Re: [rdiff-backup-users] native VSS (Shadow Copy) support
Josh Nisly wrote: Two things: 1) The rdiff-backup project likely won't accept patches for features that are platform specific. There are exceptions for OS-specific filesystem metadata, but VSS doesn't fall into that category. Now that there is consideration of restarting development, any chance we could reconsider this? Any backup solution has to wrestle with the Windows user base and the key issue on Windows is whether or not a backup solution uses VSS. If rdiff-backup supported VSS, its uptake might be huge. At very best, maybe a plugin system so that VSS can be added easily without needing to touch the core code? 2) I've written a python extension module in C++ to implement VSS. Is that something that you'd be interested in? Very, please share. Have you integrated this with rdiff-backup at all? JoshN Thanks Josh! -- Randy Syring Intelicom 502-644-4776 Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 1 Cor 10:31 Randy Syring wrote: I was going to try to add support for Windows Shadow Copy Service based on this code/concept: http://markmail.org/thread/bmyioexeuvnwlmho and am wondering if anyone had suggestions related to this. The concept seems simple enough, make a shadow copy of each drive involved and change the location of the backed up files from the actual drive to the vss image. I was thinking a new flag could be implemented '--vss' in order to tell rdiff-backup that vss images are desired. ___ rdiff-backup-users mailing list at rdiff-backup-users@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
Re: [rdiff-backup-users] native VSS (Shadow Copy) support
On Tue, Apr 6, 2010 at 11:27 AM, Randy Syring rsyr...@inteli-com.com wrote: Josh Nisly wrote: Two things: 1) The rdiff-backup project likely won't accept patches for features that are platform specific. There are exceptions for OS-specific filesystem metadata, but VSS doesn't fall into that category. Now that there is consideration of restarting development, any chance we could reconsider this? Any backup solution has to wrestle with the Windows user base and the key issue on Windows is whether or not a backup solution uses VSS. If rdiff-backup supported VSS, its uptake might be huge. At very best, maybe a plugin system so that VSS can be added easily without needing to touch the core code? I don't post here often, but I strongly agree that snapshot technology should be leveraged by the rdiff-backup environment. I'm not as positive that it needs to be in the tool itself. I can't remember the name of the package, but I believe there is a linux package that wraps rdiff-backup and uses LVM snapshots from which it runs rdiff-backup. As to VSS, it is supported in Windows XP SP3, 2003, Vista, 2008, etc. So it is a long term technology that it here to stay. To me the only thing to really discuss is how vss support should be integrated into a windows rdiff-backup environment, not if it should be. 2) I've written a python extension module in C++ to implement VSS. Is that something that you'd be interested in? Very, please share. Have you integrated this with rdiff-backup at all? The great thing about C code, etc. (as opposed to just scripts calling the Vista provided CLI commands) is that VSS CLI commands are not included in XP SP3 iirc. And also with XP SP3 you only have 20 or 30 seconds to mount the VSS snapshot after you initialize it. (again, iirc) So having it in a real program as opposed to just a script makes it easier to have the error / retry logic built in. === And for those that don't know much about VSS snapshots, one really cool feature is that services like Exchange, MS-SQL, etc. have vss knowledge integrated into them. They register themselves with the vss service and whenever a snapshot is created, the registered services are notified to quiesce themselves prior to the snapshot being made. I don't know if people are backing up that class of service via rdiff-backup, but if they are it is pretty critical that vss snapshots be used in order to ensure you have quiesced data. vss also solves the open file issue that is so problematic with windows backups. Thanks for reading Greg ___ rdiff-backup-users mailing list at rdiff-backup-users@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
Re: [rdiff-backup-users] native VSS (Shadow Copy) support
On 06/04/2010 17:03, Greg Freemyer wrote: On Tue, Apr 6, 2010 at 11:27 AM, Randy Syringrsyr...@inteli-com.com wrote: Josh Nisly wrote: Two things: 1) The rdiff-backup project likely won't accept patches for features that are platform specific. There are exceptions for OS-specific filesystem metadata, but VSS doesn't fall into that category. Now that there is consideration of restarting development, any chance we could reconsider this? Any backup solution has to wrestle with the Windows user base and the key issue on Windows is whether or not a backup solution uses VSS. If rdiff-backup supported VSS, its uptake might be huge. At very best, maybe a plugin system so that VSS can be added easily without needing to touch the core code? I don't post here often, but I strongly agree that snapshot technology should be leveraged by the rdiff-backup environment. I'm not as positive that it needs to be in the tool itself. I can't remember the name of the package, but I believe there is a linux package that wraps rdiff-backup and uses LVM snapshots from which it runs rdiff-backup. As to VSS, it is supported in Windows XP SP3, 2003, Vista, 2008, etc. So it is a long term technology that it here to stay. To me the only thing to really discuss is how vss support should be integrated into a windows rdiff-backup environment, not if it should be. 2) I've written a python extension module in C++ to implement VSS. Is that something that you'd be interested in? Very, please share. Have you integrated this with rdiff-backup at all? The great thing about C code, etc. (as opposed to just scripts calling the Vista provided CLI commands) is that VSS CLI commands are not included in XP SP3 iirc. And also with XP SP3 you only have 20 or 30 seconds to mount the VSS snapshot after you initialize it. (again, iirc) So having it in a real program as opposed to just a script makes it easier to have the error / retry logic built in. === And for those that don't know much about VSS snapshots, one really cool feature is that services like Exchange, MS-SQL, etc. have vss knowledge integrated into them. They register themselves with the vss service and whenever a snapshot is created, the registered services are notified to quiesce themselves prior to the snapshot being made. I don't know if people are backing up that class of service via rdiff-backup, but if they are it is pretty critical that vss snapshots be used in order to ensure you have quiesced data. vss also solves the open file issue that is so problematic with windows backups. Thanks for reading Greg I have a Windows utility called TimeDicer (www.timedicer.co.uk) which is a wrapper for rdiff-backup, backing up from Windows to Linux, and it uses VSS. So it is not essential to have VSS built into rdiff-backup, even though it would be nice. Dominic ___ rdiff-backup-users mailing list at rdiff-backup-users@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
Re: [rdiff-backup-users] native VSS (Shadow Copy) support
Two things: 1) The rdiff-backup project likely won't accept patches for features that are platform specific. There are exceptions for OS-specific filesystem metadata, but VSS doesn't fall into that category. 2) I've written a python extension module in C++ to implement VSS. Is that something that you'd be interested in? JoshN Randy Syring wrote: I was going to try to add support for Windows Shadow Copy Service based on this code/concept: http://markmail.org/thread/bmyioexeuvnwlmho and am wondering if anyone had suggestions related to this. The concept seems simple enough, make a shadow copy of each drive involved and change the location of the backed up files from the actual drive to the vss image. I was thinking a new flag could be implemented '--vss' in order to tell rdiff-backup that vss images are desired. ___ rdiff-backup-users mailing list at rdiff-backup-users@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
