Hey kids.

I'm just about to leave a job where I've setup a auto-backup type thing (archiving data files, making an .iso, burning the .iso)... but I've never gotten around to encluding a verify routine. So my employer is going on my good word that their data is okay. Resulting from this, two questions:

1). Does anyone know what output cdrecord gives when it encounters a 'bad' cd-rw (ie: can't be written to)? Is there something that would be visable in the log that's sent to root?

2). Anyone have a handy way to verify that a backup is complete?

Thanks, tons.
jmp

"1). Does anyone know what output cdrecord gives when it encounters a 'bad' cd-rw (ie: can't be written to)? Is there something that would be visable in the log that's sent to root?"

cdrecord gives a non zero return code when something goes wrong. You could save the cdrecord error messages and record backup failures something like this:

STARTBACKUPTIME = $(hwclock --show)
echo $STARTBACKUPTIME >> /var/log/backup.log
cdrecord -data -eject /tmp/cd.image 2>> /var/log/backup.log
ISOSIZE= $(du -sh /tmp/cd.image)
echo "ISO image size = $ISOSIZE" >> /var/log/backup.log
# Check to make sure cdrecord worked OK.
if test "$?" != 0;
then
echo "error: CD burn failed, rc = $?" >> /var/log/backup.log
fi

"2). Anyone have a handy way to verify that a backup is complete?"
The du command in the above example logs the size of the iso image.

-------------------
Steve Stites