Topic: Arkeia Backup Issues

[ztasevski]

Hi,

Having a lot of problems getting the "periodic" backup going through Arkeia. The "interactive" back works like a charm...

Installed the rpm's from:

http://www.moonlightcomputers.homelinux.com/contribs4/backup/arkeia/

Keeps on asking for a a specific tape. Is there an option that you can choose where it does not look for a specific tape but instead it backs up to any tape in the tape drive. Played around with all the options but no luch. Downloaded the official documentation from Arkeia but there's nothing about the java client.

Thanks in advance !

[Michiel]

That's the way Arkeia works. It does it to prevent you from overwriting the latest tapes but I agree with you that at times Arkeia can be too smart for its own good.

You can trick Arkeia a bit by setting the validity of back-ups to 1 day, but it will still tell you which tapes to use. I now let Arkeia name & number my tapes and write that number on the label. I gave up trying to tell Arkeia which tape to use.

[Tib]

I had the same problem .... In tapes management just tell Arkia to recycle the tape ... then tell it to write the Label (I have wed, Sun & Monthly).

Once I did that I did an interactive backup with the respective savepack (daily or monthly), pool (Monday, Wednesday, Monthly) etc ... after that I had no more probs with periodic backups.

I setup seperate savepacks and pools depending on what sort of backup I wanted.

regards.

Tib

[ztasevski]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for your replies.

Tib> Do you have to do the interactive backup with the savepack for each tape in order to get the periodic backup ?

Michiel> How do you let Arkeia automaticlly name and number the tapes for you ?

Rgrds Zoran

[Tib]

ztasevski

I only had to do an interactive backup with tapes that I had used before.

eg: I had SME loaded ... did backups for a number of months ... broke SME so I had to reload SME, Arkeia etc ... therefore I had to do those steps because Arkeia didn't want to overwrite the tapes even though the label was correct.

There is a way to do it the propper way but I don't know how ... so that method worked for me.

Regards,

Tib

[ztasevski]

ztasevski

I only had to do an interactive backup with tapes that I had used before.

eg: I had SME loaded ... did backups for a number of months ... broke SME so I had to reload SME, Arkeia etc ... therefore I had to do those steps because Arkeia didn't want to overwrite the tapes even though the label was correct.

There is a way to do it the propper way but I don't know how ... so that method worked for me.

Regards,

Tib

Hi Tib,

Thanks for your reply.

So after completing the full interactive backup cycle for each day's tape with its corresponding label you setup the periodic backup and it worked fine unattanded ?

I am particulary interested in the way Michiel done it because it seems to be the most simple way of doing it. Whatever tape is in the drive simply:

1. format it
2. label it
3. dump the data onto the tape
5. verify it's backuped ok
6. notify admin
7. eject it (if desired)

Zoran

[ztasevski]

I now let Arkeia name & number my tapes and write that number on the label. I gave up trying to tell Arkeia which tape to use.

Hi Michiel,

What options did you choose to let Arkeia automatically number & write the number on the label with the java client console ?

Zoran

[Tib]

Hi ztasevski,

So after completing the full interactive backup cycle for each day's tape with its corresponding label you setup the periodic backup and it worked fine unattanded ?

All my backups work fine after completing the full interactive backup ... no need to do any more manual setups. All I do is put it the tape and it does it's stuff auto now.

I get a message from every backup of how much was backed up and how long it took etc.

For a free backup solution this is great.

If you run linux there is even a linux ver of the client ... I found a nice feature in the linux one that in the windows one you have to do manually.

In the exceptions area linux comes up with a calendar and you set everything in there ... just view and click on the days when you don't want the daily backups to run ... so that daily and monthly backups don't collide.

But in the windows ver of the client it's a manual type in setup. So you have to find a calendar and work out what days you will have both backups trying to run.

Regards,

Tib.

[ztasevski]

Hi Tib,

I'll give that a shot and post the results !

Zoran