Backup Central

Hello everybody.

I just need some help with my brainstorming activity on how to set up
some sort of remote backup with rotation and retention.

Here my situation:

I've set up a Linux (Debian Lenny) server at my office, on which I sync
from remote customer servers their contents. Actually I'm doing this
with an ssh tunnel and rsnapshot, on a daily basis. What I now have is
the most up-to-date state of customers' data, but I also want to
guarantee a restore period of 1 month.
My first thought has been to set up a NAS on which I backup the data I
synced from the customers server, on a daily basis. I can't afford to do
FULL backups every night, I would be running out of space very soon
(calculate 20 GB for one customer, multiplied 30 times for one month =
not a convenient way!).
Thus, I thought of making *one* FULL backup every 4 weeks and between 2
FULL backups I'd just be making differential or incremental backups.
Here the first questions arise:

1) what would be better, diff or inc backups?
2) is this a good way to backup stuff for one month restore guarantee?

But the most important thing is:

when I finish my rotation, I would be overwriting the FULL backup. If
I'd be doing like this, I would loose the ability to restore data backed
up during the whole month, because both diff and inc backups rely on
their preceding FULL backup (or am I wrong?).
Therefore, my last question is: how do I have to configure my backups in
a way that I can guarantee *one full month* of restores, day-by-day?

I hope I've explained my thoughts clearly enough, otherwise just let me
know.

Thanks in advance,
Flavio Boniforti

PIRAMIDE INFORMATICA SAGL
Via Ballerini 21
6600 Locarno
Switzerland
Phone: +41 91 751 68 81
Fax: +41 91 751 69 14
Url: http://www.piramide.ch
E-mail: flavio < at > piramide.ch

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Hy there and thanks for your reply...

I would like "less storage" as my target... recovery times are not so important to me and to my customers...
About retention and FULL backups: I have now come to think that it's good to take 1 FULL every weekend and do incrementals, retaining the FULL backups 5 weeks and the incremental just 4 weeks. In this way I'm guaranteeing myself 1 full month of recoverable data...

Or am I wrong?

Thanks again,
Flavio

From: Jaspreet Singh [mailto:jaspreet.singh < at > druvaa.com]
Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2009 7:11 PM
To: Boniforti Flavio
Cc: backups < at > backupcentral.com
Subject: Re: [Backups] Remote sync, backups and data retention period



Hey,


On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 7:23 PM, Boniforti Flavio <flavio < at > piramide.ch> wrote:

I've set up a Linux (Debian Lenny) server at my office, on which I sync
from remote customer servers their contents. Actually I'm doing this
with an ssh tunnel and rsnapshot, on a daily basis. What I now have is
the most up-to-date state of customers' data, but I also want to
guarantee a restore period of 1 month.
My first thought has been to set up a NAS on which I backup the data I
synced from the customers server, on a daily basis. I can't afford to do
FULL backups every night, I would be running out of space very soon
(calculate 20 GB for one customer, multiplied 30 times for one month =
not a convenient way!).
Thus, I thought of making *one* FULL backup every 4 weeks and between 2
FULL backups I'd just be making differential or incremental backups.
Here the first questions arise:

1) what would be better, diff or inc backups?

What do want faster recovery or lesser storage ?

differential backup is cumulative of all changes since last FULL. More space but faster recovery.
incremental is changes since last backup. Less space but slow recovery.




2) is this a good way to backup stuff for one month restore guarantee?
IMO, take a full backup at least twice a month.
Better guarantees against disasters. Plus you won't overwrite the last FULL backup after 30 days


Jaspreet




But the most important thing is:

when I finish my rotation, I would be overwriting the FULL backup. If
I'd be doing like this, I would loose the ability to restore data backed
up during the whole month, because both diff and inc backups rely on
their preceding FULL backup (or am I wrong?).
Therefore, my last question is: how do I have to configure my backups in
a way that I can guarantee *one full month* of restores, day-by-day?

I hope I've explained my thoughts clearly enough, otherwise just let me
know.

Thanks in advance,
Flavio Boniforti

PIRAMIDE INFORMATICA SAGL
Via Ballerini 21
6600 Locarno
Switzerland
Phone: +41 91 751 68 81
Fax: +41 91 751 69 14
Url: http://www.piramide.ch
E-mail: flavio < at > piramide.ch

_______________________________________________
If you'd like to join the discussion, go to http://www.backupcentral.com and get
a user id. Then subscribe to one or more of our mailing lists or follow the
discussions in one of our forums (http://www.backupcentral.com/phpBB2).



--
Don't Walk as if you own the world,
Walk as if you don't care who owns it.

Jaspreet Singh
Druvaa Software

Mobile: (US) +1 408-916-1659
(UK) +44 (0)20 3239 3059
(IN) +91 99715 88344
Email: jaspreet.singh < at > druvaa.com ([email]jaspreet.singh < at > druvaa.com[/email])

Web: http://www.druvaa.com/
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