[NTLUG:Discuss] using dd to perform full backups

[Chris Cox]

NTLUG wrote:
> On Fri, 2003-12-05 at 16:13, Robert Citek wrote:
> 
>>To create an image of a partition (/dev/hda1) is fairly straightforward:
>>   dd if=/dev/hda1 of=/tmp/part1.img
> 
> 
> I have heard (or at least I think I have) of people using dd as a backup
> method.  Does anyone have any experience with this?  How well does it
> work, what are the limitations?  Obviously the benefits are its a
> complete image of the drive so the machine can be immediately re-created
> in a disaster.
> 

Actually.. you can just do:
     cp /dev/hda1 /tmp/part1.img
On Linux... but dd is more portable if you're not dealing with Linux.
dd combined with a correct multiple blocking factor might be
faster in certain cases.

I use image masters like this to rapidly create exact replicas of
systems where the HW is identical.  Kind of like Ghost.  Of course
Ghost let's you do all sorts of things and doesn't require each
machine to be identical in HW/disk configuration.

Other full disaster recovery elements are mondo/mindi and
mkcdrec.  Right now, there has been more activity on mondo/mindi,
so I'd look at that project if you're interested in creating
full disaster recovery backups with the ability to make some
tweaks.

Commercial Linux dists like RH and SUSE have "config cloning like"
facilities that allow you to propagate a particular configuration
across different platforms quickly.  They can be problematic
to setup initially, but once they're setup, that can be a
way to creating "like" configs across different HW.  Not really
for backups, but for creating common configurations.