Re: Preferred Backup Method?

On 12/04/2007 05:19 PM, Michael Pobega wrote:
On Tue, Dec 04, 2007 at 04:04:47PM -0600, Ron Johnson wrote:
On 12/04/07 15:09, Michael Pobega wrote:
What is d-u's preferred method of backups? Now that I'm running servers
on my system (Apache, MySQL, SSH, etc.) I need to find a good method of
backing up, because no matter how much security someone has things may
still go wrong.

So list your preferred methods of creating/restoring backups and the
pros and cons. Thanks!
*Much* more information needed.


Sorry, I wasn't thinking.

How much stuff? 50MB? 5GB? 500GB? 5TB?


80GB HDD. It isn't full, of course, but that's the maximum (Currently
about 45 GB)

How compressible is it? Text/MySQL files or MP3s and JPGs?


I wouldn't know the answer to that questions.

How important is it? Your own stuff, or a business' stuff?


It's pretty important; It's my own stuff, it has all of my school work,
programming work, pictures, videos, and configuration files on it.

How big of a window do you have to back it up? 30 minutes at 23:15,
and you're fired if it goes past midnight? All night between 17:30
and 07:30?


A weekly night-backup would be my preferred method.

How often will the lusers will "Michael, this stupid computer ate my
work. Bring it back!!" (Meaning, of course, that they
stupidly/carelessly deleted/overwrote it.) If it's a database, will
the developers want regular copies restored for testing?


It's just my own stuff...The odds are probably low of someone deleting
my work by accident, but better safe than sorry.

Frequency? Nightly, weekly, every-other-day?


Weekly.

Retention? Keep backups for a month? Quarter? Year? 7 years?


I'd probably keep backups for two weeks, so I've have two backups at any
given time.

Budget? Always a killer...


I have another laptop sitting around with a 60GB HDD; Could I use that
as a backup?

Otherwise all I have is a 4GB pendrive and no money (But I could get my
hands on an 80GB External HDD easily)

As for backing it up, tar. Works like a champ.


Just `tar -cvvf backup-`date`.tar /`? Is it really that simple?



Ron Johnson has asked some really good questions. You may decide to use
multiple strategies for backup, depending on your various needs.

For etch, I use duplicity, which compresses/encrypts incremental
backups, to back up my desktop (/home and /etc) to both a local and a
remote box via ssh. It's automatic, gpg security, and very easy.
Disadvantage is needing my gpg key and duplicity to restore a total
disaster. Works well for me so far.

Regards,
Ralph


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