Im trying to find way how to backup all system. I have just take control over Debian where are installed and configured POSTFIX (mail server), DNS, Apache (www).
During disaster I won't have problems with install new system.
However i have no idea how to configure POSTFIX (mail server) and DNS. That's why I found that I can make disk imige - but it is just my own idea. Maybe there is better solution like tar some part of partitions and after restore system just untar it ?

Please help me to find some easy and quick solution... untill I learn how to configure DNS and POSTFIX(mail server).

Do you have a spare hard drive?

you could plug in a spare hard drive, partition it the same and then copy all of the files across either using dd or using rsync.

Otherwise, I think partimage has the ability to make a system image, although I wasn't very successfull with that

hamish

I have alrdy mounted another hard drive. Its formatted in EXT3. However this still dont solve out my problem . I dont know what should i backup.
If I could only know what parts of system should i backup to save instalation and configuration of DNS and POSTFIX.

If you're doing this by copying file using rsync, rsnapshot, rdiff-backup, tar or cp -a, you can exclude at least these safely:
/tmp/*
/var/tmp/*
/lost+found/*
/dev/*
/proc/*
/mnt/*
/sys/*
/var/log/*

But you can allso backup whole partition or whole drive with dd or partimage as hamish said. dd has some pitfalls, I've heard there could be problems if drives don't have equal geometry, but you should be safe with partimage.

I'd go with rdiff-backup, it's very nice tool with incremental backups; it just stores diff files in special directories while latest files are readable without any additional tools. As drawback only diff files are compressed, for that you could check out the Bacula.

I'm actually trying to solve the same problem right now. It's looking like I'm going to go with partimage. If I have any success I'll let you know how it went and how I did it.

if you just want an identical partition, then you could just do:

# rsync -avl / /mnt/other_hd

this will preserve all the times and ownerships.

Note: you might want to do
# rsync -avl /bin /mnt/other_hd
# rsync -avl /boot /mnt/other_hd
.
.
.
and do each folder in / individually to avoid it copying the files from the /mnt/other_hd partition !

hope the backup went well.
hamish

I would recommend DAR . I have only found English version; I don't know if it's available in other languages. There is also Kdar, the Kde GUI version of DAR.

Hamish:
1) Before i use rsync do i have to set exactelly this same partitions set on mounted hard disk?
2) if i type command rsync -avl / /mnt/backup_hd then what really happand ? Is this going to be a kind of mirrored disk - so i can put away and in case disaster of the 1st disk replace them ?

( does this disk will be bootable and contain all datas from 1st disk )

i usually just copy my /home directory onto a cd. my home directory is where a store pretty much everything except what is currently installed on the system. i just keep links to everything i install after a fresh install. seems to work for me and it kills all the excess crap i have floating around from installing things i stopped using. not saying this is the best way to do things... just the way i do it.

screamautumn:
the question was not about what u do to backup ur home dir.

Im repeating my question:

1) Before i use rsync do i have to set exactelly this same partitions set on mounted hard disk?
2) if i type command rsync -avl / /mnt/backup_hd then what really happand ? Is this going to be a kind of mirrored disk - so i can put away and in case disaster of the 1st disk replace them ?

( does this disk will be bootable and contain all datas from 1st disk )

sorry, misunderstood. no need to be fiesty, you could have just ignored it.