another question:

how do you back-up your clients data ???

do you use tape-backup ???

Many hosts backup their data to a second hard drive, whilst others do use tape backups. However, you'll be surprised how many hosts don't even backup their servers! :eek2:

.tar backups:D

I do backup to another hard drive, and also backup that backup across a lan to a drive in another server.

We backup our backups to other servers within the same datacenter and remotely depending on the size of the backups.

We backup system configuration and all users data including their files and databases every 24 hours on a second hard disk. Backups are kept for 7 days.

Twice a week, the latest backups are sent to a remote backup server. (Completely different datacentre - you never know why you might need a backup, so having one off-site is a good idea in case the main-site burns down :D)

We tar all backups and then bz2 them. Tar is a great way of backing up as it preserves all permissions. bz2 is used to further reduce the size of the backup.

Our backups are performed in a 2 hour window, when process threads are down to a minimum. This keeps the webserver running efficiently while a backup is being performed.

In my opinion, tape backups are a thing of the past, as hard disks are so cheap now. If your servers are local, I would suggest a HDD caddie. Mount the drive for a backup, dismount after a backup is performed and take the hard-disk off-site.

It would be a good idea to keep at least two hard disk's, as you never know when one may fail.

It's not just a case of backing up a server once, you backup the server, and at the least backup the backup. :)

Good topic. I have a question on this. What tools/scripts do you use for backup? Custom scripts? Anything out there that is a good backup system?

Thanks!

Jim

We use the plesk backup tool on the plesk boxes. It's cron'd every 24 hours. We have customised the script a bit to preserve old backup files, and rename and move them around as needed. Also to bz2 them.

On our shell servers and non-cp web hosting servers, we have just written some custom shell scripts. When doing custom, I suggest you try it on a non-production server first, just to be entirely sure you are getting all the files you need. As it is easy to overlook some databases and configuration files. (esp painfull when you have over 100 rules in your ipfw config)

The best backup system, is one you write yourself imo - if you dont know how to write one, you should probably get an administrator on part time. This will definantly be an excercise you wont regret. (assuming they are possessing skills required to be a good administrator)