OT Backup

[kee nethery]

>> What hardware would you suggest for this backup array and what 
>> software & OS
>> to drive the system? Also needs to allow for expansion since these 
>> projects
>> look to be ongoing.

 From what I hear, the Apple Xserve RAID box is a wonderful thing (even 
if you are not using macs). From what I've seen, it has all the 
reliability that you could hope for. It is essentially an external hard 
drive and you can hook it up to several servers simultaneously 
(including Xserves, Linux, Windows, etc).

If you are going to have offsite backup, you are going to need a second 
server with an equal amount of disk storage. One at home and one 
elsewhere. Given the amount of data you'll be changing on a daily 
basis, the question you need to ask yourself is what is the purpose of 
the offsite storage.

if your goal is to have the data survive a fire or theft, then you 
might want to consider installing your backup server in a neighbors 
home next door to you and just run a cable between your homes. They get 
free high speed internet access, you get a backup site.

if your goal is to have others able to access the data even if your 
network connection goes down, then you need a colo. You probably do not 
need to have the offsite server as a RAID but it does need to be the 
same amount of disk space. Chances are you would need to see what is 
the maximum number of drives you can fit into one server and given the 
maximum drive size, see if that will meet your needs. If not, buy a 
second Xserve RAID.

As for replication, if I was doing this, there is a unix utility that 
does file syncing (I forget what it is called) and when you change and 
close a file, it will automatically move it to the remote server. We 
use it on Macs and on Linux servers.

Good luck. Terabytes are not cheap.

Kee Nethery