LinuxQuestions.org - backup issues

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Hi my pclinux grub kept giving error tmp directories full. Same thing for root and user.

I want to backup my home directory to my usb music player. When I boot into as text mode. I have an external usb drive with two ntfs partitions.
I also have an 18 gig COWON IAUDIO7 media player.

When I can use

cd /media

I get

disk/ disk-1/ disk-2/ I AUDIO7/ I AUDIO7-1

I can cd into disk, disk-1, disk-2 and don't recognize anything on the ntfs drive.

When I try to cd into I AUDIO7 i get "no such file or directory"

Please help I have to got to backup my /home directory

I AUDIO7 directory's name has a space inside. Try cd "I AUDIO7" command (put directory's name in quotes).

that's great! Now I can go into the I AUDIO7 directory.

But now when I do

cp /home/username /media/"I AUDIO7"

I get

cp: omitting directory '/home/username'

and the strange thing is when I cd into I AUDIO7 and I AUDIO7-1 it does not show any of the files I recognize.

I did not deliberately create two partitions. So what is I AUDIO7-1?

In fact none of the disks show any files?????

could some body help me with this?

I cannot boot into kde

I have the console but don't know how to copy my home directory to external usb hard drive.

I can see the the drive when I do

cat /proc/scsi/scsi

i just don't know what the name of the drive is when I write to it.

Please help

What is the output from

Code:

dmesg

when, you plugin the drive?
What is the output from

Code:

fdisk -l

with the drive attached?

You could start by logging into the terminal as root and deleting all of the files in /tmp. Then reboot and see if you can login normally.,

To write to an ntfs filesystem, use the ntfs-3g filesystem. This is a fuse module. You may need to install the fuse & ntfs-3g filesystems.

You can try mounting your external drive manually. First you need to know which device it is. Monitor /var/log/messages while inserting the external drive. See which partition(s) is(are) detected.
sudo tail -f /var/log/messages

Another way is to use "fdisk -l" and see which partitions are ntfs:

Code:

/dev/sda4          23198      24322    9027584  17  Hidden HPFS/NTFS

You can look up details about a particular partition using "udevinfo".

Code:

udevinfo -q env -n sda4

ID_VENDOR=ATA

ID_MODEL=TOSHIBA_MK2049GS

ID_REVISION=LC00

ID_SERIAL=SATA_TOSHIBA_MK2049G_48CYT01OT

ID_SERIAL_SHORT=48CYT01OT

ID_TYPE=disk

ID_BUS=scsi

ID_ATA_COMPAT=TOSHIBA_MK2049GSY_48CYT01OT

ID_PATH=pci-0000:00:1f.2-scsi-0:0:0:0

ID_FS_USAGE=filesystem

ID_FS_TYPE=ntfs

ID_FS_VERSION=3.1

ID_FS_UUID=7CEC8E10EC8DC4BC

ID_FS_UUID_ENC=7CEC8E10EC8DC4BC

ID_FS_LABEL=HDDRECOVERY

ID_FS_LABEL_ENC=HDDRECOVERY

ID_FS_LABEL_SAFE=HDDRECOVERY

Suppose that the external drive is /dev/sdb and the first ntfs partition is /dev/sdb1.

Code:

# make sure the fuse kernel module is loaded

sudo /sbin/modprobe fuse



# create a mount point under /mnt

sudo mkdir /mnt/ntfs_1



# mount the ntfs filesystem

sudo mount -t ntfs-3g /dev/sdb1 /mnt/ntfs_1 rw,uid=<yourusername>,fmask=0117,dmask=0007,utf8



# backup your /home directory

tar -C / -cxzf /mnt/ntfs_1/home_bu.tar.gz /home

Here I used the tar program. Since you are backing up to an ntfs filesystem, it won't save the permissions, attributes or acls for the files. Creating an archive backup, this metadata is saved as well.

