Here's an idea I have completely unrelated to my problem posting, looking
for feedback.

Goal: using single large HDDs as backup media rotating them offsite, in as
simple and bullet-proof as possible a way.

Strategy:

  two hard drives
    one with the base server OS installed, install BackupPC 3.1 via package
management
    the other set up as one big partition (probably ext3), top-level folder
"BackupPC_TOPDIR"

  under the latter: create conf and log

  move the contents of /etc/backuppc and /var/logs/backuppc contents to the
above two new directories locations,
    and the contents of /var/lib/backuppc to the TOPDIR location itself, so
everything related to BackupPC is there in one place

    (here's where I need to get the proper permissions, ideally as the
specific chmod/chown/chgrp commands to use - any pointer appreciated)

    leaving the original directories empty as mount points

  use fstab to first mount the second drive at say /mnt/sdb3, then (using
bind mounts) /mnt/sdb3/BackupPC_TOPDIR at /var/lib/backuppc
    then (more bind mounts) /var/log/backuppc at /var/lib/backuppc/log and
/etc/backuppc at /var/lib/backuppc/conf

I should be able to clone this second drive to another two, and
transparently swap them out, effectively creating three entirely independent
but functionally identical BackupPC servers. One is live, the second on the
shelf on site, the third stored at a secure offsite location. Replace A with
B, take A offsite and bring C back to sit on the shelf, next time replace B
with C etc, rinse and repeat.

Only downside is if the boss needs to restore a specific day's version of
the corporate vision statement RIGHT NOW and that happens to be offsite, but
that seems a small price to pay for the simplicity of the scheme.

Obviously only works as long as everything fits on one disk - in my case not
a problem.

I suppose another server with the full historical set on LVM-over-RAID array
would handle both those issues, as long as the single drive held at least
one full snapshot, I still think the bullet-proof-ness of my scheme is
better than an off-site-server mirrored over a WAN.

Feedback on any gotchas, and the permissions details would be greatly
appreciated. . .
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