Bareos has some learning curve, but it’s free, it’s extremely reliable and flexible. I’ve been using it for years, after switching from its parent Bacula, which I’ve been using for years before that, and it has not failed me once when I needed it.
Cheers,
Peter.
Good point. The backup strategy is at least as important as the tool used.
Using Bacula, I’m doing daily backups of critical data (which is not everything, but i.e. my business data) to an encrypted disk on an offsite server 400km from here over the internet.
I’m also still doing backups to external physical media, but on a much looser schedule since it’s always some effort to bring them to my offsite safe. The best backup of your work is pretty useless when it’s two months old.
Il 27/01/19 13:32, Peter Eckel ha scritto:
Hi Peter, thank you for you answer.
What if I will use bareos I will never get problem between version like happening today with bacula?
I could use newer bareos client on older bareos director?
Thanks in advance
Hi Alessandro,
difficult to say – I never ran into any upgrade issues with Bareos, but neither with Bacula while I was still using it.
I always do it the other way around, i.e. upgrade the director/file daemon and then the clients as time suits. No problems with that so far.
Am 27.01.2019 um 12:56 schrieb Alessandro Baggi :
> Hey there,
> what type of backup solution do you use on C7?
Check out Restic: restic.net
–With ransomware and rarely-used files, it’s also important to have generations of backups, in case an infection clobbers your recent backups of files before you detect the infection.
Yes, and not on the same disk! I have three USB disks, each of which is capable of holding half a dozen backups. Disk 1 has slots 11-19, disk 2
21-29 and disk 3 31-39. Backups are done in theory to 11, 21, 31, 12,
22, 32 …, though in practice I may dump extra backups on the same disk if I’m doing configuration or upgrade work.
And my apologies about sending it: I noticed you already corrected yourself when I hit “send” button. I should change to reading my mail beginning from latest to older ;-)
Valeri
rdiff-backup
Il 28/01/19 04:56, Nataraj ha scritto:
Why many users skip bacula? It is powerfull and very stable. It is very difficult to setup but if you know how it works it is simple.
Why do you not use bacula as backup solution?
Thanks in advance.
Hi Alessandro,
I used Bacula before I switched to Bareos.
There was a point, however, when the open source release of Bacula became, to put it mildly, a bit too inactive for my taste. Obviously I wasn’t alone with this, because roughly at that time Bareos was forked from Bacula.
Essentially, Bareos is an improved (at least IMHO) fork of Bacula, and unlike Bacuka it’s fully open source.
Cheers,
Peter.
I am a long time user of Bacula (Fedora 9) but I must admit that I do not keep up with versions. (I’m still running the F9 Bacula 5.2 director).
What real world benefits would I get from upgrading to the current Bacula version? What problems woudl I have? What are the arguments for/against Bareos?
My storage servers range from F9 to C7 and all work fine. I’m still using the old WinBacula clients even with the new Win10 boxes.
AMANDA – one config to encrypted LTO that are sent offsite and intended primarily for DR purposes, another config dumps a differently curated DLE list to virtual tapes kept on a local server.
BackupPC suffered from the same issue. V3 is still what’s available in the default repository. Since then, the dev has resumed active work and released v4, a major upgrade, and actively fixes bugs.
the fork of Bacula happened in 2013, IIRC. Things may have changed since then, but I did not bother to switch back. It’s a good thing, however, that there was a change.
The fact that I can’t find any recent RPMs anymore is definitely nothing that makes switching back an attractive option :-)
In fact Bacula is open core, i.e. there is an enterprise version that has additional functionality not contained in the community edition. It’s only fair, however, to note that there is also a downside to Bareos’ concept – binary distributions are released less frequently to the community while enterprise service subscribers receive more frequent binary updates.
I’m not blaming anyone at all – as a user of CentOS/RHEL I know about the drawbacks of a stable enterprise vs. bleeding edge release strategy.
Hm … there used to be a repository maintained by some company associated with Bacula, but I can’t find it anymore – so it seems that starting a SIG taking care of that would be a good idea.
Cheers,
Peter.
No rant intended… I believe, at some point there were no binary client for Windows system released for latest (at that point) bacula release. One could get that if one was a paid customer though, which my Department(s) WAS. That put _me_ off of upgrades to the server, and ultimately affected decision to switch over to bareos. (the very first thing I noticed: “status director” command in console in bareos was executed very fast compared my old bacula server. But that could be just me).
That said, I want to express gratitude bacula team for the great job they were doing which really made my backup for two departments I work for just a wonder. Several times I had to do restore, and that saved my people who accidentally deleted some important stuff (whole version control place for some important software project with all history, releases, branches was one of them).
In this place I will just second what you said.
