backup suggestions? (SOLVED)

[sledgehammer]

The way I normally backup my vector 5.8 data files is to copy the file in question to a usb stick or to burn it to a cdrom.

Wanting something easier (that I could schedule for automatic backup) I spent much of today with Simple Linux Backup (http://simplelinuxbkup.sourceforge.net/) but, while it ran without showing error and saved the directories fine, I could not get it to save the files within the directories.  The download says it comes with all files needed in one package, though the java discussion confused me.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.  Perhaps the whole idea of incremental backups is a bad one.  I see the system backup program in VASM but don't really want to backup system files.

John

[bigpaws]

Rsync works well.

For example

rsync -a /home/myuser /backup/myuser

It is simple and very effective. You could use cron to schedule
your backups as well. Maake additions to that for deleting old
backups and such.

HTH

Bigpaws

[hata_ph]

try robocopy for windows.........

[sledgehammer]

Thanks so much, Bigpaws, for the rsync suggestion.  It worked perfectly, saving my Documents and my foxpro files to the usb stick.  Not too sure it will save the seamonkey emails in the Local Folder because of the space between Local and Folder, but I will give that a try soon. I could always save the big Mail file.

And thanks too hata_ph.  I will look at robocopy when time permits.  I was well into rsync when your post arrived.

John

[marcus]

Remember to also add an '-r' option to rsync, so it goes recursive, otherwise, it will skip directories. I also add verbose option. If you run it with '-z', it will compress files. If you are not sure, use '-n' the first time around and it will run in simulation mode.

For other options, type 'rsync --help'. There are lots of them.

If you type this:

rsync --help > ~/rsync-help.txt

the help screen will be saved into a file in your home dir, so you can print it.

[bigpaws]

Man rsync:

-a, --archive               archive mode; same as -rlptgoD (no -H)


Bigpaws

[Joe1962]

VL 5.8 comes with grsync, a GUI frontend to rsync.

[sledgehammer]

Is it reasonably possible to do simple incremental backups with grsync? It works fine for a complete backup, though it would be nice if it also compressed the file (I will probably find out it does compress when I figure it out better).

Though I have yet to get SimpleLinuxBackup to work properly (I am making progress), that was the allure SimpleLinuxBackup originally had for me, i.e. it is supposed to do a complete backup once a week to, I believe, a tgz file, and then nightly incremental backups during the interim.    I say "simple" in part because I would like something my staff could easily do once it is set up.  Grsync might be a little dangerous for an inexperienced user.

As an aside, I had one fellow who didn't backup for TWO YEARS with predictable and disastrous results.  He, the only one here still using windows, says he thought he was occasionally backing up but, turned out, he was backing up to a second hard drive that failed. Something like that.

John

[nightflier]

I have set up several backup servers. The work is done using rsync and simple scripts called from crontab. Beautiful thing is that when going between two Linux boxes is that it does a "differential backup". Big files don't get copied in full, only the differences do. Hard disk space is cheap, so I prefer straight file copy. Makes it easier to browse and recover single files.

[sledgehammer]

Thanks nightflier,

I think it will be a while until I am up to the backup server thing, though I agree with the concepts you mention.

I now have simplelinuxbackup (./bkup) working correctly, I think,  but not automatically as I can't figure out the crontab thing.  I see dcron but it is apparently not a GUI.  I don't see kcron or vcron in the gslapt packages.  I am looking into that, slowly, as I still content to experiment with running simplelinuxbackup or gsrync manually.  I ran ./bkup last night on my data files (Documents, foxpro and local mail) before I went to bed.  It finished sometime during the night and those files are now on my 2 gig usb stick.  Unlike before, when I was having file system problems, it got the files as well as the directories. Tonight, supposedly, ./bkup will just backup today's files to the same usb stick, etc through the week, until next Monday when it will write over last night's complete backup with a new complete backup and start over.  I might not want to automate it as God only knows what would happen if I forgot to put the usb stick in before retiring. If this doesn't work, I will just backup once a week using gsrync, which might be better anyway.  Either is one hell of a lot better than my former very time consuming practice of backing up to CDs about once every month or two.

John

[sledgehammer]

Brief Update:

I am still using smplelinuxbackup. Bought an 8g usb stick and now back up all of /home to it every Monday night.  Interim backups on occasion during the week. Seems to work well.  Uses about 4g of the usb stick.  Not automated as I have to put in the 8g USB stick anyway.  . 

My /home directory is 5.6 g.  Only advantage I can see over grsync is the interim backup feature. Don't know which (SimpleBackup or grsync) is the faster backup.

Anyway, I'm happy.  Thanks to all for the help.

John 

[sledgehammer]

I went ahead and automated SimpleLinuxBackup on my old laptop. Since it compresses, everything fits well on an 8 gig USB Stick....if I remember to put in the thumb drive before I hit the sack.  So far no problems and am most relieved to know my files are saved.  Would work better on a desktop as I wouldn't have to remove the USB stick every day.

Now I am looking up ways of encrypting the USB stick.

John

[sledgehammer]

Not sure whether to start a new thread here in the software request forum or not.

Basically, I am trying my best to switch to Vector Standard 5.9.  Simple Linux Backup by, I think, Steve Rosen, worked fine on 5.8.  It won't run on 5.9. 

Grsync is not on 5.9 and I don't have time now to learn command lines for rsync, though no doubt it is very good.

I have no clue why Simple Linux Backup (http://simplelinuxbkup.sourceforge.net/) won't work on 5.9 but I had almost a year of backup peace of mind with that program on 5.8.

John

[kc1di]

you may also want to take a look a Partimage , wich is in 5.9 testing,  It backups the whole partition and makes a compressed ISO of the image.    http://www.partimage.org/Main_Page

I will look into other backup utilities to see if we can package some of them , but it will have to be in a few days. 

Cheers Dave

[bigpaws]

If you checked the dependencies you should find
where the problem is two things to look at are java
and gtk+.

According to the Docs it should run on just about
any install if the deps are met.

Bigpaws