VM. Oh, and rear doesn't require shutting down to make it's backup. -- Les Mikesell lesmikes...@gmail.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Meet PCI DSS 3.0 Compliance Requirements with EventLog Analyzer Achieve PCI DSS 3.0 Compliant Status with Out-of-the-box PCI DSS Reports Are you Audit-Ready for PCI DSS 3.0 Compliance? Download White paper Comply to PCI DSS 3.0 Requirement 10 and 11.5 with EventLog Analyzer http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=154622311&iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk _______________________________________________ BackupPC-users mailing list BackupPC-users@lists.sourceforge.net List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/