Gerhard Fiedler wrote: > AFAIK they have a Linux server version that costs a few $100s. I would be > surprised if there wasn't a workable inexpensive backup solution for a > Linux server. You still can backup all your Windows workstations to a disk > in that Linux server, independently of how you back up the server itself. True, but he didn't say he had Samba set up or similar, and file permissions between Windows and Linux are a problem when recovering from backups of Linux on Windows or vice-versa. Been there, done that. Not worth the effort vs. using something native... unless... as you point out below, the product is cross-platform and can do things like image one OS from another. More and more, that's becoming common. >> TrueImage excels at imaging just about anything it can "get its hands >> on", including Linux systems, but there wouldn't be any way to do it >> remotely from another machine running a different OS, I don't think. > > I've never used it in this way, but as I understand it, it's a > server-client type setup: you have the backup server running on the > machines that you want to back up, and use a central client to control > these servers. AFAIK, with TrueImage Workstation, you get only a Windows > client and server. Interesting. Sounds like they've added features since I last used it. Personally, I back up my Linux server by making sure I use an LFS-compliant distro (Debian) and I keep installation media and the backups of the appropriate filesystems that have data that can change. LFS distros have some filesystems that are immutable and can even (by design) be mounted Read-Only if desired for security (although it's usually things like /usr/bin and it adds steps of remounting read-write before software/packages can be added to a system), so you only have to back up the filesystems where things are "allowed" to change. And of course, you can use the find command to double-check mtime and atime on filesystems outside of your backup scheme to make sure. I use rdiff-backup and a tool that automates same called backupninja. It handles automation of a number of different backup tools, including some I use to backup live MySQL databases. It'll also do remote backups via SSH. Reinstall of the OS from bare metal using the stripped down Debian "businesscard" CD takes about 10 minutes, and reloading the backups takes... ahh, don't know, haven't done it in a while. But it's fast, and works fine. For Windows and Mac I image drives, just like you -- using whatever tools I trust and have tested. Right now there's virtually nothing critical on my Windows machines so I copy a few "semi-important" files off of them regularly to the Linux server and let the backups there handle it. They're not system files or things that file permissions problems would make annoying. Just documents. On the Macs, oh... what's the name of that tool? There are only two that do a decent job making images, but you can image easily to an external Firewire drive, and even boot from it later, no problem. The Macs are by far the easiest machine to back up and maintain. I also use Apple's native "Backup" program for incrementals to another external USB drive. (I should use the Firewire, but I have more space on that USB drive that gets used for a number of things.) The firesafe and off-site backups of the critical Linux stuff via rdiff-backups over SSH to a remote machine in a data center take care of that part of things. Nate -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist