Questions tagged [backup]
Making copies of data so that the copies may be used to restore the original after a data loss event, or for historical retention.
3,959
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129
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14
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Why is RAID not a backup?
When someone mentions RAID in a conversation about backups, invariably someone declares that "RAID is not a backup."
Sure, for striping, that's true. But what's the difference between redundancy and ...
121
votes
16
answers
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GIT as a backup tool
On a server, install git
cd /
git init
git add .
git commit -a -m "Yes, this is server"
Then get /.git/ to point to a network drive (SAN, NFS, Samba whatever) or different disk. Use a cron job every ...
86
votes
8
answers
23k
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How to backup 20+TB of data?
We have a NAS server at the company I work for that is being used for storing photography sessions. Each session is approximately 100gb. Over the last couple of years this server has accumulated 10+ ...
85
votes
11
answers
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protocol version mismatch -- is your shell clean?
When following the instructions to do rsync backups given here: http://troy.jdmz.net/rsync/index.html
I get the error "protocol version mismatch -- is your shell clean?"
I read somewhere ...
80
votes
4
answers
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How to keep the full path with rsync?
When backing up with rsync, How do I keep the full directory structure?
For example, the remote server is saturn, and I want to backup saturn's /home/udi/files/pictures to a local directory named ...
55
votes
4
answers
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Can I make rsync output only the summary?
I use rsync to backup a directory which is very big, containing many sub-directories and files, so I don't want to see the "incremental file list". I just want to know the summary in the end. If I use ...
51
votes
3
answers
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Rsync to AWS S3 bucket
For a server I am hosting a website on I want to backup the data and settings to an S3 bucket. I found out that you can't directly use rsync to backup to an S3 bucket. Is there another way to achieve ...
50
votes
14
answers
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Linux - What directories should I exclude when backing up a server?
I'm backing up a Linux server and storing it on another server.
I began with a simple
rsync -aPh --del server.example.com:/ /mnt/backup
Then someone pointed out that I shouldn't back up /proc, ...
50
votes
6
answers
26k
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How to backup GPG?
What are the critical files I need to backup from GPG? I guess my private key would qualify of course, but what else?
50
votes
6
answers
75k
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How do I back up an AWS S3 Bucket without versioning the source bucket [closed]
Is there any way to recover from accidental deletions of an Amazon S3 Bucket?
We've got critical info in our buckets and I need to mitigate the risk of accidental or malicious deletions of the bucket ...
49
votes
2
answers
19k
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Prevent the possiblity of writing data to an unmounted mount point directory [duplicate]
I have an Ubuntu server where I'm automounting an external hard drive each boot.
To do this, I've created an empty folder on the root partition, and the drive gets mounted "inside" this folder.
...
48
votes
5
answers
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Confidential Documentation and the role of the Sysadmin
I've got another interesting one.
I'm about to backup and reinstall the HR Administrator's PC. I suspect that the fastest way to do this is to use the Windows 7 Transfer tool, and create a backup ...
45
votes
11
answers
32k
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Does an unplugged hard drive used for data archival deteriorate?
If I were to archive data on a hard drive, unplug it, and set it on a (not dusty, temperature-controlled) shelf somewhere, would that drive deteriorate much?
How does the data retention of an ...
43
votes
1
answer
53k
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What exactly will --delete-excluded do for rsync?
I use rsync with great pleasure for backing up my servers, although I do have a question about the --delete-excluded parameter.
/usr/bin/rsync -a --delete --numeric-ids --relative --delete-excluded ...
41
votes
6
answers
56k
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SQL Server (2005/2008): Does full backup truncate the log in full recovery mode
I've just read through a lot of MSDN documentation and I think I understand the different recovery models and the concept of a backup chain. I still have one question:
Does a full database backup ...
40
votes
2
answers
69k
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How can I do a dump of only the table structure in PostgreSQL?
In a similar vein to this question, how would I do a schema-only dump in PostgreSQL?
40
votes
19
answers
5k
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Best practices to keep your computer(s) backed up efficiently?
I'm looking for a cheap and efficient strategy to keep my personal computers and laptops backed up.
