########################################################################### # # # $Id: README,v 1.1 2002/12/16 09:31:54 billettd Exp $ # # # # $Source: /usr/local/src/repos/www/htdocs/tools/drutils/README,v $ # # # ########################################################################### Disaster Recovery Utilities Version 0.2 --------------------------------------- Overview -------- This package provides a simple set of disaster recovery utilities to OpenBSD i386. The state of a running system can be saved and restored automatically (mostly hands off), including fdisk, disklabel, installboot and data recovery operations. There is no compilation required, the scripts are perl and shell and boot floppy images (modified OpenBSD install media) are supplied. The system draws inspiration from the HP-UX Ignite system which can create golden images as well as produce a bootable recovery tape. This system uses a boot floppy instead of a bootable tape to start the process of rebuilding the machine and does not include any of the bells and whistles found in HP-UX Ignite such as auditing changed files or the ability to re-partition or modify the target install disk. This system is limited to saving all filesystems listed in /etc/fstab to tape without being able to exclude parts of the file system hierarchy. The crux of the system is a perl script that saves fdisk and disklabel information and generates a series of rebuild scripts. These scripts and the disk configuration files are saved to tape using tar and then the filesystems listed in /etc/fstab are dumped to tape. With the disaster recovery tape and the boot floppy, you now have the ability to reproduce the system in the same state as when the tape was created. To recover from a trashed system disk, insert the boot floppy and tape and reboot. Choose the recover option, specify the tape device and the system is rebuilt automatically. Warning ------- This software is intended for servers - not for multiboot systems. It makes no provision for backing up or recovering non-OpenBSD data on the hard disk. File List --------- mkdrtape The main perl script that creates DR tapes floppyB29.fs Boot floppy image (modified install floppy) floppyB29-ser_cons.fs Boot floppy image that uses a serial console Makefile Make file used to install software mtree.conf Used by installation process in creating OpenBSD package README This file mkdrtape.8 Man page mkdrtape.html HTML version of man page mkdrtape.txt Text version of man page drfloppy.diff Diff from OpenBSD STABLE 19/12/2001 src tree for creating modified boot floppy from source. recover Script on modified boot floppies that rebuilds the system and recovers the data pkg/* Used in creating OpenBSD package Installation ------------ To install the disaster recovery utilities, uncompress/untar the distribution tarball, cd into newly created directory and run make install as the root user. tar xzf drutils-0.1.tar.gz cd drutils-0.1 make install The install target creates a OpenBSD install package drutils-0.1.tar.gz in the packages sub-directory. This package is added to the system using pkg_add. The script to create the disaster recovery tape is installed into /usr/local/bin and the floppy images are installed into /usr/local/libdata/drutils. The man page is installed into /usr/local/man/man8. You can create the floppies by running make with the floppy or floppy-serial targets. insert 1.44 MB floppy in floppy drive make floppy This simply runs: dd if=floppy29.fs of=/dev/fd0c bs=32k De-Installation --------------- Since the script and floppy images are installed with pkg_add, you can remove them with pkg_delete. The rebuild scripts and fdisk and disklabel information created by mkdrtape are stored in /var/dr. This directory is not removed by pkg_delete and can be safely removed if desired. pkg_delete drutils-0.1 Operation --------- See mkdrtape(8) for the main documentation. A brief summary is provided here. After installing the package, run the mkdrtape utility. If your tape drive is not /dev/nrst0, specify the tape drive using the -t option. You will need to run this as root. /usr/local/bin/mkdrtape To recover the system, load the boot floppy and the disaster reecovery tape and reboot the system. Choose the recover option by typing r. Enter the tape device. The default choice is /dev/rst0, you can simply hit if this is where the tape is loaded or enter the tape device if it is loaded elsewhere, e.g. /dev/nrst1. The disk is then partitioned using fdisk and disklabel. The boot block is installed using installboot and the data is recovered using restore.