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How can I undelete user files?

tdejohn

How can I undelete user files?
« on: May 28, 2007, 11:55:56 PM »
Ok I messed up big time here.  I have been using SME 7.0 server for some time now with Windows 2000/XP clients on my home network. I was recently experimenting with a Linux client (Xandros 4) and created a mount point for my SME user share. For reasons I won't go into I decided to delete the user profile (Xandros local user) from the desktop machine while logged into the local machine as root. I deleted the user and files! To my horror, when I logged into the SME server from one of my other machines my user share had NO FILES in it.
Obviously I confused the Windows concept of a pointer to a server's files as opposed to a mount point of a Linux/UNIX file system.

Can they be recovered? There won't be any file activity on the server until I resolve this and no I don't have a backup.

Offline cactus

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Re: How can I undelete user files?
« Reply #1 on: May 29, 2007, 07:54:20 PM »
Quote from: "tdejohn"
Can they be recovered? There won't be any file activity on the server until I resolve this and no I don't have a backup.
AFAIK, unless you enabled the recycle bin for an ibay there i no way of recovering deleted files on SME Server.

Five important rules for administrating a SME Server:[list=1]
  • Backup
  • Backup
  • Backup
  • Backup
  • and do not use the root user to administrate your server.[/list:o];-)
Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than its worth ~ Baz Luhrmann - Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

Offline CharlieBrady

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Re: How can I undelete user files?
« Reply #2 on: May 29, 2007, 09:07:15 PM »
Quote from: "cactus"

AFAIK, unless you enabled the recycle bin for an ibay there i no way of recovering deleted files on SME Server.


Correct.

tdejohn

How can I undelete user files?
« Reply #3 on: May 30, 2007, 12:49:39 AM »
Thanks guys for the quick response. I'm well aware of the reasons for, and the necessity of backups. If you refer again to my post you will note that I was not administering the SME server at the time. I was deleting a local user on a Xandros4 client machine that had mounted the home folder of an SME user. It was appropriate to be logged into the local machine as root to delete the user. The fact that the files were deleted from the SME server was a totally unexpected outcome.
I had searched for some info pertaining to my situation but found only old posts one of which had suggested that a "trash can" be incorporated into future releases. It sounds like that is the case now but I didn't catch any info in my earlier search. Sounds like a good idea.
Fortunately I found a backup source of the files in question so the most recent work is lost but not the most important stuff. I'll have to see what people are using to back up the SME server. It is fairly new for me and I haven't investigated it yet since it is just a home network. This is a learning experience so that I might incorporate an SME or other open source type server in a production environment. Most of my experience has been in the Windows/Mac area and I haven't had this kind of issue before.