Valeri
There’s probably going to be a lot of misinformation where bareos is concerned. The developers forked that product claiming that when they signed license assignments they didn’t know that this could or would allow Bacula to begin a dual-license release in which some features were added to a separate proprietary release. Bacula’s developers claim that the fork included code that was not licensed to them. Their lawsuit was settled with undisclosed terms. Given what information is available publicly, I am inclined to believe that the fork was in the wrong, but users are often more concerned with protecting people that they like than they are in license compliance.
Hi Gordon,
thanks for this interesting background information!
On the other hand, I’m not trying to defend one company against the other – their lawsuit has been settled as you wrote, and so that’s stuff that is in the past and doesn’t have much relevance from a technical viewpoint.
When I switched from Bacula to Bareos it was a purely technical decision, driven by the ease of maintaining an installation of Bareos vs. Bacula. In the meantime, the forks have diverged a bit, and there are some very interesting features (such as a flavour of opportunistic TLS encryption based on PSK) that make me stay with Bareos.
Leon’s suggestion of creating a Backup SIG that could – among other things – maintain an RPM release of recent Bacula versions would IMHO really help Bacula a lot. At least it would eliminate my first reason for switching, and probably it would never have happened had current releases been available more easily.
Cheers,
Peter.
I’ve been using Duplicati along with backblaze B2 + local storage, and using it on both my windows and 2 CentOS boxes
I was using Crashplan for years until they shut it down for home users, and it’s a great replacement
30 thoughts on - CentOS 7 And Backup Solution
Amanda (from base CentOS) -> USB removable disk -> firesafe.
Backups on or by the computer might protect you from disk failures, but are useless in case of fire or theft.
Hi Alessandro,
the same as on most other operating systems: Bareos.
<http://www.bareos.org/en/>
Bareos has some learning curve, but it’s free, it’s extremely reliable and flexible. I’ve been using it for years, after switching from its parent Bacula, which I’ve been using for years before that, and it has not failed me once when I needed it.
Cheers,
Peter.
Good point. The backup strategy is at least as important as the tool used.
Using Bacula, I’m doing daily backups of critical data (which is not everything, but i.e. my business data) to an encrypted disk on an offsite server 400km from here over the internet.
I’m also still doing backups to external physical media, but on a much looser schedule since it’s always some effort to bring them to my offsite safe. The best backup of your work is pretty useless when it’s two months old.
Il 27/01/19 13:32, Peter Eckel ha scritto:
Hi Peter, thank you for you answer.
What if I will use bareos I will never get problem between version like happening today with bacula?
I could use newer bareos client on older bareos director?
Thanks in advance
Hi Alessandro,
difficult to say – I never ran into any upgrade issues with Bareos, but neither with Bacula while I was still using it.
I always do it the other way around, i.e. upgrade the director/file daemon and then the clients as time suits. No problems with that so far.
Do you happen to be at FOSDEM? The Bareos team is going to be there, as usual: <http://www.bareos.org/en/news/bareos-fosdem-19.html>
Cheers,
Peter.
I must correct myself:
I meant storage daemon, not file daemon!
Cheers,
Peter.
+1
Valeri
you mean, director and STORAGE daemon, right? File daemon _IS_ a client…
Valeri
and then the clients as time suits. No problems with that so far.
Hi,
As all ours *nix systems: « rsnapshot ».
It’s very simple, based on rsync and assume historical backup on a real Unix FS. So, restauration is as simple then backup.
Hi Valeri,
yep. I noticed when klicking on ‘send’, as usual :-)
Cheers,
Peter.
Von meinem iPad gesendet
+1
rsnaphot is a simple but perfect working tool
Ralf
rsync to a remote site and then BackupPC. (Use the BackupPC version 4 in Software Collections.)
Urbackup is a great tool too.
Am 27.01.2019 um 12:56 schrieb Alessandro Baggi:
Check out Restic: restic.net
We use an Rsync script:
https://github.com/Nextpertise/autorsyncbackup
Am 27.01.2019 um 12:56 schrieb Alessandro Baggi:
> Hey there,
> what type of backup solution do you use on C7?
Check out Restic: restic.net
–With ransomware and rarely-used files, it’s also important to have generations of backups, in case an infection clobbers your recent backups of files before you detect the infection.
Yes, and not on the same disk! I have three USB disks, each of which is capable of holding half a dozen backups. Disk 1 has slots 11-19, disk 2
21-29 and disk 3 31-39. Backups are done in theory to 11, 21, 31, 12,
22, 32 …, though in practice I may dump extra backups on the same disk if I’m doing configuration or upgrade work.
