DR using a mksysb image on disk. Post: 302949120

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Operating Systems AIX DR using a mksysb image on disk. Post 302949120 by bakunin on Tuesday 7th of July 2015 11:16:57 AM

07-07-2015

Registered User

Quote:

Originally Posted by gz3xzf

This may be a dumb question and the more I think about it the worst it seems!!

As a matter of fact, there are no dumb questions - just dumb answers.

Quote:

Originally Posted by gz3xzf

I have inherited some standalone systems where they are using the mksysb command to create a disk file image; this image is then backed up to Networker.

My dumb question is how would we go about restoring this image should the server need to be replaced (i.e. internal disks as well)?

In fact this is a very good question! Backups are a worthless waste of space if they can't be restored so it is prudent to make sure they indeed can be.

I suppose you are not very proficient with AIX so i will start with some basics:

An mksysb image is a (bootable) backup of the systems default volume group - rootvg, where all the relevant filesystems - "/", "/usr", "/var", etc... are located. Do a

Code:

lsvg -l rootvg

to find out what exactly is in your rootvg. All this is backed up in such an image. There is a command "savevg", which does similar backups for any (non-rootvg) volume group which you may want to read up about.

Still, there is more to an mksysb: it also contains boot code and all the means to restore it to an empty hardware. In principle you can boot from an mkysb image and have the complete system (minus application data in VGs other than the rootvg) restored completely, including network interfaces, users, groups, print queues and whatever you have configured on your system.

So, to answer your question: from a working mksysb image you are able to restore the complete system with every customisation. Alas, there is a catch: You can direct the image to every device or a file like you do, but if you do not take the mksysb either from NIM or to a tape as destination the boot code will not be included. You will need to boot from a generic boot device (system CD-ROM, etc.) and then use the mksysb image to restore the system.

You may want to try this out on spare hardware to understand the process, before you really need to restore a system in the wake of some catastrophe.

I hope this helps.

bakunin

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LEARN ABOUT DEBIAN

tsk_loaddb

TSK_LOADDB(1)						      General Commands Manual						     TSK_LOADDB(1)

NAME

       tsk_loaddb - populate a SQLite database with metadata from a disk image

SYNOPSIS

       tsk_loaddb [-vVk] [-i imgtype ] [-b dev_sector_size ] [-i imgtype ] [-d output_dir ] image

DESCRIPTION

       tsk_loaddb  loads  disk information from image to a sqlite database.  This database can then be used by tools in other languages for analy-
       sis. By default, the database is stored in the same directory as the image with ".db" appended to the name.

       The arguments are as follows:

       -d output_dir
	      specify a directory to output the database file to (must be an existing directory) if not specified the database file will  be  cre-
	      ated in the same directory as the image file

       -v     verbose output to stderr

       -V     Print version

       -k     Don't  create  block  data table.  This table maps each block to the file that allocated it.  This option will make this program run
	      faster.

       -i imgtype
	      The format of the image file (use '-i list' for supported types)

       -b dev_sector_size
	      The size (in bytes) of the device sectors If -i or -b are not given, autodetection methods are used.

EXAMPLES

       To load image data from image.dd to image.dd.db:

	    # tsk_loaddb ./image.dd

AUTHOR

       Brian Carrier <carrier at sleuthkit dot org>

       Send documentation updates to <doc-updates at sleuthkit dot org>

																     TSK_LOADDB(1)

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