Catalog Files

[jchristiansen]

I think this is a pretty simple question. I am currently backing up clients to the local server volume (Mac OSX). I have added a Packet Loader to allow me to back add removable media. My plan was to continue the curent client backups to my 4 backup sets which rotate 1 backup set per week for 4 weeks. To this I was going to add a backup script that copied the backup set for the week to a tape set.

 

Here is my question. Since the catalog file is stored on a loval volume on the server, if there were a catastrophic loss (fire), I would lose the backup server and be left with my tape(stored offsite). Would this be a common setup, and I would simply rebuild the catalog file, or am I going about this the wrong way. My concern was if there would ever be a problem rebuilding the catalog files.

 

Thanks in advance!

[nekr0phage]

Hi Jeff,

 

You are correct, the catalogs would be lost with the server and you would rebuild them from the media. There should not be a problem rebuilding the catalog files unless there were a physical problem with the media, or a problem with the data written to the medium. In either case having a catalog or not does not matter, as the data itself is damaged.

[jchristiansen]

Thanks!

 

So then my strategy would be OK to copy the backup sets to a tape once a week for off site storage. The reason I chose this method is I figured it would be better for the tape drive to only have to copy from a local drive, instead of taking the files over the network.

[nekr0phage]

Hi Jeff,

 

That would absolutely be okay and is actually a fairly common strategy. Disk to disk to tape tends to yield better performance rates than writing from source over the network directly to tape. However, since two operations are involved, it takes longer overall.