Topic: Backup problem

[Allan Bergmann Jensen]

I've tried to backup more than 2 Mb data to Desktop prior to an upgrade to E-smith 5.6 but it won't suceed. As reported some time ago, E-smith seems to be unable to handle bacup to desktop when data exeeds a 2 Mb limit.

Can anybody confirm that this is still a problem, and are there any solutions?

Does anybody know if MySql databases are included in a "Backup to desktop"?

Allan Bergmann Jensen

[Bertrand CHERRIER]

The 2Mb limit is not of e-smith, but windoze 9x.
If you were using a tape backup, you could fill the entire tape without a problem.
Have you tried running XP ? the file limit size is bigger.

And yes the mysql databases are included.

[Cyrus Bharda]

See these threads:

http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=20072.msg78947#msg78947

Now there is a search link you too can use to find these things out

I suggest using Darrell May's backup2ws, much easier Thanks Darrell again!

Cyrus Bharda

[Kelvin]

Hi Bertrand,

I'm afraid you are not correct.

Search the forums and you will see lots of info on e-smith's 2GB limit.

By the way, Win98 with FAT32 has a single file size limit of 4GB, not 2GB.

And NTFS's limit is in the Terabytes (don't care about the exact number at the moment, I have no means of filling that up yet !).

SME 5.6 addresses some of the 2GB issues but not all.

Kelvin

[Charlie Brady]

Kelvin wrote:

> I'm afraid you are not correct.
>
> Search the forums and you will see lots of info on e-smith's
> 2GB limit.

Bretrand is correct. All versions of SME/e-smith can create a backup file greater than 2GB. The 2GB limitation of e-smith < 5.6 comes at restore time.

> SME 5.6 addresses some of the 2GB issues but not all.

Also correct. Restores from desktop are limited to c. 4GB at this time(*). There is no such limitation for restore from tape.

Charlie

[Kelvin]

Charlie,

If you read Allan's original post properly, you will see that Bertrand's reply is in reference to the fact that backup to desktops have a 2GB limit (which still exists) and not the fact that backups to tape have no such limit.

Therefore, my comments are to the point and valid for the thread.

Please follow a thread through when posting comments.

If you going to generalise, backup to desktop isn't the only thing to suffer from a 2GB limit in SME versions prior to 5.6 now, is it ?

Kelvin

[Charlie Brady]

Kelvin wrote:

> If you read Allan's original post properly, you will see that
> Bertrand's reply is in reference to the fact that backup to
> desktops have a 2GB limit (which still exists) and not the
> fact that backups to tape have no such limit.
>
> Therefore, my comments are to the point and valid for the
> thread.

Backups to desktop do not have a 2GB limit, or any limit, and never have, unless it is imposed by the file system of the destination. The ability to restore from those desktops via the web panel is what suffers from SME/e-smith limits.

Yes, Allan did suggest that the limitation was with e-smith, but he gives no evidence to support his conclusion. Are you sure that his problem is not the client OS's file system?

Charlie

[Kelvin]

>Backups to desktop do not have a 2GB limit, or any limit, and never have, unless
>it is imposed by the file system of the destination. The ability to restore from
>those desktops via the web panel is what suffers from SME/e-smith limits.

OK, if you're going to split hairs, then I stand corrected -- however, I stand by my assertion that backup to desktop has a 2GB limit because you cannot "restore from desktop" if your backup file is > 2GB. I'm sorry but in my books, when you create a function like a server backup utility, you must have a fully functional reverse of it as well (which is the whole point of Allan's original post). Forget about getting out a 3rd party utility to open up the compressed file and extract the files, etc. etc. etc. This defeats the purpose of an "easy to use" system.

And if you're going to split hairs, you should update your documentation and clearly specify that *FAT-16* has a file size limitation of 2GB but *FAT-32* has a file size limitation of 4GB, and not just lump all Win9x file systems as *FAT*, and so on and on and on......

Kelvin