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Linux agent backing up a mounted NTFS volume

edndbd
Level 3

I will have some dual-boot workstations, both of whose OSes will need to be backed up. If the Linux instance mounts the Windows NTFS disk in its fstab, would the Linux agent of Backup Exec be able to grab content on the NTFS volume?

9 REPLIES 9

pkh
Moderator
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You can try turning on the Follow Mount Points option.

Do note that your configuration does not allow for the recovery of the workstation.

Colin_Weaver
Moderator
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Employee Accredited Certified

Almost certainly a configuration we have never officially tested - which kind of makes it into an "Alternative Configuration" where it might work but it would be up to you to test and understand any limitations.

 

A thought springs to mind that whilst it might let you get at the files - it probably can't protect Access Control lists (ACLs) against the security of the file system within NTFS and you may even struggle with things like Incremental Backup Jobs as well.

edndbd
Level 3

Thanks to you both. The issue is that dual-boot is a customer requirement, and the Windows instance is likely to have a harder time garbbing the Linux files than vice versa.

There may be a way to schedule a boot into each OS to back them up with the proper agent, but I don't know what that is at the moment.

edndbd
Level 3

Data would be all we're interested in. A WS rebuild is OK.

pkh
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Make sure you have the necessary licences to do the backups. If you do a dual-boot, then you would need two licences

edndbd
Level 3

If scheduling and compute power (and space) sufficed, I wonder if dd if=/dev/rsd01c | tar -czf /var/windows/disk.tar.gz (or something like that) before backing up Linux might help.

Colin_Weaver
Moderator
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Employee Accredited Certified

Kind of strange to have dual boot these days as single booting and running a workstation based virtualization product has become the more usual practice because then an individual user can access both environments quickly.

 

 

edndbd
Level 3

If you're saying that a license for each OS is necessary if each is booted to be backed up, certainly. Are you saying two licenses are needed if WIndows is presented to the Linux instance as a mounted volume or an tarred file?

edndbd
Level 3

I may take this up with the customer, but they want to clone somebody else's environment.