tony@rata.vuw.ac.nz (Tony Martindale) (07/21/89)
BACKUP VIA NETWORK, REQUEST FOR INFO. SUMMARY
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Original Message:
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We have recently invested in a campus wide network. At the moment
the network is Ethernet running on optical fibre, in the future we hope
to upgrade this to FDDI.
One of the services we hope to offer users of the network is remote
backup of their personal computers, file-servers, departmental computers
etc, onto our central machine(s) with disk farm(s) attatched.
*Question*: Is there any software out in netland that exists, or is being
developed that does this sort of thing?
Software using TCP/IP would be of the most interest to us, however info. on
any software would be appreciated. If there is no software out there at all
we are considering developing the software.
*Questions*: If we were to develop our own software, what functions, apart
from full and partial backup/restore, would people like to see in such a
system? Are there other people/organisations, out there, who would be
interested in a backup system like this?
If we were to "roll our own" the intitial environment would probably
be a Unix server backing up, Macs on appletalk via Kinetics/Multigate, IBM PC
clones and Unix workstations on Ethernet.
Software that we know about is by Dan Tappan, at BBN Corporate Computer
Resource Centre. This software backs up a Mac via a Kinetics FastPath
bridge to a Unix machine running CAP.
Replies via email please. If there is enough response I will post a
summary. Many thanks in advance ...
Comments:
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Thanks to everone who replied to my posting, I received 19 replies in
total. In this summary only those replies with relevant information have
been included. Those people who replied asking for replies to be sent to
them I have/will mail/ed them a copy of this summary.
Some replies have been edited, mainly formatting and cutting down
signatures.
I would be interested in any more information regarding this subject,
please reply via email.
In short there is no software that fits our needs exactly. There are
backup capabilites with some network software packages, and some
people/organisations that have written software for their own particular
needs. The final reply in this summary suggests someone may be developing
a commercial product.
If we choose to develop our own system, I will keep those people who
replied informed.
Replies:
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From: Jim Lowe <james@csd4.milw.wisc.EDU>
Organization: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
If you find out anything from your query I would be interested in hearing
about it. We are in the process of either writing a backup system from
scratch or purchasing one. Our computer center here would like to do
the same things that you are talking about (backing up other peoples files,
large disk farm, nfs, etc).
We may end up writing the backup system ourselfs, but that is still waiting
for management approval.
There is a package called BUMP that Terry Slatery (tcs@brl.mil) is working
on. BUMP is used to migrate files on and off a filesystem to tape. If
we write our own backup system we will probably pilfer as much BUMP code
as we can into it.
--
- Jim
Internet: james@csd4.milw.wisc.edu Uucp: uwmcsd4!james
Bitnet: james%csd4.milw.wisc.edu@INTERBIT
From: dab@vax.ftp.COM
Organization: FTP Software, Inc.
Your message wasn't clear if you were only interested in MACs or
wanted to be able to backup IBM PCs as well. This message is about
how to backup IBM PCs. Our product, PC/TCP, comes with an
implementation of TAR which uses the Berkeley rmt and rsh or rexec
protocols. As an extension to TAR I've added the ability to do
incremental dumps (a la dump/restore) so TAR could be more useful for
doing backups. In the next version, I intend to be able to do
incremental backups using the DOS archive bit as well. If you have
UNIX hosts around as servers, this is a pretty easy system to use. If
you don't, I know of one group who has written the appropriate server
code for VMS or I can tell you the protocol if you'd like to implement
it anywhere else.
David Bridgham
FTP Software, Inc.
(617) 246-0900
From: frog!barr@uunet.UU.NET
Organization: Charles River Data, Framingham MA
I don't know of existing products, other than Novell stuff, but you
remind me of an interesting proposal at Apollo to use their NCS for
this purpose: use their location broker(s) and remote procedure calls (RPCs)
to backup via TCP/IP sockets (UDP/IP sockets).
