Hi all,

Can anybody give some comments to the following steps of restoring a RHEL server which is running IBM X Series hardware ?

Assumption
==========
1. The Linux OS is totally crashed and corrupted. It is necessary to setup the OS from scatch.

2. No tape drive is available.

3. I have a shell script performing weekly backup of the Linux OS. The script runs the "tar" command to backup the following filesystems in rootvg. ( /home /opt /usr /var /bin /etc /initrd /lib /misc
/root /sbin /selinux /srv /tftpboot /tmp )


Steps to restore
================
1. Install base OS from the Redhat Installation CD.

2. Restore the tar ball of the above rootvg's filesystems ( /home /opt /usr /var /bin /etc /initrd /lib /misc
/root /sbin /selinux /srv /tftpboot /tmp )
Anything should be "excluded" ?
Anything else should be "included" ?

3. I heard that the /boot should not be restored from the tar ball. Otherwise, the kernel will be crashed immediately. Then, what should I do to have the same kernel as before the OS is crashed. I want to get back the same OS (including all rpm packages, OS files, etc...) as before.

4. Any other necessary steps ?

Any comment is welcome and appreciated.
Thanks a lot.

Jay

Rather than go this route you could use something like Mondo Rescue to create an install ISO for your system as it exists so you don't have to muck with default settings you'd get from a fresh install.

http://www.mondorescue.org/

A tar restore might not overwrite key system files that are "busy" at the time of restore because the fresh install is running.

Also you say you backup with tar but don't say to WHERE you are backing it up. If you're backing up to other space on the same server you wouldn't be able to access in the event of a system crash.

This may be useful http://www.linuxtopia.org/online_boo...ide/index.html

Jlightner,

Thanks for the reply.
1. Actually, I am thinking of using Kickstart to help the fresh intall. Have you had experience on it ?

2. For tar restore, what can I do for those key system files that are "busy ? Actually, I want to restore the rpm packages and system configuration files which may have been changed before (e.g. /etc/hosts, /etc/resolv.conf ...)

3. I use tar to backup and put the tar ball in a centralized NFS server. After fresh install of a crashed server, I would mount the NFS filesystem to get the tar ball and then restore it. Is this okay ?

Any comment is appreciated.
Jay

Thanks.

Jlightner,

Thanks for the reply.
1. Actually, I am thinking of using Kickstart to help the fresh intall. Have you had experience on it ?

2. For tar restore, what can I do for those key system files that are "busy ? Actually, I want to restore the rpm packages and system configuration files which may have been changed before (e.g. /etc/hosts, /etc/resolv.conf ...)

3. I use tar to backup and put the tar ball in a centralized NFS server. After fresh install of a crashed server, I would mount the NFS filesystem to get the tar ball and then restore it. Is this okay ?

Any comment is appreciated.
Jay