Re: [LUG] Tape Backup

[Simon Waters <Simon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Kai Hendry wrote:
> In one of my jobs, we just used dd to dump a whole partition to tape.
> Can't remember the command line unfortunately, it was straight forward,
> except for some block size change that was system dependent.

HP have a DD style tool in their secondary loader partition
(well some versions and variants of HP-UX).

This means you need only bootable HP-UX media for your platform
to initiate a recovery (assuming you used the same tool for
backup).

Crude but effective (well for certain system changes - not much
good for general backup) - I guess the Linux equivalent is a
bootable floppy with dd on.

So for say a major upgrade;
Backup using normal backup software (allows restore to other
disks)
DD filesystems to tape from bootable floppy (second backup
allows easy restore).
Upgrade
The procedure also means you have two copies on tape, just in
case a tape fails.

Ironically the first time I came across it in a procedure the
live servers didn't have the relevant software installed in the
relevant partition because they were a different model from the
servers usually used at that bank. Fortunately Sunday wasn't
spent backing out the changes the old hashioned way.

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