Hello All,
I have several questions about LVM snapshots.
o Are snapshots persistent across reboots? If not by default, can
they be made to be persistent?
o How many snapshots can I have at once?
o Is there some in-depth documentation out there on just the snapshot
aspects of LVM?
I spent about an hour googling for this info, but couldn't find what I
needed.
Why am I interested in this?
Last year I took advantage of one of those occasional Tiger Direct (
shameless plug ;) deals to get myself a 200GB drive for 50 bucks. I am
using the drive to backup my machines. Right now I backup once a month
by copying the user data from my iBook, my wife's iMac, and my Knoppix
laptop to the drive. Each time it comes to about 15GB total. I am
beginning to fill the drive, so I want to design a more efficient way
of using it with OSS tools. My plan is this:
o Acquire a cheap used PIII pc. Install the 200GB drive and Centos
(for familiarity's sake, RHEL is one of the distros I use at work)
o Make an LVM partition on the drive.
o Designate half the drive to data and half the drive to snapshot
space.
o Rsync every machine weekly. Prior to each rsync, snapshot the
drive.
o Keep as many snapshots as will fit. Presumably this will be many
more "full" backups that I can hold than by just copying stuff to the
drive outright.
I am downloading Centos right now to test this scheme. I thought I
would ask while I wait for bit torrent. Has anyone tried something
similar to this?
-Adam