You might want to read Section 5.2 of the "tar" info manual. It covers using the -g option for incremental dumps. You could use this option and backup only new files in the future.

many thanks for all the replies. First of all to clarify a few changes since my initial post. I had a spare drive which I formatted in reiser fs and using as external usb drive.

When I do fdisk-1 I get

/dev/hda1 swap ( bootable ) (start at 1) end at 219 id 82 swap ( blocks 1759086 )
/dev/hda2 / start at 220 end at 1422 / ( blocks 9663097 )
/dev/hda3 start at 1423 end at 7296 ( blocks 47182905 ) id 5 extended
/dev/hda5 start at 1423 end 7296 ( blocks 47182873) id 83 linux

If i remember correctly hda2 is root partition.
Swap is self explanatory
I know I had left arount 48 gig for /home but don't if if that translates into had3 or hda5. The whole hard drive is no more than 60 gigs.

Lower down from the fdisk table i have:

Disk /dev/sda: 160 GB 160041885696

Device boot: /dev/sda1
start: 1
End: 19457
Blocks: 156288321
Id: 83
System: linux

I am logged in as root

cp -R /home/username/ /dev/sda1/my_backup

or

cp -R /home/username /dev/sda1

I get following error:

cp: accessing '/dev/sda1/my_backup': not a directory

BTW it was when I tried to delete the tmp files that now I am prevented logging in KDE. I now realize i deleted a couple of files with the .kde extension which I should have done.

I have to learn a good backup method for the future. I prefer the console method.

you first need to mount the drive

Code:

mount /dev/sda1 /mount

When i do

mount /dev/sda1 /mount

I get

mount: mount point /mount does not exist

then you need to create it

Code:

mkdir /mount

i am now getting

mkdir /mount
mkdir: cannot crate directory '/mount': No space left on device

This very strange because the internal hard drive should have plenty of space
I am under the [root@username /]# directory

do ls, and mount on an existing directory like /temp or /tmp or /media or /mnt
Another option, cd to /var/log and delete all the backup logs, like syslog.0,syslog.1,messages.1.gz and so on to free up some space
what is the output from

Code:

df -h

i just did

df -h -T

and got

/dev/hda2 type ext3 size 9.1 gig available 0% use 100% /
/dev/hda2 type ext3 size 45 gig available 22 gig used 52% /home

so can i mount sda1 on the /home partition?

i just did

df -h -T

and am getting

/dev/hda2 type ext3 size 9.1 gig used 9.1 gig available 0% used 100% mounted on /
/dev/hda3 type ext3 size 45 gig used 23 gig available 22 gig used 52% mounted on /home

I am wondering if i can mame the mount directory on /home

let me check to boot logs

yes
mount it on /home
then do
cp -R /home/user /home/mountpoint

i am doing that. I created a directory called mount on the home dir
then

cp -R /home/username /home/mount

After this is done, do i just

cp -R /home/mount /dev/sda1

?????

You created the directory mount in your home directory.
So this will act as the mounting point.
Now issue the following command

Code:

mount /dev/sda1 /home/mount

this will attach your external drive at
/home/mount
now type

Code:

cd /home/mount

there you will see the drive
then type
cp -R /home/user /home/mount
This will copy your home directory to the drive

When finished, first unmount the drive before you remove it

Code:

umount /dev/sda1

i have a very slow pentium III. It is still copying files onto the external drive.

Thank you very much!!!

I will let you know how i get on.

Another thing you might like to do for me is give a simple explanation on the concept of attaching the external drive to /home to fstab.

BTW do you know any good online LPI courses?

I have been looking all over but very difficult finding one. I also heard LPI organization are updating the exams at April. So how can i be sure exam materials are up to date?

One thing I don't think you realize is that the files in /dev/ are special files and not the partitions themselves. You have been using them inappropriately in prior posts. See the manpage for mount and mknode for maybe a better understanding. The mounting is performed by the kernel. It it actually the major and minor numbers of the file (rather than the name) that the kernel uses. Unix (and Linux) has a single root filesystem and all other partitions are mounted over directories under the root (/) filesystem.