Red Hat Linux 7 Unleashed

By William Ball

• Table of Contents
  • Copyright
  • About the Lead Authors
  • About the Contributing Authors
  • Acknowledgments
  • Tell Us What You Think!
  • Introduction
  • I. Red Hat Linux Installation and User Services
  • Chapter 1. Introduction to Red Hat Linux
  • Chapter 2. Installation of Your Red Hat System
  • Chapter 3. LILO and Other Boot Managers
  • Chapter 4. Configuring the X Window System, Version 11
  • Chapter 5. Window Managers
  • Chapter 6. Connecting to the Internet
  • Chapter 7. IRC, ICQ, and Chat Clients
  • Chapter 8. Using Multimedia and Graphics Clients
  • II. Configuring Services
  • Chapter 9. System Startup and Shutdown
  • Chapter 10. SMTP and Protocols
  • Chapter 11. FTP
  • Chapter 12. Apache Server
  • Chapter 13. Internet News
  • Chapter 14. Domain Name Service and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
  • Chapter 15. NIS: Network Information Service
  • Chapter 16. NFS: Network Filesystem
  • Chapter 17. Samba
  • III. System Administration and Management
  • Chapter 18. Linux Filesystems, Disks, and Other Devices
  • Chapter 19. Printing with Linux
  • Chapter 20. TCP/IP Network Management
  • Chapter 21. Linux System Administration
  • Chapter 22. Backup and Restore
    • Successful Backup Considerations
    • Qualities of a Good Backup
    • Selecting a Backup Medium
    • Selecting a Backup Tool
    • Backup Strategies and Operations
    • Restoring Files
    • What Is in the Archive?
    • Summary
  • Chapter 23. System Security
  • IV. Red Hat Development and Productivity
  • Chapter 24. Linux C/C++ Programming Tools
  • Chapter 25. Shell Scripting
  • Chapter 26. Automating Tasks
  • Chapter 27. Configuring and Building Kernels
  • Chapter 28. Emulators, Tools, and Window Clients
  • V. Appendixes
  • A. The Linux Documentation Project
  • B. Top Linux Commands and Utilities
  • C. The GNU General Public License
  • D. Red Hat Linux RPM Package Listings

Qualities of a Good Backup

Obviously, in the best of all possible worlds, backups would be perfectly reliable, always available, easy to use, and really fast. In the real world, trade-offs must be made. For example, backups stored offsite are good for disaster recovery, but are not always available.

Above all, backups need to be reliable. A reliable backup medium will last for several years, whereas a reliable archive medium should last much longer. Of course, if the backups are never successfully written to the backup medium, it does not matter how good the medium is, and today's ever-increasing storage requirements can tax even the very best hardware and strategies.

Speed is more or less important, depending on the system and use of the data. If a time window is available when the system is not being used and the backup can be automated, speed is not an issue. On the other hand, restoration might be an issue. The time it takes to restore the data is as important as the need to have the data available.

Availability is a necessary quality. Performing regular backups does no good if, when they are needed, they are unavailable. Backups for disaster recovery may not be available locally and don't always include data timely enough to restore a single file accidentally deleted by a user. A good backup and recovery scheme includes both a local set of backups for day-to-day restores and an offsite set of backups for disaster recovery purposes.

Fast, available, reliable backups are no good if they are not usable. The tools used for backup and restoration need to be easy to use. This is especially important for restoration. In an emergency, the person who normally performs the backup and restores might be unavailable, and a nontechnical user might have to perform the restoration. Obviously, documentation is a part of usability.

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