[clug] Neat Backup Solutions for desktops...

[Andrew Janke]

On Tue, Dec 8, 2009 at 19:52, Mike Carden <mike.carden at gmail.com> wrote:
> Do a weekly Test Restore before any tapes leave the system for
> off-siting[0] and every 6 months (or whenever) do a bare metal
> recovery on raw hardware[1] and run tests on it.
>
> IMHO, a backup that you have never tried to use is an exercise in
> being seen to back up.

+2

At this juncture I might mention that I don't backup system disks at
all, only data. All my systems are managed/installed via FAI+cfengine
which means for me a "Restore" is a completely automated install +
configure from scratch. For a new desktop system or to rebuild a RAID
system from scratch takes about 5-10 minutes with a local NFS package
mirror.

And yes i do backup the cfengine config... :)

This sort of approach certainly makes upgrading between Ubuntu/Debian
versions a snap, just figure out which package names have changed and
rebuild your nfsroot, PXE boot and grin. So I "test restore" all my
systems at least twice a year when the new version of Ubuntu/Debian
comes out or when I can't figure out what has gone awry with some
system config so just mash the reset button, pick PXE boot from the
BIOS and re-install the sucker. If I don't think I can sort the
problem in 5 minutes it's not worth the time when you can re-install
faster..... :)  Think of it as a "scorched earth" approach to counter
users having sudo access on their own machines.


--
Andrew Janke
(a.janke at gmail.com || http://a.janke.googlepages.com/)
Canberra->Australia    +61 (402) 700 883