Backup Central

I noticed this morning that my backups had not run over the weekend. They
are supposed to be automated and run every day. A full backup runs weekly.
Incremental backups run every night or day. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
backups were all missed. This was for every single computer.

I'm naturally wondering what changed. I have run the backups manually.
However, this is definitely not a good solution. Backups run manually just
fine. I rebooted my server, and this did not fix the problem.

The only change that comes to mind is that I did one new PC to the backup
server last Friday. I have not changed any other setting.

Some backups are scheduled to run only at night. Other backups can run
anytime.

Chris Baker -- cbaker < at > intera.com
systems administrator
INTERA -- 512-425-2006



------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

Chris Baker wrote:
I noticed this morning that my backups had not run over the weekend. They
are supposed to be automated and run every day. A full backup runs weekly.
Incremental backups run every night or day. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
backups were all missed. This was for every single computer.

I'm naturally wondering what changed. I have run the backups manually.
However, this is definitely not a good solution. Backups run manually just
fine. I rebooted my server, and this did not fix the problem.

The only change that comes to mind is that I did one new PC to the backup
server last Friday. I have not changed any other setting.

Some backups are scheduled to run only at night. Other backups can run
anytime.

Usually this means that your pool filesystem is 95% full (or wherever you've
configured it to not start backups).

--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell < at > gmail.com

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

It definitely is related to file-space usage. Thank you.

Chris Baker -- cbaker < at > intera.com
systems administrator
INTERA -- 512-425-2006


-----Original Message-----
From: Les Mikesell [mailto:lesmikesell < at > gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, March 08, 2010 7:10 PM
To: General list for user discussion,questions and support
Subject: Re: [BackupPC-users] Backups no longer run automatically

Chris Baker wrote:
I noticed this morning that my backups had not run over the
weekend.
They are supposed to be automated and run every day. A full
backup runs weekly.
Incremental backups run every night or day. Friday, Saturday, and
Sunday backups were all missed. This was for every single computer.

I'm naturally wondering what changed. I have run the
backups manually.
However, this is definitely not a good solution. Backups
run manually
just fine. I rebooted my server, and this did not fix the problem.

The only change that comes to mind is that I did one new PC to the
backup server last Friday. I have not changed any other setting.

Some backups are scheduled to run only at night. Other
backups can run
anytime.

Usually this means that your pool filesystem is 95% full (or
wherever you've configured it to not start backups).

--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell < at > gmail.com

--------------------------------------------------------------
----------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval Try the new
software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/




------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

Really running with same problem of BackupPC,looking forward for more useful suggestion.Thanks.

elitejones wrote:
Really running with same problem of BackupPC,looking forward for more useful suggestion.Thanks.


That usually means you have less than 5% of disk space on the pool filesystem -
or whatever you configured the threshold to be to stop running automatically.

--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell < at > gmail.com


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

I had over 95% file space usage. I deleted some old files that I did not
need. Once I did that, my backups started running again.

Chris Baker -- cbaker < at > intera.com
systems administrator
INTERA -- 512-425-2006


-----Original Message-----
From: elitejones [mailto:backuppc-forum < at > backupcentral.com]
Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 5:39 AM
To: backuppc-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
Subject: [BackupPC-users] Backups no longer run automatically


Really running with same problem of BackupPC,looking forward
for more useful suggestion.Thanks.

+-------------------------------------------------------------
---------
|This was sent by elite.jones1 < at > gmail.com via Backup Central.
|Forward SPAM to abuse < at > backupcentral.com.
+-------------------------------------------------------------
---------



--------------------------------------------------------------
----------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval Try the new
software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/




------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

That usually means you have less than 5% of disk space on the pool
filesystem - or whatever you configured the threshold to be to stop
running automatically.

Maybe an email once a day to the admin that this threshold has been
reached, and that backups are no longer being scheduled, could be
implemented?

Nagios/whatever _should_ be used to let you know that:
- disk space is almost full
- backups are > some age

But it won't tell you why BackupPC has stopped doing backups - and the
less experienced admin won't immediately know it's because a disk
space threshold has been reached.

Thoughts?

Regards,

Chris Bennett
cgb

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

Chris Bennett wrote:
That usually means you have less than 5% of disk space on the pool
filesystem - or whatever you configured the threshold to be to stop
running automatically.

Maybe an email once a day to the admin that this threshold has been
reached, and that backups are no longer being scheduled, could be
implemented?

Nagios/whatever _should_ be used to let you know that:
- disk space is almost full
- backups are > some age

But it won't tell you why BackupPC has stopped doing backups - and the
less experienced admin won't immediately know it's because a disk
space threshold has been reached.

The 'host summary' web page shows everything at a glance. Look at it once in a
while if you care what is happening. And the system will send email after a
configurable number of days without backups on a target. Configure what you
want there.