And my apologies about sending it: I noticed you already corrected yourself when I hit “send” button. I should change to reading my mail beginning from latest to older ;-)
Valeri
rdiff-backup
Il 28/01/19 04:56, Nataraj ha scritto:
Why many users skip bacula? It is powerfull and very stable. It is very difficult to setup but if you know how it works it is simple.
Why do you not use bacula as backup solution?
Thanks in advance.
Hi Alessandro,
I used Bacula before I switched to Bareos.
There was a point, however, when the open source release of Bacula became, to put it mildly, a bit too inactive for my taste. Obviously I wasn’t alone with this, because roughly at that time Bareos was forked from Bacula.
<http://www.admin-magazine.com/Archive/2013/17/New-features-in-the-Bareos-Bacula-fork>
Essentially, Bareos is an improved (at least IMHO) fork of Bacula, and unlike Bacuka it’s fully open source.
Cheers,
Peter.
I am a long time user of Bacula (Fedora 9) but I must admit that I do not keep up with versions. (I’m still running the F9 Bacula 5.2 director).
What real world benefits would I get from upgrading to the current Bacula version? What problems woudl I have? What are the arguments for/against Bareos?
My storage servers range from F9 to C7 and all work fine. I’m still using the old WinBacula clients even with the new Win10 boxes.
AMANDA – one config to encrypted LTO that are sent offsite and intended primarily for DR purposes, another config dumps a differently curated DLE list to virtual tapes kept on a local server.
BackupPC suffered from the same issue. V3 is still what’s available in the default repository. Since then, the dev has resumed active work and released v4, a major upgrade, and actively fixes bugs.
https://github.com/BackupPC/BackupPC
Yum repo for v4:
https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/hobbes1069/BackupPC/
Hi Leon,
the fork of Bacula happened in 2013, IIRC. Things may have changed since then, but I did not bother to switch back. It’s a good thing, however, that there was a change.
The fact that I can’t find any recent RPMs anymore is definitely nothing that makes switching back an attractive option :-)
In fact Bacula is open core, i.e. there is an enterprise version that has additional functionality not contained in the community edition. It’s only fair, however, to note that there is also a downside to Bareos’ concept – binary distributions are released less frequently to the community while enterprise service subscribers receive more frequent binary updates.
I’m not blaming anyone at all – as a user of CentOS/RHEL I know about the drawbacks of a stable enterprise vs. bleeding edge release strategy.
Hm … there used to be a repository maintained by some company associated with Bacula, but I can’t find it anymore – so it seems that starting a SIG taking care of that would be a good idea.
Cheers,
Peter.
No rant intended… I believe, at some point there were no binary client for Windows system released for latest (at that point) bacula release. One could get that if one was a paid customer though, which my Department(s) WAS. That put _me_ off of upgrades to the server, and ultimately affected decision to switch over to bareos. (the very first thing I noticed: “status director” command in console in bareos was executed very fast compared my old bacula server. But that could be just me).
That said, I want to express gratitude bacula team for the great job they were doing which really made my backup for two departments I work for just a wonder. Several times I had to do restore, and that saved my people who accidentally deleted some important stuff (whole version control place for some important software project with all history, releases, branches was one of them).
In this place I will just second what you said.
Valeri
There’s probably going to be a lot of misinformation where bareos is concerned. The developers forked that product claiming that when they signed license assignments they didn’t know that this could or would allow Bacula to begin a dual-license release in which some features were added to a separate proprietary release. Bacula’s developers claim that the fork included code that was not licensed to them. Their lawsuit was settled with undisclosed terms. Given what information is available publicly, I am inclined to believe that the fork was in the wrong, but users are often more concerned with protecting people that they like than they are in license compliance.
Hi Gordon,
thanks for this interesting background information!
On the other hand, I’m not trying to defend one company against the other – their lawsuit has been settled as you wrote, and so that’s stuff that is in the past and doesn’t have much relevance from a technical viewpoint.
When I switched from Bacula to Bareos it was a purely technical decision, driven by the ease of maintaining an installation of Bareos vs. Bacula. In the meantime, the forks have diverged a bit, and there are some very interesting features (such as a flavour of opportunistic TLS encryption based on PSK) that make me stay with Bareos.
Leon’s suggestion of creating a Backup SIG that could – among other things – maintain an RPM release of recent Bacula versions would IMHO really help Bacula a lot. At least it would eliminate my first reason for switching, and probably it would never have happened had current releases been available more easily.
Cheers,
Peter.
I’ve been using Duplicati along with backblaze B2 + local storage, and using it on both my windows and 2 CentOS boxes
I was using Crashplan for years until they shut it down for home users, and it’s a great replacement
cheers
Dunc
Borg backup from EPEL.
VG
Rainer
Am 27.01.19 um 12:56 schrieb Alessandro Baggi: