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backup tape append lonetar lone-tar backup

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Newsgroups: comp.unix.sco.misc
From: Jeff Hyman <scolist@cactus.com>
Subject: Re: sco-list: One Tape Drive many machines- Restore RootFS
Date: Fri, 5 Oct 2001 19:28:34 GMT
Message-ID: <m15paeA-0005mWC@cactus.com> 


LONE-TAR:
=========
   Avoids multiple backup sets to one tape also, but the demand
has increased for various reasons. We have been shipping since
August 6, the capability to do multiple backups onto one tape
for OSR5. It is not integrated into our interface yet, but will be 
within a few weeks. While its in the field, we'll integrate the
code to the other flavors or Linux/Unix. Its a large US Gov. contract
that required this, and created the incentive to make it happen. It's
not rocket science, and does create an environment where some
of the other features (at this time) are not usable... ie: TapeTell,
FastSeek. What does work, and is the most critical piece, is the ability
to do bit-level verification of multiple datasets. This is working.
The ability to locate the correct dataset for a restore is also a 
necessary piece of the solution. This too is functioning. From a
Crash Recovery issue, the data is accessable, but not conveniently.
IOW: It's not integrated into AIR-BAG or RESCUE-RANGER interface.
One must exit to the shell and position the tape to the correct 
backup set prior to a restore using the new feature at this time.

BackupProfessional:
===================
   BP was designed from the ground up to handle complete network 
backups to include multiple backup sets, and multiple OS's 
(including NT/Win) to one or more backup devices, with crash
recovery for multiple OS's across the network. 

Both are available to evaluate at:  http://www.CACTUS.com            


BackupEdge's CD capabilities are excellant. My hat is off to Tom 
and his talented crew for a fine piece of work. We look forward to
the next level of see-saw'ing back and forth with features.

Tom... reprint permission denied! :-)

Best Regards,
Jeff Hyman, CEO/President
                                .--.
__________________________  .-. |  |  __________________________________
 Lone Star Software Corp.   | | |  | .-. Email:   jeff@cactus.com
 Cactus International, Inc. | |_|  | | | Sales:   (800) 525-8649
 509 E. Ridgeville Blvd.  _ |___   |_| | Support: (301) 829-1622
 Mt. Airy, MD 21771     _| ~-   |   ___| Fax:     (301) 829-1623
 http://www.CACTUS.com  \,  _}  |  |     
------------------------- \( -- |  | -----------------------------------
                                |  |

Recently, D. Thomas Podnar wrote:
> > Bill Campbell Wrote:
> 
> : Backup Edge will do this.  I assume that Lone Tar and other
> : ``SuperTar'' programs can as well.
> 
> Actually Bill, BackupEDGE is not a 100% solution for this problem, as
> described, although I appreciate the sentiment. I'll point out the
> problems below.
> 
> Perhaps Jeff Hyman can tell us whether his Lone-Tar or Backup
> Professional products will fit the entire bill.
> 
> : On Thu, Oct 04, 2001 at 08:36:20AM -0700, Terry wrote:
> : >We have a number of SCO5.0.5 servers in our computer room. We want to
> : >backup all the servers onto one tape drive, no problem. Currently we
> : >have one tape drive per machine, this is a pain in the butt. However,
> : >I have a concern about the RootFS backups and how to Restore them. We
> : >would like to use CD's.
> 
> BackupEDGE SS does NOT currently support the concept of multiple
> backups on one tape. Although it is not technically difficult to do
> make BACKUPS by simply using the no rewind device, setmarks, etc.,
> there are issues of verification, indexing for Quick File Access,
> and disaster recovery that make it difficult to support our
> ENTIRE environment. There is also the philosophical problem of having
> "all your eggs in one basket". Until we can resolve these to our
> satisfaction, we won't support multiple backups to a tape.
> 
> We certainly support the concept of remote backups using tape changers,
> autoloaders, libraries, etc. Any of the machines can change the
> remote tape before beginning a backup.
> 
> : >1.I would like to make my RootFS backup on a CD, is this a problem? If
> : >not, what CDR do you recommand, We are a IBM shop.
> 
> : >2.What special things would I need to do on my Root&Boot Diskettes to
> : >then access my CD from the diskette for a restore.
> 
> Terry, I assume this is because you think you need to restore the
> root FS to restore remote tapes. This is not necessarily the case
> but let's look at the issues.
> 
> Later versions of OpenServer have network capabilities built into
> the "mkdev fd" boot floppies. These could potentially be the base
> for restoring an entire remote backup. Lot's of testing and manual
> work to do.
> 
> Or, you could do a backup of the root/stand filesystems to a file
> using cpio and burn them to a SCSI CD-R/RW using cdrecord. Note that
> ATAPI CD burning is not available under OpenServer.
> 
> So you could probably do what you DESCRIBED. But that may not be the
> most effective method.
> 
> 
> BackupEDGE SS can create boot floppies OR a bootable CD, either of
> which can automatically set up filesystems and restore from a remote
> tape drive. Additionally, you can create single or multiple volume
> backups of your boot, root, and any other filesystems directly to
> a CD-R/RW, and have them be bootable directly into our crash recovery
> system.
> 
> BackupEDGE SS can create bootable CDs, or bootable CD backups, on
> either the local CD-R/RW drive, or across the network to a remote
> device. So if you had a single SCSI CD-R/RW and a bunch of ATAPI
> readers, you'd still be able to make CDs and eliminate floppies.
> 
> In any event, although we will do a lot of what you need, we're
> not going to give you an automatic method of doing multiple
> backups to a single tape.
> 
> 
> There is an announcement about BackupEDGE SS posted on
> comp.unix.sco.announce. Of course, more info and a trial
> copy is available on our web site.
> 
> Best Regards,
> Tom
> ---
>   D. Thomas Podnar - President  tom@microlite.com
>   Microlite Corporation         724-375-6711 Voice
>   2315 Mill Street              724-375-6908 Fax
>   Aliquippa PA 15001-2228       888-257-3343 Toll Free Sales
> +-----------------------------------------------------------+
> | Makers of                                                 |
> |  BackupEDGE SS - Data Archiving Software For UNIX & Linux |
> |  RecoverEDGE   - Network-Enabled Smart Disaster Recovery  |
> |                  for Linux, Open UNIX 8, UnixWare 7.1,    |
> |                  and OpenServer 5.0.x.                    |
> |http://www.microlite.com            ftp://ftp.microlite.com|
> +-----------------------------------------------------------+
> |  Now With Tape, Autochanger, CD-R/RW and DVD-RAM Support  |
> +-----------------------------------------------------------+
 

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