--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell < at > gmail.com


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

The 'host summary' web page shows everything at a glance. Look at
it once in a while if you care what is happening.

I was just curious how the unfamiliar admin would be able to determine
backups have stopped. From what I can tell, the host summary does not
report if backups have stopped due to DfMaxUsagePct being exceeded.

And the system will send email after a configurable number of days
without backups on a target. Configure what you want there.

But I was able to find a section in bin/BackupPC_sendEmail which will
report this particular case:

if ( $Info{DUDailySkipHostCntPrev} > 0 ) {
my $n = $Info{DUDailySkipHostCntPrev};
my $m = $Conf{DfMaxUsagePct};
$adminMesg .= <<EOF;
Yesterday $n hosts were skipped because the file system containing
$TopDir was too full. The threshold in the
configuration file is $m%, while yesterday the file system was
up to $Info{DUDailyMaxPrev}% full. Please find more space on the file system,
or reduce the number of full or incremental backups that we keep.

EOF
}

So perhaps the host summary or Server Status page could communicate
that DfMaxUsagePct has been exceeded as well as the raw numbers which
it currently reports...

Pool file system was recently at 90% (3/17 09:12), today's max is
90% (3/17 01:00) and yesterday's max was 90%.

I'm just trying to think how it could be clearer, so users don't need
to email the support list

Thanks for your reply so far.

Regards,

Chris Bennett
cgb

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

On 3/16/2010 6:04 PM, Chris Bennett wrote:
The 'host summary' web page shows everything at a glance. Look at
it once in a while if you care what is happening.

I was just curious how the unfamiliar admin would be able to determine
backups have stopped. From what I can tell, the host summary does not
report if backups have stopped due to DfMaxUsagePct being exceeded.

It doesn't explicitly show why backups didn't run, but if you look down
the 'Last Backup (days)' column, the numbers should all be less than one
if you have daily backups scheduled. If it is more than a day without a
failure mentioned in the 'Last Attempt', it means that it didn't start
as scheduled, and that's about the only thing besides the server or
backuppc service being off that would prevent it. So then you look at
the top of the page where it shows the pool filesystem use.

And the system will send email after a configurable number of days
without backups on a target. Configure what you want there.

But I was able to find a section in bin/BackupPC_sendEmail which will
report this particular case:

if ( $Info{DUDailySkipHostCntPrev}> 0 ) {
my $n = $Info{DUDailySkipHostCntPrev};
my $m = $Conf{DfMaxUsagePct};
$adminMesg .=<<EOF;
Yesterday $n hosts were skipped because the file system containing
$TopDir was too full. The threshold in the
configuration file is $m%, while yesterday the file system was
up to $Info{DUDailyMaxPrev}% full. Please find more space on the file system,
or reduce the number of full or incremental backups that we keep.

EOF
}

So perhaps the host summary or Server Status page could communicate
that DfMaxUsagePct has been exceeded as well as the raw numbers which
it currently reports...

Didn't know that was even there. Maybe there's a bug that keeps it from
being triggered.

Pool file system was recently at 90% (3/17 09:12), today's max is
90% (3/17 01:00) and yesterday's max was 90%.

I'm just trying to think how it could be clearer, so users don't need
to email the support list

Well there are plenty of other things that can go wrong - as you already
understand since you are making backups. So it's a good idea to peek at
that host summary page regularly anyway.

--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell < at > gmail.com




------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/

It doesn't explicitly show why backups didn't run, but if you look down
the 'Last Backup (days)' column, the numbers should all be less than one
if you have daily backups scheduled. If it is more than a day without a
failure mentioned in the 'Last Attempt', it means that it didn't start
as scheduled, and that's about the only thing besides the server or
backuppc service being off that would prevent it. So then you look at
the top of the page where it shows the pool filesystem use.

I'm just thinking out loud how BackupPC could be more user-friendly to
the less experienced admin so they don't get frustrated and email the
list, not understanding why backup scheduling is failing. It's a very
explicit condition, that the Server Status and/or Host Summary page
could easily report on and would make the admins life a little easier.

If there's one thing I hate about proprietary backup products it's
those little things that you have no power to change and make the
product a little less intuitive - at least with BPC, we can fix those
less-intuitive parts.

Anyway, I might put together a patch to report on this - I'm not sure
how active the 3.X release cycle is given there's lots of work going
into 4, but perhaps someone will use it...

Didn't know that was even there. Maybe there's a bug that keeps it from
being triggered.



Thanks for the conversation - BPC is a great engine and some of these
more subtle usability could be ironed out to make it have a broader
appeal (and enjoyable to use..)

Regards,

Chris Bennett
cgb

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Download Intel® Parallel Studio Eval
Try the new software tools for yourself. Speed compiling, find bugs
proactively, and fine-tune applications for parallel performance.
See why Intel Parallel Studio got high marks during beta.
http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-sw-dev
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users < at > lists.sourceforge.net
List: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki: http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/