Using BackupPC to backup Linux server to a windows network drive?

Question

I have installed a new ubuntu server that runs subversion and a intranet. This is currently not being backed up so I installed BackupPC onto this server also.

It currently backups to /var/lib/backuppc/pc/localhost however I would like to back up to a networked windows server (i.e. in windows I would type: \mywindowsserver\linuxbackup\ to access my backup from my Vista machine).

All the nightly backups are done by the windows server and I have some space on the server for backing up my ubuntu files and config.

Cab someone suggest what I need to do to do this using BackupPC.

I have SMBClient 3.2.3 installed but not samba.

I look forward to your replies.

thank you

Answer 1

BackupPC uses hard-links in its storage, so you're not going to be able to just share a folder on the Windows machine to mount on the Ubunut machine for BackupPC to write into.

I'd recommend either using rsync (http://rsync.samba.org/) or Unison (http://freshmeat.net/projects/unison) to synchronize the /var/lib/backuppc/pc/localhost directory to a remote directory on your Windows machine. You're going to lose the hardlinks when you do that, but at least you'll have the files off the box.

Answer 2

BackupPC is a server solution for backups. It's meant to pull backups from several hosts onto the BackupPC server.

I guess you should look into another backup software.

Update:

duplicity may be worth a try. It's a simple backup solution with support for incremental and encrypted backups.

Answer 3

Evan is right, but however it is possible:

Mount a windows share, Creating a big file (you may use dd) on it. This file will be your Backup drive partition - like a hard disk partition.

This creates a 100 MB test partition:

dd bs=1024 count=$[100*1024] if=/dev/zero of=test.part

create a loop device from it (ok if the loop device is free and it worked):

losetup /dev/loop0 || losetup /dev/loop0 test.part && echo OK

You can mount it as a loop device (like you mount iso files) after you created a ext3, ext4 or an other file system of your choice on it:

mkfs.ext3 /dev/loop0
mount /dev/loop0 /backupToWinShare

Keep in mind - this solution depends on the Availability of the Windows share...

Alternatively you should think about a iSCSI device/iSCSI RAID or an cheap Linux server (which may run an iSCSI target...). This depends on your Budget and your further requirements...