It would indeed be relatively easy & platform-independent to do. I last year
used NCS on Prime & MSDOS PC systems, for database front/backend RPCs, all
talking over NCS via UDP/IP sockets. The contractors who supplied NCS
for MSDOS, now called 'Course-6' (?), in Cambridge MA, proposed writing
this backup software in conjunction with Apollo. I don't know what came
of it, but NCS (Network Computing System) functionality would do a lot of
the work by itself.
From: thumper!pff@bellcore.bellcore.COM
Organization: Bellcore MRE
Sounds as if we have a mutual interest in this. We are now having all new
systems include an Ethernet card (Dove FastPath III, or Apple[ 3Com's]) in
hopes that some day we will figure out how to implement Dan Tappan's product.
The problem is, is that I'm a "Mac" person, and the Unix-eese person only
speaks
Unix. Neither one of us really understands the others "lingo / language".
We're getting there. According to one Tappan product user upstairs (BIG
R&D facility = another world upstairs!) Tappan's Dumper, etc; are not
without fault - somewhat ambiguous as to what error occurred, etc.
Nevertheless it seems to be the (only / best) game in town.
I'd be very interested in what you find out.
TOPS ala Unix is better than a sharp stick in the eye, but not "automatic".
We can't trust our users to even do a simple finder level "drag" to the TOPS
(Unix) volume. The process that we end up with must be "automated" and fast.
But I believe the Ethernet cards will be fast enough. Hint: It seems to
me that even the Ethernet cards don't use full Ethernet bandwidth, when
compared to say a Sun 3 or 4. Nowhere near the "normal" 10MB/S capacity of
Ethernet. Still, a helluva lot faster than Atalk.
Someday, SOMEONE will figure out that there are some serious Mac users here,
that know what Ethernet & Unix are...
Please let me know of any "intelligent" responses you might get - e-mail
is preferred since I don't read this group every day.
Best Regards,
Pete Ferris
From: mcvax!cgch!whwb@uunet.UU.NET
Hi Tony,
I am looking for such a product as well. I should run on top of TCP/IP and
be able to backup UNIX to central DEC systems. If you connect the systems
with NFS you can write the backup with standard system backups to the
central site. Retrieving a certain file for restore is awkward using
NFS since the most backup routines scan through the whole backup (assuming
it is a tape) to find the file. This delivers a high network load with a
low outcome.
There is one similar solution around on top of Hyperchannel (at least for
VAX'es and IBM's) named HYPERTAPE (contact: MultiStream Systems
Incorporated, Denise Yegge, P.O.Box 497, Excelsior, Minnesota 55331, USA).
They had the plan to run it also on top of TCP/IP. This information is from
Feb. 1988, you may check if it is still true.
Please send me any answers you get in this subject.
Hans W. Barz, R.1032.3.34, CIBA-GEIGY, 4002 Basel, Switzerland
mail: whwb@cgch.uucp
From: George Bray <geo@surf.sics.bu.oz>
> *Question*: Is there any software out in netland that exists, or is being
> developed that does this sort of thing?
I've heard of a program called Redux that a LocalTalk user can run to
backup his hard disk to an AFP server, but this is for small installations.
We have a similar setup to you. Bond Uni is mainly a UNIX environment
with many Macs. We're just getting the CAP stuff running on some VAXen
and would like to solve the backup problem too.
> all we are considering developing the software.
Yes! Do it!
> *Questions*: If we were to develop our own software, what functions, apart
> from full and partial backup/restore, would people like to see in such a
> system? Are there other people/organisations, out there, who would be
> interested in a backup system like this?
Have an INIT running in the background detecting the shutdown sequence.
The machine will ask you if you want to backup.
Settings for incremental and full backups in the chooser. You choose a
device to back up on.
Restoration: The ability to restore only a file or folder from backup
is selected from a tree heirarchy (Like HFS Backup). Or maybe a
FontDA Mover interface?
