[CLARIFIED] Get rid of tar backup? Why?

[giner]

Hello,

I love Proxmox VE mostly because it has always followed KISS principle, intentionally or not. It has been always, I would say, "perfect set of tools". Raw disk images VS proprietary VMDK (helped me a many times when I needed to migrate a drive somewhere, for example, to physical machine, or when I just had to test something), tar archives for backups (helped me when I accidentally removed all of XXX.conf files and was able to restore them quckly from tar archives just using tar command). Moreover, Proxmox VE is cool because Linux skills are mostly enough for any Proxmox-related tasks in compare to VMware/Xen/Hyper-V or whatever, where you have to learn each application independently.

So, the question is what was the reason to replace tar backup by the new OWN format? I'm talking about this change: https://git.proxmox.com/?p=qemu-server.git;a=commitdiff;h=91bd6c909b29421410997ce341e7ef0a5fc889f6

Best regards,
Stanislav

 

[dietmar]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

I'm talking about this change: https://git.proxmox.com/?p=qemu-server.git;a=commitdiff;h=91bd6c909b29421410997ce341e7ef0a5fc889f6

Basically a further step to make things simpler ;-) Tar is a complex format not suited for VM backups. The new format can make backups of any storage device with snapshots (no more need for LVM snapshopts).

 

[giner]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

Is it possible to set the new way by default but left old way as an option at the same time?

 

[giner]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

In addition to my previous comment:

I was also scared by Proxmox 2.0 when I installed it for the first time because there were no more plaintext qemu config files (I mean XXX.conf). Then I found out that those are stored in sqlite3 database, well, okay, it's not as good as plain text but we could cope with it (and hopefully file based backend would also be possible someday ).

Custom binary format just scary me because I would not able to extract it or do something else (and somewhere else) without the new version of qemu. So I would use tar + LVM as a backup if it was possible for most cases and the new format for very special cases if it was really needed.

 

[dietmar]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

Is it possible to set the new way by default but left old way as an option at the same time?

no - that would make it unnecessary complex.

 

[dietmar]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

I was also scared by Proxmox 2.0 when I installed it for the first time because there were no more plaintext qemu config files (I mean XXX.conf).

We still store plaintext config files, and you can easily access the via the file system in /etc/pve.

We previously stored those file with ext3, and now use sqlite3.

And I am 1000% sure that sqlite is the better documented format, and much easier to restore on error - compared to ext3.

Custom binary format just scary me because I would not able to extract it or do something else (and somewhere else) without the new version of qemu.

I suggest you read the documentation for all those various tar formats - that is really scary. The new code is much simpler, and we provide a simply binary (called 'vma') to create or extract those files.

Besides, tar miss some features we need (else I would also stay with tar).

 

[giner]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

We still store plaintext config files, and you can easily access the via the file system in /etc/pve.
We previously stored those file with ext3, and now use sqlite3.
And I am 1000% sure that sqlite is the better documented format, and much easier to restore on error - compared to ext3.

Sure, I know but when something bad (that prevent starting a cluster) happen then I can't access /etc/pve either. And it's not possible to just mount /../sqlite3.db to /../pvetmp. And at this time I have to start thinking about reinstalling cluster from zero and restoring XXX.conf from backups.
BTW, is it supposed to be able to restore just XXX.conf file from the new VMA archive or I will have to extract all of Gigabytes?

I suggest you read the documentation for all those various tar formats - that is really scary. The new code is much simpler, and we provide a simply binary (called 'vma') to create or extract those files.

For sure, but there are common tools to work with tar and I can use them on any Linux machine.

Besides, tar miss some features we need (else I would also stay with tar).

It's clear
Is it possible to remain tar backups as an option?

 

[dietmar]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

And it's not possible to just mount /../sqlite3.db to /../pvetmp.

You can simply start in local mode ('pmxcfs -l') and you can access all data vi /etc/pve.

BTW, is it supposed to be able to restore just XXX.conf file from the new VMA archive or I will have to extract all of Gigabytes?

yes

Is it possible to remain tar backups as an option?

Again, will will not support 2 different ways to backup - one is enough.

 

[giner]

Re: Get rid if tar backup? Why?

Okay, clear. Thank you for your time and clarification.