off site PBS server that gets updates using USB

[RobFantini]

Hello
we have a couple of pve backup systems ready to use in case server room burns down.

using regular pve backups we rsync to usb, then use that usb off site to restore backups.

with PBS we want to do something similar as our WAN conneciton can not handle the pbs sync.


so I did this:

1- restored a pbs backup from usb to /backups

2- installed pbs

3- then tried to add /backups/store1 as a datastore and got this:

proxmox-backup-manager datastore create store1 /backups/store1
Error: unable to create chunk store 'store1' subdir "/backups/store1/.chunks" - EEXIST: File exists

Next I think that I should try to add the datastore then restore the usb? I'll try that but if any advise on a better way please respond.

 

[RobFantini]

so creating the datastore just had to be done before the restore. after restore pbs > datastore > content shows the backups.

I used rsync -aHx to do the backup and restore.

if there is a better suggestion for data transfer to and from usb please post a reply.

 

[fabian]

(incremental) rsync from/to an external disk should work fine for doing a manual sync via sneakernet

 

[dbayer]

Would it be a good idea to do a PBS backup to a mirrored ZFS pool. Then split the pool, take it to the remote server. Add that split pool to the remote server with zpool import. Then make that the datastore for future remote sync jobs?

 

[fabian]

also an option, but 'dd' is probably simpler in that case (and more file system/storage agnostic)

 

[dbayer]

Thanks for the info. I'm already setup with a zfs backup pool on location using pve-zsync. I was actually in the planning stages of doing the pool split for a remote backup using zfs send. So for me the pool split is pretty simple.

 

[RobFantini]

Thanks for the info. I'm already setup with a zfs backup pool on location using pve-zsync. I was actually in the planning stages of doing the pool split for a remote backup using zfs send. So for me the pool split is pretty simple.

if possible we you have this figured out, could you post your zpool commands at both nodes? I think this is could be a very good way to get backups off site. we have supermicro removable hdd's at all locations so this would work for us.
in the mean time we are battling to set up the usb method.

 

[dbayer]

Sure thing. Just to get you started. Read about the split command and the import command in the zpool man page. That explains the basics of what I'm going to do.

I'll post again, once I've got this accomplished.

 

[dbayer]

I posted the procedure I used to do this here...

https://forum.proxmox.com/threads/moved-datastore-to-remote-pbs-server-via-zfs-pool-split.76711/