From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sun Mar 30 15:05:28 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BB89837B401 for ; Sun, 30 Mar 2003 15:05:28 -0800 (PST) Received: from zoon.lafn.org (zoon.lafn.org [206.117.18.9]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3C08F43FCB for ; Sun, 30 Mar 2003 15:05:28 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from bc979@lafn.org) Received: from lafn.org (host-66-81-203-182.rev.o1.com [66.81.203.182]) by zoon.lafn.org (8.12.3/8.11.3) with ESMTP id h2UN5QiM007680 for ; Sun, 30 Mar 2003 15:05:26 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from bc979@lafn.org) Date: Sun, 30 Mar 2003 15:05:25 -0800 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v551) From: Doug Hardie To: Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In-Reply-To: Message-Id: <172A7198-6304-11D7-B001-000393681B06@lafn.org> X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.551) Subject: Re: Create a "hot backup" server machine? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 30 Mar 2003 23:05:30 -0000 On Sunday, Mar 30, 2003, at 14:18 US/Pacific, Ralph Dratman wrote: > I'm trying to create an offsite "hot backup" of a FreeBSD server. If > the primary server fails, I want to transport the spare machine to the > existing site and bring it up as a replacement, with little or no > reconfiguration necessary. > > Nightly mirroring would be adequate in this situation. The system is > not running live transaction processing or anything comparable. > > Is there a straightforward, automated way to mirror a whole FreeBSD > system, using open source software? > > I'm testing ftpcopy to remotely mirror the files and directories. > Ftpcopy performs an incremental comparison using dates and file sizes, > which should minimize the nightly backup time and traffic load. So far > that part seems to be working well. > > But I haven't figured out how to get the users, groups and permissions > mirrored. There are about 200 users. And there may be other gotchas I > haven't thought of yet. The approach I am using is to tar the system to a file on the production machine and then rsync that file with my off-site backup machine. I leave it as a tar file on the backup as its almost impractical for me to move that machine to the production site. I would replace the machine on the production site and then copy the file back from the backup machine and un-tar it. In your case I would create the tar file, rsync it to the backup machine and then un-tar it there. Tar retains permissions and ownership properly. Leave the previous tar file on the backup machine as rsync will use it to reduce the download time. My backup file (4 servers) is just over 4 GB. The rsync transfer only sends 1/16th of it. Much of the archived data does not change very often. -- Doug