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Re: Using CVS as an enterprise backup facility


From: Todd Denniston
Subject: Re: Using CVS as an enterprise backup facility
Date: Thu, 12 May 2005 09:22:05 -0500

Merlin Beedell wrote:
> 
> CVS sounds like a possible solution to the following scenario:
> 
> We are currently looking at backing up our main [file] servers to a remote 
> site's hard disk.  The requirements are:
>  All files to be copied to the remote site just once (i.e. so that 200Gb does 
> not get transferred every night/week or month over broadband connection).
>  From then on we only need to back up new or changed files.
>  For Changed files, we need to keep up to 3 (or a configurable number of) 
> prior versions
>  We need to see a simple report showing backup completion and any issues on 
> the way
> 
>  To restore, we need to be able to easily select a file from a directory 
> structure on the backup machine, and choose the most recent or one of the 
> previous versions.
> 
> I don't know of any backup software that runs quite like this (does anyone?). 
>  Clearly CVS would just be a component of such a system - yet it seems so 
> possible that it really aught to be attempted.  The key part is in a simple 
> interfaces for
>   - selecting servers and directories that should be backed up
>   - a scheduler
>   - a reporter
>   - a restore interface.
> 
> Am I being mad, or are there loads of existing products that do this, or does 
> this sound like a great idea?

Sounds like you really want to keep your backups in a VMS filesystem[1],
which some might claim indicate you to be heading for madness. I thought
there was a project to provide a VMS filesystem for linux, but I can't find
it quickly. Curiosity question, how many VMS folks you got there?

If ALL of your files are _ASCII text_ then you might be able to implement
what you want with CVS, but otherwise I highly suggest abandoning that idea.

There are several open source backup solutions available[2], AMANDA[3]
backing up to a disk, with some extra tools[4], seems the most likely to me
to come close to what you want. 

In February someone discussed doing what you are suggesting with (or on)
Subversion[5].

If you could live with one backup, but have that backup in live hot real
time, you might want to look at DRBD[6].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenVMS_filesystem
        http://www.panix.com/~kingdon/free-vms.html
        http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Filesystems-HOWTO-9.html#ss9.19
[2] http://freshmeat.net/search/?q=backup&section=projects&Go.x=0&Go.y=0
[3] http://amanda.sourceforge.net/
[4] http://freshmeat.net/search/?q=amanda&section=projects&Go.x=0&Go.y=0
[5] http://svn.haxx.se/users/archive-2005-02/0892.shtml
[6] http://www.drbd.org/
-- 
Todd Denniston
Crane Division, Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC Crane) 
Harnessing the Power of Technology for the Warfighter




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