topic Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD in Operating System - OpenVMS

OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 02:47:29 GMT

Hello,

I have a OpenVMS system that I want to take an image backup of. I want to store the image backup on a CD. But the OpenVMS don't have a CD burner drive, but I have I PC that's connected to the same network as OpenVMS:

So I thought I could store the image backup on OpenVMS, and the transfer the file to PC for burn on CD.

Is it possible to do that? Thanks.

Geir

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Joseph Huber_1 — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 03:12:05 GMT

You can make a disk-image using the "logical disk driver" LD on VMS. Look if You have
sys$startup:LD$STARTUP.COM ?
It loads the LD driver. See HELP LD how to to create and mount a disk-image.
(If You don't have LD on older systems, get it from the freeware CD.)
Then use backup to copy the disk in question to
the LDn: device. The resulting image file can then be copied to the PC, and burned on CD.

A different question is the size: a CD can hold a maximum of about 700MB only. For bigger disks it may be better to make a backup saveset, compress it, and burn the compressed saveset on CD.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Jeroen Hartgers_3 — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 04:52:18 GMT

if you have diskspace in spare, you can make a backup to disk. Use zip on vms to zip the file transfere the zip file to a pc and burn it to a cd. If you don't zip the file the file attributes wil be lost. Thise will give you trubbels with reading in the future

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 04:57:07 GMT

Hi,

Thanks for the answer. Im'm running OpenVMS 6.2, and unfortunately the command is not available.

If I use
show dev d command
the disk is approximately 2354670 blocks.(apporx 1.2Gb)

Maybe I should execute the backup command with /media=compact.

Is it possible to execute a rsh command on a PC, and store the backup on the PC?? If it's possible it would solve my problem.

Thanks

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Dave Laurier — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 07:44:54 GMT

Hi Geir,

The qualifier /media=compaction is only applicable when creating a backup to a tape drive. The "compaction" keyword means that the data should be compressed.

I think, just as the others, there are two possibilities, for both you will need a certain amount of disk space.

I assume that if you are trying to store the backup on a Compact Disc the data will have to be around 700 MB, however you indicate it to be 1,2 GB (uncompressed). In other words it needs to be compressed at some point.

In my opinion there are a number of options:

1. Create a image backup to a saveset. You can then ZIP the saveset file (compression ratio probably better than 1:2), transfer it to the PC and put it on a CD:

$ BACKUP /IMAGE /SAVE_SET
$ ZIP .ZIP

If you ever need to restore the disk, put the CD in the PC, transfer the ZIP file to the OpenVMS system, unzip and use the BACKUP command to restore the disk.

2. Create a logical disk drive with the LD tooling (I believe it is available from the OpenVMS freeware CD). This method will use container files for logical disk drives. You can use the logical disk drives just as any other drive (make sure you size them large enough).

Because you want to store the backup on a CD you can not simply create an IMAGE backup to the LD device at this would mean that the size stays around 1,2 GB. So you will have to create an IMAGE backup to a SAVE_SET file:

$ BACKUP /IMAGE /SAVE_SET

Then compress the file with ZIP and then store it on the LD device:

$ ZIP .ZIP
$ COPY .ZIP LDA100:[BACKUP]

When you are finished transfer the container file for the specific LD device (I believe the extension is something like *.DSK) to the PC, rename the file from *.DSK to ISO and burn the ISO file to CD with for instance the freeware burnatonce or burn4free tooling.

The advantage of method 2 is that you can easilly MOUNT the CD from VMS and restore the SAVE_SET file (without having to put the CD in the PC and transfer from there to VMS).

Regards,

Dave

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Steven Schweda — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 08:00:21 GMT

> Is it possible to do that?

Probably, but it's not simple.

> the disk is approximately 2354670 blocks.
> (apporx 1.2Gb)

Which is more than a CD can hold, so you will
need to use some kind of compression.

> [...] /media=compact

This tells the >>tape drive<< to enable
compression. Fron V7.3-2:

BACKUP

/MEDIA_FORMAT

/MEDIA_FORMAT=[NO]COMPACTION

Output Save-Set Qualifier

Controls whether data records are automatically compacted and
blocked together. Data compaction and record blocking increase
the amount of data that can be stored on a single tape cartridge.