For example, currently I take a snapshot of my desktop once a week with Ghost and place the image ...
39
votes
4
answers
82k
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How To Backup "crontab -e" Files?
I want to do a complete server backup.
I already have my backup script copying all of the html/php files for the web app, and the mysql databases, placing them into a .tar.gz file.
How can I add the ...
37
votes
7
answers
73k
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How can I speed up a MySQL restore from a dump file?
I am restoring a 30GB database from a mysqldump file to an empty database on a new server. When running the SQL from the dump file, the restore starts very quickly and then starts to get slower and ...
36
votes
6
answers
121k
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compressing dd backup on the fly
Maybe this will sound like dumb question but the way i'm trying to do it doesn't work.
I'm on livecd, drive is unmounted, etc.
When i do backup this way
sudo dd if=/dev/sda2 of=/media/disk/sda2-...
35
votes
3
answers
45k
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How to perform incremental / continuous backups of zfs pool?
How can zfs pools be continuously/incrementally backed up offsite?
I recognise the send/receive over ssh is one method however that involves having to manage snapshots manually.
There are some tools ...
34
votes
7
answers
32k
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How can I use rsync with a FAT file system?
I would like to write a simple backup script that saves some data to a FAT drive. Should I reformat the drive and use a better file system or is it possible to use rsync with FAT? If so, what problems ...
33
votes
14
answers
17k
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Is it safe to store data on a hard drive for a long time?
Is it safe to backup data to a hard drive and then leave it for a number of years?
Assuming the file system format can still be read, is this a safe thing to do. Or is it better to continually ...
33
votes
3
answers
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How does dropbox version/upload large files? [closed]
I have a free dropbox account (2GB), and I was wondering how the versioning of large files works.
I have a full backup of all my webfiles that sites @ just over 1GB. After the initial upload of 1GB, ...
32
votes
5
answers
2k
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Do I still need a backup if I have a redudant storage system with rollback capabilities?
My organization recently bought a storage system. It has 1.5Petabyte, with RAID6, and there is an online synced mirror in a physical different location.
The system allows rollback / file recovery, by ...
30
votes
5
answers
26k
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Do you need -e ssh for rsync?
I always used to use the following command when copying from a server:
rsync --progress -avze ssh user@host:/path/to/files ./here
However, a friend of mine showed me that I can simply do:
rsync --...
28
votes
7
answers
1k
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Cliffhanger: The backups are right... here... right?
At my work, backups have a surprisingly low priority. The backup strategy was implemented a while ago, and since then it's just assumed the backups are fine. If you ask the sysadmins, they'll say ...
28
votes
7
answers
10k
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Backing up a 22 GB MySQL database daily
Right now I am able to do the backup using mysqldump. But I have to take down the web server AND it takes around 5 minutes to do the backup. If I don't take down the web server, it takes forever and ...
28
votes
3
answers
26k
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Does Rsync Allow Files To Be Synced Both Ways?
I have backed up a linux web server using rsync with cygwin. I now have a perfect copy of the server on my windows laptop. If i delete or modify a file on my laptop and run rsync again with cygwin ...
28
votes
1
answer
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pg_dump backup compression
When executing a pg_dump which should I use and why?
pg_dump -U <user> <database> | gzip -c > backup.gz
or
pg_dump -F c -f backup.tar.gz -U <user> <database>
27
votes
5
answers
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What's the best way to automate backing-up of PostgreSQL databases?
I find it tedious to have to backup databases every week. And I also think weekly backups should be turned into daily backups. If I had to do that, I don't want to do it manually. What's the best way ...
25
votes
7
answers
4k
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Secure offsite backup, even in the case of hacker root access
I'm looking for a way to implement a more secure way of doing an offsite backup that will also protect my data against the situation where a malicious hacker has gained root access to my server. Even ...
25
votes
3
answers
55k
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How can I back up a table structure but NOT its data in MySQL
I am using MySQL Administrator for making my database backup. I can perfectly back up the whole database with all its tables. There are some tables whose size is very big so I wonder if I could only ...
25
votes
5
answers
112k
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How to backup a full Centos Server?
