Topic: Restoring a backup from the console

[Nate]

I recently updated to v.5 from v.4.1.1.  I can't restore the backup on my windows desktop because netscape, ie, opera, etc seems to time out before the image is ever fully transfered to the server.  

So I decided to copy the .bak file to a temp folder (/tmp/backup), what I want to do is run the restore right off the server that way I don't have to rely on my computer to send the file to the server and then have the server uncompress, I want to eliminate my windows machine from the equation.

Now heres my question -- How to I do that?  Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

[Jeff Martin]

A good place to start might be the how-to Des Dougan wrote "How to backup to disk using flexbackup" found at http://www.e-smith.org/cgi-bin/contrib.cgi

His how-to explains how to send the flexbackup file to a windows machine automatically and I suppose could be changed to send the file to the same server.

Remember though that the flexbackup file saved on the server would only be useful for restoring individual files and not restoring a complete system in the event of a complete disk failure.  Also the .bak file isn't used for restoring individual files.

Hope that helps

Jeff

[Nate]

I had wated enough time trying to figure out how to restore the bak file, so to stop the timeout problem I modified the http.conf and increased the timeout period.  

That went just fine then when I rebooted the server I no longer had any connection so after wasting enough time with v5 I went back to v4.1.2.

[rob fantini]

This is a SERIOUS   BUG.

  1- I backedup to desktop on 1 sme 5.0 [with the update blade]

   2- I tried to restore to a new 5.0 [with update blade]

 It times out.

 So I scp the backup to the new box.

 tried  gunzip
got the error:

[root@fbc2 /]# ll sme*
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root      9756000 Oct 20 09:56 smeserver-09-20-2001.tgz[root@fbc2 /]

# gunzip sme*

gunzip: smeserver-09-20-2001.tgz: unexpected end of file
[root@fbc2 /]#

 
 So backup and restore do not work.  

 Any suggestions?
 I'll look at modifying the backup and restore script or use a tape drive...

[rob fantini]

Using the old sme 5.0 computer, I just tried

1- backup to desktop.  went ok

2- verify the backup - that hung, like the restore..

 In the past I've used the backup,verify and restore. and it worked.
I'm not sure which version etc..

[Rob Fantini]

What I eneded up doing

 save the following to a tar file:
/usr/local
/home/e-smith
/etc/e-smith/templates-custom
/etc/e-smith/templates-user-custom
/etc/ssh
/root/.ssh
/etc/passwd
/etc/shadow
/etc/group
/etc/gshadow
/etc/smbpasswd

if you use  RAV [anti virus software] save
 /usr/local/rav8/etc  to a seperate tar file .
 

get the tar file to the new system.
   I use  scp  to copy between systems.
   as the new and old systems had the same local i/p address,
   I had to scp to a 3-rd computer, then unplug the  nic cable from        
   the old and plug in the new.
  Then scp from the 3-rd computer to the new one.

restore  the tar file

/sbin/e-smith/signal-event post-upgrade

restart

 then run sme manager to tell it which ethernet cards to use for
 local and remote networks.

 All worked.. I just had to install some misc pgms. THe rav tar file
is needs to be restored after rav is installed.

[Patrick Basile]

Hello everyone,

Will the steps Rob outlined in his post save ALL the user settings/files?  My reason for asking is this (and if I'm barking up the wrong tree please tell me) - I built a new server box and installed SME V5.  I then updated and modified it just the way I want it - adding Samba 2.2.2, SARG, custom fetchmail, raidmonitor, etc.  Now I want to migrate my users/files from my ESSG 4.1.2 server to the V5 box.  I don't really want (or need) the 4.1.2 system settings, so I don't think I want to do a backup/resore...do I?

Thanks for your ideas/help.

Regards,
Patrick

[Rob Fantini]

THis problem is fixed.  

 The computer I'm using as desktop is a linux workstation.  The problem was that  the root directory  '/'  was allocated only 250mb.  

 As my usage on the disk was about 80%, and /tmp was being used
by the backup to desktop process,  the computer ran out of disk space.

 After reinstalling the operating system to another disk [took only 15-20 min] and making sure  filesystem '/' had plenty of space,
backup,verify and i'll assume restore work.