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.dorner@pequod.cso.uiuc.edu (Steve Dorner) (07/24/89)
In article <4352*kenw@noah.arc.cdn> kenw@noah.arc.CDN (Ken Wallewein) writes: >1. HFS Backup 3.0 > ... > I'm testing it now. It does what they say, but I don't like either the > manual or the user interface. I've been using this product for some time (and its predecessor for even longer). If I had money to spare, I would certainly find SOMETHING ELSE. Following is a summary of why I don't like the program. "I don't like the manual" must be the understatement of the year, rivalled only by "I don't like the user interface." Both are ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE. Worse than that, the program has bugs, and doesn't do what you expect or want. Let me list a few: 1. If you backup to floppies (I know the poster didn't), don't use the "Overwrite" format. After a few backups to a set of floppies, the program becomes confused, and further backups fail. Also, you will spend a lot of time swapping floppies ("Gimme #1. Now #8. Oops, I want #1 again. Now #8. How about #1 again? ..."). 2. The timed backups don't always find network volumes, even when they are mounted just fine. 3. The program has a fairly nice set of filters; for example, it lets you omit system files and applications (which are presumably replaceable from original disks). The trouble is, if you create a backup using these filters, the program doesn't save a list of your FILTERS, it saves a list of the FILES it backed up. If you try to do an incremental backup, it will only backup files that are already in the backup set. Newly created files, even if they match the filters, WILL BE OMITTED from the incremental backups. This is so wrong-headed I find it hard to believe. (In fairness, the manual mumbles something about this, but you never know exactly what the manual is trying to say, and whether it really means what is seems to say, so I didn't believe it at first.) 4. The pretty "splash screen" confuses MacroMaker, so you can't even automate backup using MacroMaker (unless you are cleverer than I). I do still use the program; I find I can get a real-live incremental backup by a combination of MacroMaker and manual intervention. But there is no way that I can use HFS Backup for unattended backups to network volumes. -- Steve Dorner, U of Illinois Computing Services Office Internet: s-dorner@uiuc.edu UUCP: {convex,uunet}!uiucuxc!dorner IfUMust: (217) 244-1765
dave@etsu.CMI.COM (David Halonen) (07/26/89)
I agree with the complaints of a crummy manual and interface. Yuck! There is at least two different files/prefernces that one must save in order to have the same environment from run to run. Specific complaints: Timed backups do not work if Moire is running. Not good. If you open/launch a backup set (a file that is aware that you wish to back up to a mounted volume) and the mounted volume cannot be found (although it is usually mounted), the program terminates after you click "ok". Since I separate my data files from my program files, I always have to go and hunt down the program just to run the silly program. What a pain. -- David Halonen, Center for Machine Intelligence, Electronic Data Systems Ann Arbor, MI (313) 995-0900 AppleLink: N0548 Internet: dave@suna.cmi.com
brucer@pwcs.UUCP (Bruce Alan Riebe) (07/26/89)
> > This is a tad late, but I have come across a couple of commercial products >which seem to address this issue rather well, from Personel Computer >Peripherals Corp. >2. NetStream 'Set & Forget' Network Backup > - backs up all servers and nodes on a network to a single device - > your choice of tape, optical, or hard disk drive. > - apparently free with the purchase of PCPC's JetStream 8mm Exabyte- > based 2 Gbyte tape dtive We are thinking of purchasing a JetStream and NetStream, but would like to know if anyone has any experience with these products over multiple zones? Bruce -- Bruce Riebe: Supervisor of User Services City of St. Paul Public Works Computer Services 700 CHA 25 W. 4th St. St. Paul, MN 55102-1660 (612) 298-5553 Quote: Keep grandma off the streets -- legalize bingo. (Fortune)
topping@yacht.cis.ohio-state.edu (brian e topping) (08/21/89)
I am working on an application that will update a local volume to be a mirror image of another mounted volume. It requires that you have the drivers to mount the remote volume (AppleShare, TOPS, etc.) but it does make a mirror image of the volume, down to the position of the icons within folders. Anyone interested may drop me a line. ETA should be a couple of weeks for solid betas. Brian Topping <topping@cis.ohio-state.edu>