[ale] Backup strategies

[Pat Regan]

Chris Kleeschulte wrote:
> I can't push 500GB offsite via the Internet, so what I am doing is  
> gpg encrypting the backups and sending it to a usb disk and then  
> shipping the backup drives offsite.
> 

Why not?  If you use software that transfers data using rsync or an
rsync-like protocol then the total amount of data only matters for the
first copy.  The bandwidth required for every other backup depends on
the amount of data that changed.

The nice thing about rsync is that it only transfers the parts of a file
that changed instead of entire files.

In a unix-only world I am a big fan of rdiff-backup.  It likely uses the
smallest amount of space to store previous differentials.

In my last job I used BackupPC to backup all our Windows and Linux
servers off site.  That was a much simpler use than the software was
designed for, though.  But it had a nice web interface for restores.  To
make it work well over the WAN I had to install rsync on the Windows
servers.

I ran the initial backup locally, then I hauled the backup server to the
remote site.

I'd never advocate backing up to disk as a replacement for tape, but it
is a pretty cheap way to get nearly instantaneous off-site backups.

Pat



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