| OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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1. OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Supporting thread for the Do you need software for backup poll. |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 13:18 |
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     posts: 152 since: 16 Aug, 2004 |
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2. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Kim (24 Sep, 2006 13:1 : Supporting thread for the Do you need software for backup poll.
Personally, no, I don't need backup software. A little familiarity with the command line, archive tools (such as Zip, etc) and/or REXX is sufficient for me. On a larger scale (ie: attracting other users without such familiarity), I'd say yes. The more necessary, easy to use features either available or incorporated into eCS, the better. As opposed to spending energy or money on a backup solution though, perhaps someone a little programming saavy could write and donate one to the eCS/Warp cause. With Serenity's live demo CD as a possible basis (or the ability to create a bootable environment from a working eCS system), this should be very easy utilizing REXX, one of the freely available REXX GUI tools, some sort of freely available compression software and the power & functionality of eCS/Warp that could be easily included in a live boot CD (such as format, LVM, etc). I guess the question is: is this poll being used as a recommendation tool to give Serenity or other eCS/Warp programmers the results who could be working on other projects, or is this based off of curiousity? -Robert |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 16:48 |
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3. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Kim (24 Sep, 2006 13:1 : Supporting thread for the Do you need software for backup poll.
Hi
It is not really a case of needing Backup software - it is a case of needing competent up-to-date Backup software that does not have any silly file size restrictions. I have BackAgain/2000 which is OK for backing up my slightly less than 2 GB boot drive but absolutely useless for backing up a 15Gb drive unless I want to fiddle around a lot. So I think the question should really be "Do you need Backup Software that works with large JFS formatted drives and does not have a silly 2Gb file size restriction?" Regards Pete |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 20:16 |
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       posts: 49 since: 23 Jan, 2004 |
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4. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Traditional "backup" software is not needed here. I do own BackAgain/2 but never actually used it much. For the few data files I have, CDR and zip will suffice. For full system backup (OH YES, you do need it! It has saved my ass a couple of times when my hard drives finally died), I would recommend using DFSee and an external hard drive. I've found this to be a FAR better solution than traditional backups. I just plug in the external drive, use bootable CD-R, and image the entire drive. When it fails, I just plug in the backup drive and order a new replacement. I'm up and running in the few minutes it takes me to physically swap in the drive. Even an 80GB notebook drive costs me only ~$75, well worth it for peace of mind and ease of use. Compare that to how much it would cost in you DVD-R, CD-R or tape? How long would it take you to recover? |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 20:25 |
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       posts: 46 since: 12 Apr, 2004
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5. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| I agree with Issac. We have no backup solution on eCS. Back Again/2k was nice, but with a 2GB file size limit, it's useless. Zip/Unzip is doubly useless as a backup program with both 64K files and 2GB filesize limitations. I considered buying the Back Again/2k source code and fixing the filesize problem, but I hesitate, because there is very little support from the eCS users for developers. I suppose I could propose a bounty here on OS/2 World. |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 20:54 |
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6. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Since hard drives are getting bigger in size, it is good to have a backup that can also match that size and be used with eCS.
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BigWarpGuy - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - OS/2-eCS.org Director of Communications - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - supporting the past OS/2 user and the future eCS user http://www.os2ecs.org
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| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 21:47 |
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       posts: 72 since: 29 May, 2001 |
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7. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Personally no - I'm doing very well with my own homebrew, with some REXX+home made utilities (made with FreePascal) +Dfsee+RAR - I have created a nice tool (With support for rotational backups) for backup of my desktop, notebook and server shares - but 100% tailored for my special needs and conditions. But perhaps if a backuptool, that is very easy to configure - supports all kinds of backup-media (Including CD/DVD and HDDs) - with the ability to create images of partitions along with file backup (With wildcard and specific files and the ability to handle hidden and system files) occur - I might be interested  |
| Date: 24 Sep, 2006 on 23:57 |
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8. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Kim (24 Sep, 2006 13:1 : Supporting thread for the Do you need software for backup poll.
I currently have a cron job that uses ZIP to backup various partitions and important directory structures, and I also manually use DriveImage to back up key boot partitions, but a nice program to perform incremental backups to a network drive would be very nice. I remember using programs like Fastback under DOS, and something similar under OS/2 (but using DVD or hard drive media, not diskettes! <bg>) would be useful to me. I'd actually love to find a nice cross platform solution for OS/2, Linux, and Windows, but that's a bit harder to create. |
| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 02:19 |
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9. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| If eCS/OS2 is focusing on the business market then the backup software is absolutely necessary. |
| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 07:17 |
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     posts: 1 since: 08 Jul, 2003 |
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10. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Do you need software for backup? Definitely. I currently use BackAgain/2000, combined with a tape drive and it meets my needs. I have also used xcopy for backup. I haven't run into the 2G+ file problem yet on my eCS system.
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Chris Living in Paradise!!
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| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 14:53 |
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     posts: 30 since: 29 Jan, 2001 |
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11. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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last updated at 25 Sep, 2006 15:10 (1 times) If you have an old box that you can install Linux on you might try something called Backuppc. Totally automatic after being set up. I use it to backup three clients (Macosx, Winxp and linux). |
| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 15:06 |
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12. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| I absolutely need backup software. I have many gigabytes of information that require frequent backups in multiple generations. Some of this information must be backed up every 3 hours, some every 6 hours and so on down to once a week. This is complex and has to be automated to be practical. I use BA 2000 to do this and since one copy isn't secure enough, (the drive(s) could crash in the meantime... and have), I also have my crucial information copied over to another machine nightly using DSync. Once every two weeks I burn those BA 2000 backups onto DVD keeping and rotating through 3 generations.I don't think BA 2000 is ideal, but it makes it all possible for me. If something better comes around and I can reduce 3 peices of software down to one, then I'll give it a good looking at for sure.
