>>>>>>   dd if=/dev/sda of=/mnt/sdb1/WinNT_backup.img
>>>> ...
>>>>> ...or I could use Norton Ghost (which we have a commercial license 
>>>>> for). 
>>>
>>>> Hmmm... Why do companies want to use money on such programs ?
>>>
>>>   If the program breaks, they have someone to call to. No such luck with
>>> free software.
>>
>> So you are saying that their chances of having the problem fixed in 
>> time is better if they have paid money for the program ?
> 
> Sure.  If Norton Ghost dies they can spend hours on the phone or in 
> email exchanges to both act all bossy customer and demand a new copy or 
> a fix, rather than spending a few minutes getting Knoppix to boot and 
> then typing those 4 lines.

In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular, 
Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a partition 
of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc. It also has 
the ability to backup and restore over the network using compression and 
so forth. And you can browse and modify the backup image on the server 
without having to restore it first. And...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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>>> ...or I could use Norton Ghost (which we have a commercial license for). 
>>
>> Hmmm... Why do companies want to use money on such programs ?

Because it has useful functionallity that saves us money?

>> But what if the HD breaks ?
> 
> - or if the PC is rooted ?
> - or if the installation is messed up by a virus or an employee ?

Well, let us hope that doesn't happen in the next 3 weeks then, eh? 
After that, the machine I just spent all this time setting up is going 
to be decommissioned anyway. (GAH! >_< That was *so* worth it...)

The new machines are going to be set up from a Ghost image, so if one 
breaks it'll be much faster to fix.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
...
> In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular, 
> Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a partition 
> of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc. It also has 
> the ability to backup and restore over the network using compression and 
> so forth.

knoppix@Knoppix:~$ konqueror man:dd man:ssh man:gzip &
knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo su -
root@Knoppix:~# dd if=/dev/sda bs=1k conv=sync,noerror | gzip -c | ssh 
-c blowfish andrew@linuxbox "dd of=sda.img.gz bs=1k"

Also see:
http://wiki.egee-see.org/index.php/SEE-GRID_Guide_on_WN_replication

> And you can browse and modify the backup image on the server 
> without having to restore it first.

andrew@linuxbox ~ $ gunzip sda.img.gz
andrew@linuxbox ~ $ /sbin/sfdisk -l -uS sda.img
andrew@linuxbox ~ $ konqueror man:mount

(Look for loop and offset)

Also see:
http://www.andremiller.net/content/mounting-hard-disk-image-including-partitions-using-linux

> And...

knoppix@Knoppix:~$ konqueror man:man man:info &

-- 
Tor Olav
http://subcube.com

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Tor Olav Kristensen wrote:
> Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> ...
>> In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular, 
>> Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a 
>> partition of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc. It 
>> also has the ability to backup and restore over the network using 
>> compression and so forth.
> 
> knoppix@Knoppix:~$ konqueror man:dd man:ssh man:gzip &
> knoppix@Knoppix:~$ sudo su -
> root@Knoppix:~# dd if=/dev/sda bs=1k conv=sync,noerror | gzip -c | ssh 
> -c blowfish andrew@linuxbox "dd of=sda.img.gz bs=1k"

None of this lets you restore to a partition of a different size or backup 
only the used sectors, or browse the files in the backup over the network 
without decompressing them.

It also doesn't let you clone a new Windows machine from an old one.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   There's no CD like OCD, there's no CD I knoooow!

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular,
> Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a partition
> of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc.

Like the many ntfstools? I'm sure there's one that can skip free blocks.

> It also has 
> the ability to backup and restore over the network using compression and
> so forth.

According to Unix philosophy, no backup tool should have compression
built-in. If you need it, you use a pipe and an external compression tool.

> And you can browse and modify the backup image on the server 
> without having to restore it first.

Mount it with a loop device.

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Nicolas Alvarez wrote:
> Like the many ntfstools? I'm sure there's one that can skip free blocks.

Yes, but what's the point in adding a UNIX dependency when there are free 
ghosting tools that work just fine entirely under Windows and without you 
even having to quiesce the file system before you ghost it?

If you really want to know why someone would pay money for the product, look 
at the page on wikipedia to see the list of features it would be a PITA to 
put together under Linux. For *some* people, time is money. :-)

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   There's no CD like OCD, there's no CD I knoooow!

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>> In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular,
>> Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a partition
>> of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc.
> 
> Like the many ntfstools? I'm sure there's one that can skip free blocks.

Are there any that aren't alpha? Every system I've seen for reading NTFS 
from Linux is either read-only or has a big flashing red disclaimer on 
it. Ghost was written by people who's signed the NDA and seen the spec 
for the NTFS filesystem.