BACKUP does not do compression itself.

LD may be available from the freeware
collection for VMS V6.2, but I don't see
what it will do for you in this case.

> [...] and store the backup on the PC??

BACKUP does not do network I/O.

As Jeroen Hartgers said, you can do the
BACKUP to a disk file save set, compress
that save set file using Zip (or some other
program, but Zip has the advantage of
preserving the save set's RMS file
attributes), copy the compressed save set
file (Zip archive, or whatever) to the PC
(using binary FTP, or whatever), and use your
normal CD-writing program(s) on the PC to put
that onto a CD.

The last step here assumes that your PC's
CD-writing software can write a CD with an
ISO-9660 file system, which seems pretty
likely. Otherwise you'd need to create a
CD image somewhere (using LD or mkisofs, or
some other scheme). I doubt that this is
necessary.

Note that this scheme requires enough disk
space to hold the whole BACKUP save set plus
the (Zip-) compressed save set, which sounds
to me like close to 2GB. And if you can't
compress the save set enough, then things
get complicated, as you would need to break
it into pieces, which would require a program
to do it, and still more disk space to hold
the pieces.

Similarly, if you ever wanted to restore
anything, you would need to expand (UnZip,
or whatever) the compressed save set from the
CD, onto a local disk before you could use it
with BACKUP (but that would require only
enough storage for the original save set,
assuming that you can read the CD directly on
your VMS system). (Of course, if it's now in
pieces, you would need to reassemble it.)

Note also that at VMS V6.2, Zip will probably
not work with a (save set) file bigger than
2GB. (The problem is with the C run-time
library, and I doubt that large-file support
was back-ported as far as VMS V6.2, so even
the latest BETA Zip-UnZip programs probably
won't give _you_ large-file support.)

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Art Wiens — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 09:01:35 GMT

Perhaps you have to modify your goal "I want to store the image backup on a CD".

If the objective is to be able to recover from a v6 system disk failure, having a compressed savesets on various cd's will make an already trying time (your production is toast) even more difficult. It is possible as others have described here. You would absolutely need to have a fully tested written procedure that someone could follow if you're hit by a bus one day ;-)

As much as it pains me to say, tape technology is probably the "simplest" form of recoverability in this case. Get yourself a TZ88 (20/40GB capacity) and do image backups to it, do standalone's as often as you can. Make sure you have Standalone Backup built on at least one other disk - assuming you have more than one.

You didn't describe your hw at all. If you perhaps have a StorageWorks shelf attached and a free slot or two, you could get a couple more disk drives and do disk to disk image backups. They are hot swapable, quite reliable and fairly cheap at this point. Recovery would be even easier with this suggestion.

Philisophical Phriday,
Art

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:15:36 GMT

Hi,

Thanks for the answers. One more queston:

I have done following:

1) I took an image backup of OpenVMS disk0
2) After the backup finished, I copy the image backup to disk with the copy commands from tape to disk0.
3) I copied the image backup to a windows 2000 server with ftp-command ( I also use bin command in ftp, to be sure). The PC server have a DVD-burner built in.

And now the questions: Is it possible to burn the image backup on a CD from 200-server??

Thanks.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

John Abbott_2 — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:24:07 GMT

Q: Are you expecting to be able to insert the burnt CD into a VMS CD drive and backup/image from cd to disk ? (thus restoring your system disk)

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:26:27 GMT

Hi,

Sounds crazy, but I want to try it:

Geir

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Volker Halle — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:40:48 GMT

Geir,

you're missing a step: You cannot burn an .BCK saveset to CD and expect OpenVMS to then be able to mount that CD !

You need to use LD to create a DISK CONTAINER file on OpenVMS, then copy and burn that DISK CONTAINER file to a CD.

