Ongoing Avid Unity Backup

[pantangele]

Years ago, I used to be able to do with Retrospect what I'm trying to do unsuccessfully now... Advice would be deeply appreciated.

 

I'm working on a movie. We have 16TB of Avid Unity storage. It will likely be 32TB later.

 

That storage has been partitioned into about 20 work spaces that I am mounting on seven separate editing systems. Four of these systems are running Mac OS 10.5.5.

 

I have connected to the Unity via fibre connected into the Mac Pros via an ATTO Celerity card. I have no problems mounting the drives on the Macs. They show up beautifully on the Desktop and I can add them to Devices. Great.

 

What I want to do is back the work spaces (mounted volumes on my Desktop) to firewire drives. I'd like to write a script such that each week I can backup only files created since the last backup. I'd like the software to prompt me to switch firewire drives when the last becomes full.

 

I intend to backup new files weekly and then store the firewire drives offsite in case of fire or theft.

 

Here's my problem:

 

I downloaded a trial copy of Retrospect 8.1, along with a temp multi-server license.

 

Although the Unity work spaces are mounted on my Desktop and in Devices, Retrospect does not see them as sources and I have been unable to add them any other way... Is there something I'm missing?

 

Also, Retrospect does not recognize my firewire drives as backup destinations...

 

Again, I used to use Retrospect to do exactly what I'm trying to do now and it worked beautifully. Has this functionality been removed? If not, help! For now, I'm hand copying.

[pantangele]

I ended up using a PC and 7.6 software.

 

I'm convinced this is just broken in 8.0 on Macs. Which really sucks. Huge hassle for me.

 

[CallMeDave]

I have no problems mounting the drives on the Macs. They show up beautifully on the Desktop

 

On the machine hosting the Retrospect Engine, the RetroEngine process runs as root. "The Desktop" is a function of the Finder, which is running as the current logged in user. OS X will not allow volumes mounted by one user to see (or use) volumes mounted by another user.

 

and I can add them to Devices

 

What does this mean?

 

The Storage Devices widow does not have an "Add" button; could you please describe exactly what you are seeing and exactly what you are doing?

 

Although the Unity work spaces are mounted on my Desktop and in Devices, Retrospect does not see them as sources

 

- The Storage Devices window is to show physically attached storage devices, such as tape drives and optical burners. It's not supposed to show network share points. What exactly do you see there?

 

- What does the "mount" command show in Terminal?

 

Also, Retrospect does not recognize my firewire drives as backup destinations...

 

Interestingly, "Destinations" is no longer a term within the program.

 

In any case, Retrospect backs up to Media Sets, and those Media Sets come in various types, and the data being backed up can be stored on various types media.

 

You can store a File Media Set on an external hard drive, and you can use an external hard drive as a Member of a Disk Media Set.

 

You should see locally (to the machine hosting the Retrospect Engine) attached volumes in the Sources window and you should see them in the drop-down sheet when you click the "+" icon in the Members tab of the Media Sets window.

 

 

Dave