OT: paging MAC expert(s) --- What's a Performa?

From: Christopher Smith <csmith_at_amdocs.com>
Date: Mon Nov 19 13:24:29 2001

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Erlacher [mailto:edick_at_idcomm.com]

> I'm concerned mainly about Win9x. There were numerous backup
> packages that
> worked VERY well under [DOS6.22/Win3.11]. Since the release
> of Win9x, I've
> bought several backup packages, and a couple of releases of
> each, yet not seen
> one that even barely worked on any sort of consistent basis.

Ahh, well if you allow third-parties into the picture, it changes somewhat.


[Backup utility problems snipped]

> There's something about the OS that interferes with a backup.
> The Microsoft
> Backup for Win98 seems to work ...sorta... but it only works
> ...sorta... and
> falls down many times, misinterpreting a drive that the OS
> recognizes correctly
> to be a 2GB partition to be 300+ Terabytes. Naturally it
> falls down later
> because of that problem. <sigh>

Since it's a microsoft utility, you can bet that the moment you upgrade
windows, the backups will be unusable, since the new, improved version will
be completely incompatible.

> An OS without a real backup utility is of little use because
> you have to have
> backup ... not just copies of things, but a real backup,
> context and all, that

Bingo. Windows is not an enterprise class system, nor, IMNSHO, is it even
worthy of being used in a production context. ... but back to the topic at
hand. :)

> enables you to get back to where you were. DOS didn't have

In a single utility? Perhaps not, but how much "context" do you expect from
DOS? :) The built-in backup program would copy files onto some other
medium, and a recovery disk could at least be made relatively simply. Maybe
I'm misunderstanding your complaint, though.

My problem with the DOS backup utility was that every time somebody at m$
re-compiled something, your old backups were useless.

I assume a third-party add-on would fix that.

> that, UNIX doesn't
> have it (though it does have TAR, which makes copies to

I find that TAR gives me useable backups in general. Again, there's no such
thing as a "standalone tar," so you'll need a recovery disk/tape/something.

It also has CPIO if you're into that sort of thing, and several third-party
things.
 
> tape), OS/2 doesn't have
> it, LINUX doesn't have it ... I don't know what a guy's to

See unix above... also note that TAR may be available for OS/2.

It is slightly harder to build an OS/2 recovery disk.

> do. I guess
> image-copying the disk to tape, empty space and all, is the
> only solution. Of
> course that means the files are replaceable only on an all or
> nothing basis.

Well, do you consider that space part of your "context?" Where is the line
drawn? Also note that the empty space isn't exactly empty in most cases.

As for "all-or-nothing" replacement, that's not exactly the case. You
certainly could mount an image right from the backup device (very slowly for
tape ;) and read files out. It would be a larger problem if your backups
don't fit filesystem-for-cartrige.

I'm relatively convinced that as long as you can backup files and attributes
(including ACL, etc), treating special files as if they were (special, that
is...), you ought to be ok.

The only place you'd get bitten is in systems that need to know an exact
location of a bootable image, or other such special file. That can probably
be handled in the restore procedure, though.

So I think DOS and Unix can be backed up pretty well. Windows is a
different story, I guess. It would help, for windows, of course, if they'd
provide a decent, uniform, block-device access method. Don't hold your
breath, though.

> ^%$#_at_! ... what a bunch of crap!

What really makes it inexcusable is the fact that a backup utility shouldn't
be too difficult to cook up.

Regards,

Chris


Christopher Smith, Perl Developer
Amdocs - Champaign, IL

/usr/bin/perl -e '
print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n");
'
 
Received on Mon Nov 19 2001 - 13:24:29 GMT

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