Re: Is there a write-up on using amvault with an archive config?

On 2022-03-23 2:19 a.m., Jon LaBadie wrote:
> Thanks Winston, this moves me a bit closer.
>
> A couple of inline questions:
>
> On Tue, Mar 22, 2022 at 12:34:16AM -0400, Winston Sorfleet wrote:
>> I use amvault to tertiarary media (LTO-2, I am just a casual home user)
>> while my main archive is VTL on a slow NAS.  I use cron, but obviously I
>> could just run as-needed from the command line.
>
> My archive will be on its own disk.  I planned to keep it in the server
> along with the regular backups, but moving it to a different computer
> could further reduce some failure modes.
>
>> You're right, it is a bit hard to intuit, and I had to get some help
>> from the community here as it is using overrides.
>>
>> The command line I use is as follows:
>>
>> /usr/sbin/amvault -q --latest-fulls --dest-storage "tape_storage" vtl
>>
>> Where vtl is the config.  The key part is the "tape_storage" which
>> refers to the appropriate vault-storage template in the amanda conf
>> file.  E.g.
>
> So "vtl" is the config name of the archive, correct?
> Would that config name be used in restore/recovery commands as well?

Jon - correct, "vtl" happens to be my config name, used for my regular 
amtape operations (which makes use of "storage vtl" as opposed to 
"vault-storage tape_storage").

>
> Just doing "latest-fulls" would not be appropriate for my use case.
> For some pretty static DLEs I only do fulls about every 6 weeks.
> An example is my almost never changing collection of online music.
> No need for amvault to archive many copies of that.  I likely would
> use a date specification ("--src-timestamps ...) and "--fulls-only".
>
> I see that specific DLE can be specified at the end of the amvault
> command line.  From the manpage it shows:
>
>    [hostname [ disk [ date [ level ...
>
> However I could have multiple amanda configs with the same hostname 
> and disk combination, say a DailySet and a WeeklySet. Where would you
> specify the amanda config you wish to archive (or "vault" if you wish).
>
> The manpage says "latest" can be used as an alternative to a date
> specification.  The wording is "then the most recent amdump or amflush
> run will be used."  Do you know if that is literally accurate?  If I
> use both "--fulls-only" and "latest" plus list a specific DLE, will
> nothing be archived if the level 0 was in the 2nd most recent dump?
> Or might it locate the latest level 0 of that DLE?
>
>
>
>> storage "vtl"
>> vault-storage "tape_storage"
>>
>> define storage "tape_storage" {
>>     erase-on-failure yes
>>     policy "HP_Robot"
>>     runtapes 1
>>     set-no-reuse no
>>     tapedev "LTO-2"
>>     tapetype "LTO2"
>>     tapepool "$r"
>>     tpchanger "LTO-2"
>>     labelstr "Vault-[1-7]"
>>     autolabel "Vault-%" any
>> }
>
> For this requirement, I love the idea of autolabeling.
> Will be another first for me.
>
>> define changer LTO-2 {
>>     tpchanger "chg-single:/dev/nst0"
>>     device-property "LEOM" "TRUE"
>> }
>>
>> define tapetype LTO2 {
>>    comment "HP Ultrium 448, hardware compression off"
>>    length 193024 mbytes
>>    filemark 0 kbytes
>>    speed 20355 kps
>> }
>>
>> Obviously for you it will be simpler since you don't have to engage the
>> SCSI subsystem and define actual tapetype parameters or fiddle with
>> blocksizes.  And you're not limited to a single "tape".
>
> I think I'll be looking to "spin down" the archive disk.
> It would be used so seldom.
>
> Thanks again.
> Jon
>
>>
>> On 2022-03-21 15:46, Jon LaBadie wrote:
>>> *** Apologies if a near duplicate has been posted ***
>>> *** I initially submitted it with the wrong email ***
>>>
>>>
>>> Amazing, I've used amanda for about 25 years and never set up
>>> an archive config nor used amvault.  No time like the present
>>> as I setup a new server with increased capacity.
>>>
>>> I don't want an archive config that does periodic massive
>>> dumps.  Instead I'd prefer that on-demand I could copy a
>>> level 0 DLE to the archive in such a way that amrecover/
>>> amrestore could use the archive config.  Both the source
>>> and the archive destination would be vtapes but on
>>> different drives in different housings.
>>>
>>> I "think" that amvault would be the appropriate tool.
>>> If not, correct my error please.
>>>
>>> Has anyone done a write-up on setting up and using such
>>> a scheme?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Jon
>>>
>>>> End of included message <<<
>