>> And you can browse and modify the backup image on the server 
>> without having to restore it first.
> 
> Mount it with a loop device.

Random, but... why the hell do you need a loopback "device" in the first 
place? Why can't you just mount (say) an ISO image directly? Requiring a 
loopback device means that

1. there are only a finite number of them available,

2. before you can mount anything loopback, you have to determine which 
device numbers (if any) are free.

It just seems unecessarily complicated...

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Invisible wrote:
>>> In fairness, Ghost does much, much more than dd does. In particular,
>>> Ghost comprehends NTFS, so you can do things like restore to a partition
>>> of a different size, backup only the "used" sectors, etc.
>>
>> Like the many ntfstools? I'm sure there's one that can skip free blocks.
> 
> Are there any that aren't alpha? Every system I've seen for reading NTFS 
> from Linux is either read-only or has a big flashing red disclaimer on 
> it. Ghost was written by people who's signed the NDA and seen the spec 
> for the NTFS filesystem.
> 
>>> And you can browse and modify the backup image on the server without 
>>> having to restore it first.
>>
>> Mount it with a loop device.
> 
> Random, but... why the hell do you need a loopback "device" in the first 
> place? Why can't you just mount (say) an ISO image directly? Requiring a 
> loopback device means that
> 
> 1. there are only a finite number of them available,

Have a look at this document:
   http://www.slax.org/documentation_loop_mount.php

Here's how I understand the situation:

Linux kernels earlier than v. 2.6.23 had 8 loop devices, unless you specified more
Linux kernel v. 2.6.23 had 256 loop devices
Linux kernel v. 2.6.24 and later does not have these limitations


> 2. before you can mount anything loopback, you have to determine which 
> device numbers (if any) are free.

Just try this:

   mount -o loop,offset=somenumberofbytes ~/sda.img /mnt/sda1

 From the mount manual:

mount will try to find some unused loop device and use that."

-- 
Tor Olav
http://subcube.com

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>>> Mount it with a loop device.
>>
>> Random, but... why the hell do you need a loopback "device" in the 
>> first place? Why can't you just mount (say) an ISO image directly? 
>> Requiring a loopback device means that
>>
>> 1. there are only a finite number of them available,
> 
> Have a look at this document:
>   http://www.slax.org/documentation_loop_mount.php
> 
> Here's how I understand the situation:
> 
> Linux kernels earlier than v. 2.6.23 had 8 loop devices, unless you 
> specified more
> Linux kernel v. 2.6.23 had 256 loop devices
> Linux kernel v. 2.6.24 and later does not have these limitations

The device files still have to exist in the filesystem though. (That's a 
fairly bizare concept in itself...)

>> 2. before you can mount anything loopback, you have to determine which 
>> device numbers (if any) are free.
> 
> Just try this:
> 
>   mount -o loop,offset=somenumberofbytes ~/sda.img /mnt/sda1
> 
>  From the mount manual:

> is given), then mount will try to find some unused loop device and use 
> that."

So somebody wrote the code to automatically select a free device. The 
fact is, you still need there to be a free device. I still don't get why 
you can't just mount the file itself...

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Invisible wrote:
>>>> Mount it with a loop device.
>>>
>>> Random, but... why the hell do you need a loopback "device" in the 
>>> first place? Why can't you just mount (say) an ISO image directly? 
>>> Requiring a loopback device means that
>>>
>>> 1. there are only a finite number of them available,
>>
>> Have a look at this document:
>>   http://www.slax.org/documentation_loop_mount.php
>>
>> Here's how I understand the situation:
>>
>> Linux kernels earlier than v. 2.6.23 had 8 loop devices, unless you 
>> specified more
>> Linux kernel v. 2.6.23 had 256 loop devices
>> Linux kernel v. 2.6.24 and later does not have these limitations
> 
> The device files still have to exist in the filesystem though. (That's a 
> fairly bizare concept in itself...)
> 
>>> 2. before you can mount anything loopback, you have to determine 
>>> which device numbers (if any) are free.
>>
>> Just try this:
>>
>>   mount -o loop,offset=somenumberofbytes ~/sda.img /mnt/sda1
>>
>>  From the mount manual:


>> and use that."
> 
> So somebody wrote the code to automatically select a free device. The 
> fact is, you still need there to be a free device.

If your kernel is of a newer version there will always be a free loop device,
I.e. you don't have to worry about that.


> fact is, you still need there to be a free device. I still don't get why 
> you can't just mount the file itself...

Because the file is not a block device.

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loop_device

-- 
Tor Olav
http://subcube.com

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