I switched a few weeks ago from a dedicated server to a VPS. Now that everything is working well on the VPS I would like to shutdown the dedicated server and close my account with the hosting company.
...
25
votes
2
answers
8k
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ZFS Data Loss Scenarios
I'm looking toward building a largish ZFS Pool (150TB+), and I'd like to hear people experiences about data loss scenarios due to failed hardware, in particular, distinguishing between instances where ...
25
votes
10
answers
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Can I rsync to multiple destinations using same filelist?
I'm wondering if it's possible for rsync to copy one directory to multiple remote destinations all in one go, or even in parallel. (not necessary, but would be useful.)
Normally, something like the ...
24
votes
8
answers
2k
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How do I protect business critical data against fire?
We have 72 hard drives that contain our webcast inventory. The number is increasing. We're located in a frame building and we are afraid of not only fire, but catastrophic fire.
I've priced fireproof ...
24
votes
12
answers
84k
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Using Rsync to backup to an external drive
I'm buying an external hard drive to back up the computers in my house (finally!!). I'm hoping to use rsync. I've seen an example that does (or seems to do) exactly what I want. Something like this:...
24
votes
11
answers
40k
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Sync LVM snapshots to backup server
I have a number of Xen virtual machines running on a number of Linux servers. These VMs store their disk images in Linux LVM volumes with device names along the lines of /dev/xenVG/SERVER001OS and so ...
24
votes
6
answers
49k
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What happens during a live SQL Server backup?
Some of my coworkers were surprised when I told them that I can back up an SQL Server database while it's still running and wondered how that's possible. I know that SQL Server is capable of backing ...
24
votes
2
answers
18k
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Docker volume backup and restore
I'm using Docker to deploy some services on a CentOS 6.4 server, and I'm trying to figure out how to properly backup data they generate.
For example, one of the services is a web application where ...
23
votes
5
answers
41k
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How to keep: daily backups for a week, weekly for a month, monthly for a year, and yearly after that
I need to backup data and config files on this server, daily. I need to keep:
daily backups for a week
weekly backups for a month
monthly backups for a year
yearly backups after that
All of this ...
23
votes
8
answers
177k
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How to backup virtual machines on a standalone ESXi host?
Standalone ESXi (4.1) host without any vCenter Server.
How to backup virtual machines as quickly and storage-friendly as possible?
I know I can access the ESXi console and use the standard Unix cp ...
23
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Are encrypted backups a good idea?
I'm in charge of a small set of laptops and wanted to get some sort of automated remote (over WAN) backups going; the backups would be going to a RAID drive. Because we don't really have a secure ...
23
votes
7
answers
3k
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Backup strategy for developer-focused Apple environments?
It's interesting to see the technological split between structured corporate environments and more developer-driven/startup environments. Some of the Microsoft technologies I take for granted (VSS, ...
22
votes
4
answers
12k
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What is Time Machine doing?
Sometimes OS X tells me that it's "Preparing backup..." for an enormous amount of time. The time it takes seems to have no correlation to the amount of data to be backed up. Same for the "Finishing ...
22
votes
1
answer
19k
views
Gitlab backup file location (Omnibus installation)
I have installed Gitlab using omnibus installation package.
I took a backup using below command
sudo gitlab-rake gitlab:backup:create
Backup was successfully created. But I am not sure where to ...
22
votes
3
answers
15k
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Are RDX removable disks a good replacement for LTO tape?
Over a period of three weeks, I experienced six complete failures of LTO-1 and LTO-2 tape drives at client sites. Some had failed mechanisms. Others lost the ability to write reliably. These were HP ...
21
votes
8
answers
5k
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Do snapshots + RAID count as a good on-site backup solution?
The two main reasons I can think of for taking backups seems to be taken care of when I use both snapshots and RAID together with btrfs. (By RAID here, I mean RAID1 or 10)
Accidental deletion of data:...
21
votes
9
answers
3k
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Best practices for backup checking?
It is a common situation, when administrator makes system for automatic backuping and forgets it. Only after a system fails administrator notices, that backup system has broken before or backups are ...