fbackup / tar question

[Ridzuan Zakaria]

Hi,

We have a K460 HP-UX 10.20 (32 bit) server that currently has Oracle database ( Version 8.0.5) running on it. Due to vendor software we are not able to upgrade OS as well as the database version.

In the past the database was backup (coldbackup) using Legato Software to tape. Recently we decided to backup the database to disk (NFS mounted NAS) using fbackup and tar command. However the backup aborted whenever the achive file reach 2GB. According my Unix Admin, this is because HP-UX 10.20 doesn't support file larger than 2GB on NFS mounted disk.

My question is how do I backup my archive file in multiple 2GB file using fbackup or tar command.?

Thanks.

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Ridzuan,

You should be able to patch 10.20 to the point where it does support greater than 2 GB files on an NFS disk. But the admin may be right, if so you are stuck, because fbackup likes tape.

You might check the NFS server and make sure its using NFS v3. That is the version of NFS that introduced files bigger than 2 GB.

If the NFS server is hpux and its filesystem was not newfs 'd with -o largefiles then this will provent you from making files bigger than 2 GB.

Also, if the system that is the NFS server is 11.00 or below the /etc/fstab of the filesystem needs a largefiles parameter.

Assuming the NAS device and NFS are not the problem, the focus is on your current OS.

tar has a patch on newer HP-UX that allows tar files up to 8 GB. check the itc patch database if that exists for 10.20 tar.

You can also use GNU tar from http://hpux.connect.org.uk/ to get past the 2 GB limit.

If however your Unix admin is correct then you must approach the problem backwards.

1) Make sure that 10.20 has NFS v3 installed.
2) Make the oracle database files NFS shares in /etc/exports.
3) exportfs -av
4) Shut down the oracle database.
5) Mount the NFS shares from another machine that fully supports largefiles.
6) Copy the entire database to NAS
7) Start oracle on your 10.20 machine
8) Make a tar backup of the copy of the oracle database you now have on the NAS device.

You must shut down oracle and get a cold backup for this backup to be worth anything. You must also test recovering with it.

SEP

[A. Clay Stephenson]

You have more or less shot yourself in the foot using NFS. I'll assume that none of your DB files are bigger than 2GB otherwise you will need to use split -b to split a single file into multiple chunks. IN any event, since you have NFS you can simply cp -Rp to copy the files. You should write a script that will then chown each of the files/directories so that that metadata are preserved.

[Ridzuan Zakaria]

Hi SEP,ACS;

I was told by my Unix Admin NFS v3 is not available on HP-UX 10.20. Is that right?

We have datafile larger than 2GB (9GB) but all the datafiles are using local mount disk with largefile option enabled. Only the mountpoint designed to store backup file is NFS mounted NAS.

I tried to use cp -p comamand in the pass to copy datafile to NFS mounted NAS but it stop at 2GB for datafile larger 2GB with the following message "File too large".

Thanks.

[Steven E. Protter]

Yes,

I believe your admin is probably right about that. I still run a couple of 10.20 boxes, but rarely touch them.

You might get around this with Samba:

http://hpux.connect.org.uk/hppd/hpux/Networking/Misc/samba-3.0.10/

You are going to have to download the source, the third option on this page and compile the client.

That might get you around the 2 GB problem with Samba.

You are in a bit of a squeeze here though.

SEP

[A. Clay Stephenson]

To the best of my fuzzy memory, 10.20 no matter how patched limits NFS files to 2GB maximum. I think the 10.20 version of split supported the -b split option if not you can download the bsplit source from any of the HP-UX Porting centre's.

In any event, the split command will solve your dillema:

cd /NFS/dir/xxx
split -b 1000m /u01/data/data01.dat data01.dat

That will produce multiple 1GB data01.dat files with suffixes aa, ab, ac, ...

You can then reassemble these files using cat data01.dat* because the suffixes are generated in lexical order.

Man split for details.

Your NFS approach on 10.20 was not a well-reasoned solution.

[V. Nyga]

Hi,

have you tried the option 'largefiles' when mounting the NAS directory?

Volkmar

[Ridzuan Zakaria]

Volkmar,

No I have not tried to mount NAS directory with largefiles option. My understanding is that we need to install NFS v3 in order to do that and it is not avaialable on HP-UX 10.20.

Can I still do that without NFS v3 installed?

Thanks.