Sure it's possible to burn a CD on a Windows system (from an OpenVMS disk container file) and mount/read that disk later on an OpenVMS system, but you are now in Windows land and things may get a little bit vague ;-)

There is a nice 'little' writeup in ATW 9820:

Create Bootable Optical Media (CD, DVD)?

http://h71000.www7.hp.com/wizard/wiz_9820.html

From own experience:

- you need a CD burning application, which can burn 'raw' images (I used NERO 6, but there are other possibilities as well)

- depending on your OpenVMS CDROM drive, don't use CD-RW - the older CDROM drives can't handle them

- use low speeds when burning the CD

Volker.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Volker Halle — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:45:10 GMT

Geir,

LD is available as freeware and works on OpenVMS VAX (V5.4 or higher) and OpenVMS Alpha (V6.2 or higher):

http://h71000.www7.hp.com/freeware/freeware40/ld062/

Volker.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

John Abbott_2 — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:50:40 GMT

Geir, you can use LD on VMS V6.2

http://h71000.www7.hp.com/freeware/freeware50/ld063/freeware_readme.txt

Read Volkers reply and links. The ATW article should give you all the info you need to succeed.

Best Regards
John.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Steven Schweda — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 10:38:15 GMT

> 2) After the backup finished, I copy the
> image backup to disk with the copy
> commands from tape to disk0.

Why not simply do the BACKUP to disk0? COPY
can have problems when copying a BACKUP save
set from tape.

> Sounds crazy, but I want to try it:

It sounds especially crazy if it means that
you expect to get "apporx 1.2Gb" onto a CD.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Jan van den Ende — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 11:09:16 GMT

Geir,

on the 1.2 vs 0.7 Gb issue: maybe (just MAYBE) the situation is not as bad as it looks from the previous answers:
- how full is your 1.2 Gb disk? Image backup only saves actual data, NOT unused disk space.
- are your page- swap- and dump-files on your system disk? Those SHOULD be marked NObackup (check with DIR/FULL), and then that data is also not copied.

Whether this helps (enough) you will have to check on the actual system.

hth

Proost.

Have one on me.

jpe

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Steven Schweda — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 11:14:39 GMT

Yup. The size of the BACKUP save set is the
important thing.

But we don't know what that is.

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 04:22:25 GMT

Hi,

Thanks to all. Since I'm a OpenVMS novice it would be nice if you could give me a cookbook:

1) The backup image on tape is less than 700Mb.
2) What applications do I need if I want to make a mountable virtuell disk partitions on VMS?? Is it LD?? Since OpenVMS is not connected to Internet, I must download the exe-file to USB-stick, and then use ftp from a PC to OpenVMS. I donn't have zip or other commands on VMS. I do not need header files, source code +++

3) The disk on the Alpha server, is big enough to contain the image file. Is it possible to copy the virtuell disk + image backup to a PC if I want to burn the disk+contents to a CD.

Hope that someone could help me. Thanks

Geir

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Karl Rohwedder — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 05:12:35 GMT

Geir,

- install LD using SYS$UPDATE:VMSINSTAL. Volker gave you the link
- logout/login to active LD command
- create a dir to hold the container file, best would be not the systemdisk, if available, e.g.
CREATE/DIR disk:[BACKUP]
- create container file,
LD CREATE BACK/SIZE=1400000
set to nobackup
SET FLE BACK.DSK/NOBACKUP
- connect it to a LD device
LD CONNECT BACK ! -> LD returns device
- mount it
MOUNT/FOREIGN ld-device
- backup
BACKUP/IMAGE/IGN=INTER SYS$SYSDEVICE: ld-device: {/LOG/VERIFY]
- dism/disc LD device
DISMOUNT ld-device
LD DISCONNECT ls-device
- transfer to PC (binary mode) and burn it in raw format, e.g. using Winoncd

regards Kalle

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

geir_2 — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 05:35:07 GMT

Karl,

Thanks for the e-mail. I'm running OpenVMS 6.2, so I must copy the all commands via Internet to USB-stick.

If possible, It would be great if I could copy the needed program, and not a whole zipped library. So if someof you have the needed program available it would be nice.

Thanks

Geir

Re: OpenVMS Image backup on CD

Karl Rohwedder — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 06:27:30 GMT

Geir,
the directory Volker mentioned contains a ZIP file LD062.ZIP, which contains all savesets to install the kit.

(http://h71000.www7.hp.com/freeware/freeware40/ld062/)

regards Kalle