image

[Jon Steele]

Hi,

I have an A500 I would like to make a copy or image of the installed OS and installed software.I have never done this before.Can someone help me out and point me in the right direction to do this.

Your help is appreciated.

Jon

[Gavin Clarke · Accepted solution]

Ignite-UX is the product you need to be looking for, with this you can create a make_tape_recovery which you can then boot from to restore your root volume group.

[Pedro Cirne]

Hi,

Probably you already have ignite installed, if you don't download it from:

http://www.docs.hp.com/en/IUX/

Then:

#make_tape_recovery -v -I -x inc_entire=vg00

Enjoy :)

Pedro

[Jon Steele]

Thanks for the quick response.I am a novice at unix.I have a server with ignite installed.Do I run that command from my ignite server or do I run it from the A500?I do not have ignite installed on the A500.

Thank you for your help and time.

Jon

[Alessandro Pilati]

Jon,
try before with
make_tape_recovery -p -v -x inc_entire=vgname
so you can first preview the result of making the image.

Then launch the commands explained in the answers above, so you'll create a full backup of your system, also including other VG other than the VG00.
The command will use the default tape, but you can specify also other devices.

Regards,
Alex

[Gavin Clarke]

The easiest way is to install it on your A500. So first download it from the location Pedro gave, then install with swinstall.

You can do clever stuff with Ignite servers, perhaps that can wait for a bit.

[Gavin Clarke]

You'll need the pax patches too, which you can install with swinstall.

Have a good read of the document on that link, it looks pretty helpful to me.

[DCE]

Jon,

The make_tape_recovery command needs to be issued from the A500. You will need to install a minimal version of ignite in order to accomplish it.

If you wish, you can set up an ingnite server and have it issue the recovery command, but again, you will need a minimal ignite install on the A500.

Another way to make an achival backup of the system is to reboot the system in single user mode, mount all the mount points ( mount -a ) and perform a full backup to tape using your preferred choice.

cpio, tar and fbackup are on the system, and any of them will backup to tape.

You can even do a full system backup with the system in multiuser mode, but any open files will not be backed up properly.

Dave

[Gavin Clarke]

Here's a link to another post which talks about ignite servers, if you decide to go for a network backup:

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=947588

It might not be the best post, it seemed to help though.

[Pedro Cirne]

Hi Jon,

You don't need to setup an Ignite server for this, it's much easier to install Ignite and do it to a tape.

On my previous post I metion the link and commando to run!

Enjoy :)

Pedro

[Alessandro Pilati]

Jon,
download Ignite at the following link:
http://docs.hp.com/en/IUX/download.html

Regards,
Alex

[Jon Steele]

I have tried that command but it seems like it is not coping to the tape drive.Should there be other options I need to add to this to make it copy to the tape drive?

Jon

[Alessandro Pilati]

Just a question,
your tape driver is properly configured?

Run
ioscan -kfnC tape
and post the output...

Then launch the make_tape_recovery command adding the option "-a tape_driver"
tape_driver default is /dev/rmt/0m

Alex

[Gavin Clarke]

Jon,

What is the situation? You said that Ignite was not installed on your A500, you can check this with:

swlist -l product | grep -i ignite

If Ignite is installed then you can proceed with:

make_tape_recovery -v -I -x inc_entire=vg00 -a /dev/rmt/0mn

or whatever your tape device is (you must use mn for no rewind).

If ignite is not installed then go to the link Pedro gave, download and install it, using the document on that link as a guide.

Please let us know how it is going.

Cheers.

[Jon Steele]

Thank you all for your help.It is done.I really appreciate your help.

Jon

[Gavin Clarke]

Cool.