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| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 16:23 |
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     posts: 277 since: 10 Aug, 2004 |
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13. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Jesper (25 Sep, 2006 15:10): If you have an old box that you can install Linux on you might try something called Backuppc. Totally automatic after being set up. I use it to backup three clients (Macosx, Winxp and linux).
Hmm... I hadn't heard of backuppc, however doing a quick search for it, it it is written in perl. Since we have a port of Perl on OS/2, it should be possible to get this running under OS/2 / eCS. I'll have a quick look and see... |
| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 17:23 |
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14. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| I use BackAgain 2000 to backup to tape drive. Saved my behind so many times that I've lost count. So yes, backup software is a must. cytan |
| Date: 25 Sep, 2006 on 19:47 |
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     posts: 3 since: 26 Sep, 2006 |
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15. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Yes. The lack of decent backup software for OS/2-eCS is embarrassing. Modern tape drives are huge and very fast, and some are quite affordable -- I have a Sony AIT-1 Turbo drive that uses 40GB (native) tapes and can back up 21GB/hr. The only tape backup program that works with it is the now-orphaned PC-BaX. I have tried them all and know all their limitations. None of them support files > 2GB. All of them will crash if they simply have too many files to scan before starting the backup. Specifically: - GTAK/GTAR -- A very old port of GNU tar; it was excellent at the time but its long filename support is poor. With the --posix switch it can handle long filenames better, but it will only backup and restore a file's modification time, no the other two timestamps. Does not restore directory timestamps.
- BackAgain/2000 -- Terribly unreliable. It can back up well, and verify a tape, but three days later might not be able to read its own tapes. Spanning tapes with this program is a recipe for data loss. Also, because it installs its own .FLT driver, it will not coexist with any ASPI-based tape software. Use ASPI once, and BA/2K is completely unable to see the tape drive again.
- NovaBack SCSI -- This works reasonably well. Its GUI interface is incredibly poorly designed, and it can keep you from using the desktop at all for several minutes at a stretch. Also, because it keeps indexes on a separate tape partition, it cam sometimes fail to identify spanned tapes. Can support variable and large block sizes, although its supplied tape drive database is woefully out of date (and Novastor's latest ones aren't much better).
- PC-BaX v3.20 -- This is the one I use, although overall its design is poor. With tweaks to the config it can operate an AIT drive at full speed. It can also mangle its own tape metadata, though I've learned how to repair that. Uses 1K block size.
- Seagate Backup for OS/2 Warp -- This one looked promising. It backs up very fast, and has an attractive interface. It will, however, crash every single time you try to restore more than 2GB of files.
- Fastback Plus for OS/2 -- I haven't tried this with the AIT drive. It might work, as it's a fairly simple program. But its indexes are not Y2K-aware, and it does not restore directory timestamps.
What OS/2-eCS desperately needs, then, is a modern backup program capable of supporting SCSI and ATAPI tapes, as well as CD/DVD-RW and hard disk backups; that supports large files; that keeps an intelligent database of backups; that doesn't use creepy proprietary tape formats, which always fail; and which can handle backups of millions of files in tens of thousands of directories. That would be nice. |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 02:21 |
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       posts: 114 since: 12 Jul, 2003 |
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16. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Fahrvenugen (25 Sep, 2006 17:23):
Jesper (25 Sep, 2006 15:10): If you have an old box that you can install Linux on you might try something called Backuppc. Totally automatic after being set up. I use it to backup three clients (Macosx, Winxp and linux).
Hmm... I hadn't heard of backuppc, however doing a quick search for it, it it is written in perl. Since we have a port of Perl on OS/2, it should be possible to get this running under OS/2 / eCS. I'll have a quick look and see...
The current build of Perl for OS/2 uses EMX - so it will definitely have a problem with files > 2gb..... |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 05:33 |
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     posts: 124 since: 20 Nov, 2003
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17. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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I am presently using GTar/GTak with TarFront, a 1996 program that you can find on Hobbes, with a 12/24 Gb SCSI tape. I'd gladly switch to something more modern/more functional. I definitely need a better, well designed, standards-based backup program.Bye Cris |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 11:43 |
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     posts: 3 since: 26 Sep, 2006 |
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18. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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I am presently using GTar/GTak with TarFront, a 1996 program that you can find on Hobbes, with a 12/24 Gb SCSI tape. I'd gladly switch to something more modern/more functional.
Paul Smedley has built a recent version of tar. Presumably it supports large files and long filenames. Unfortunately, it has no tape support. The source for Andreas Kaiser's tape.exe contained proprietary code so he never released it. I could live with a port of a current version of tar that supported ASPI tape drives, though. And support for ATAPI tape devices would probably be necessary too. |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 14:31 |
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     posts: 1 since: 26 Sep, 2006 |
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19. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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| Hi, if you need a backup software and you don't have a tape unit, you can use star backup (hobbes). It is a tar compatible program, but more powerful and faster. It is software I ported to OS/2 some time ago, and it supports 64 bit file I/O and OS/2 extended attributes. In the zip file I included a sample rexx script for automated rotation of backup files. Yuri |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 16:09 |
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     posts: 277 since: 10 Aug, 2004 |
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20. Re:OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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Smedles (26 Sep, 2006 05:33):The current build of Perl for OS/2 uses EMX - so it will definitely have a problem with files > 2gb.....
Paul, Forgive me for not being as familiar with compilers as I'd like to be, so this question may seem out of place to anyone 'in the know', but... would the difficulty with files > 2 GB still exist if perl was built with the newer GCC 3.3.5 / Libc0.6.1 instead of EMX? |
| Date: 26 Sep, 2006 on 16:15 |
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| OS2 World Poll: Do you need software for backup? |
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