> If we were to "roll our own" the intitial environment would probably
>be a Unix server backing up, Macs on appletalk via Kinetics/Multigate, IBM PC
>clones and Unix workstations on Ethernet.
Yup
Use MacTCP. MacNFS will be out soon. Maybe you could interface with that.
George Bray AppleLink: AUST0287 MacNet: GEO Pager:075-50-7004
Byte Technologies ClubMac: GEO CompuServe: 72711,253 Phone:075-95-1111
at Bond University Internet: geo@surf.sics.bu.oz.au Fax: 075-95-1160
From: Bjorn Satdeva <bjorn@sysadm.sysadmin.COM>
> One of the services we hope to offer users of the network is remote
> backup of their personal computers, file-servers, departmental computers
> etc, onto our central machine(s) with disk farm(s) attatched.
>
> *Question*: Is there any software out in netland that exists, or is being
> developed that does this sort of thing?
>
Hi Tony
We have some shell scripts, which we are using at some client sites to
provide backup accross the network. They are using the remote shell
for execution and data transfer, and the archives is created using
cpio and compress. They are of cause not able to work with non-Unix
systems, and have the draw-back, that the central backup machine(s) must be
trusted (in /.rhost on the remote machine)
We are planning on rewirting them "some time real soon now", using C and
Kerberos for autentication. If you want the scripts, send me mail.
Bjorn Satdeva
---
Bjorn Satdeva -- email: bjorn@sysadm.sysadmin.com or uunet!sysadm!bjorn
From: jerry@athena.arc.nasa.GOV,
There is a new version of Unitech's backup program that is designed to
do backups over the net. This is only for Unix boxes, and we are to Beta
test is in less than a month.
Jerry Scharf
Nasa Ames research center
From: jerry@olivey.ATC.Olivetti.COM
In article <1989Jun8.220321.13679@comp.vuw.ac.nz> you write:
> One of the services we hope to offer users of the network is remote
>backup of their personal computers, file-servers, departmental computers
>etc, onto our central machine(s) with disk farm(s) attatched.
Sun's PC/NFS with the extra "lifeline" package supports doing PC packups
to the central server.
From: msd@bo.ind.TRW.COM
Tony:
I am currently working on such a thing, with the intention that it become
a commercial product. The specs are currently proprietary, so I can't
let them out. If you have done any kind of requirements survey though,
I might be able to tell you what kind of match there may be with what
you're after.
Sorry for the vagueness here.
++msd -- msd@TRW.Com -- Marc S. Dye (ayuda Company)
1393 Stonemeadow Ct.; Camarillo, CA 93010; USA (805)987-0433
END OF SUMMARY
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Tony Martindale Computing Services Centre,
Domain: tony@rata.vuw.ac.nz Victoria University of Wellington,
Path: ...!uunet!vuwcomp!rata!tony P.O. Box 600,
Tel: +64 4 721-000 Fax: +64 4 712-070 Wellington, New Zealand.Rudy.Nedved@RUDY.FAC.CS.CMU.EDU (07/25/89)
CMU CS: ------- I am working on and putting the finishing details on a 4.3BSD Unix oriented backup system so we can change from manually running backups on 80+ machines to automatically running backups on 500+ machines. It takes a modified version of dump/rdump called edump and a modified version of rshd called oprshd (uses real passwords to break system administrator bounds) and backs the data up on tape drives. It is a prototype system and internally very ugly. After I have gained some experience oriented insight I will rewrite it and clean it up. Sun file servers: ----------------- A company called Trimachi I believed based in Stage College, PA has a system for backing up SunOS file servers. super saver: ------------ I saw the source code for a system from Berkeley I believe called super saver. It had limited confiuguration options but looked workable. Epoch: ------ There is an integrated system from a company I think is called Epoch that uses WORM disks and other disks and automatically migrates old data to the WORM disks for permanent archival. -Rudy