[OPLINTECH] Offsite backup software

Mon Mar 11 11:56:41 EDT 2019

This may or may not be of use to you, but what I do for the libraries I
work with is provide a free-of charge, best-effort, no guarantee offsite
backup to my own backup server. I do this because...well...generally, my
libraries suck at it. LOL! And this way I can be sure that they're getting
regular and reliable backups! Years ago, I used to have local on-site
backup strategies in place at each library, but inevitably, the
responsibility would fall upon a local staff member with the most technical
inclination. At some point, the backup would fail and the person in charge
wouldn't know enough to recognize that a failure had occurred. Fast forward
to today, and the level of reliable local expertise (WRT backups)  in my
small libraries hasn't really increased all that much (with a few pockets
of exception here and there). So to help reduce the cost each library
incurs to set up their own backup strategy (regardless of off- or on-site)
and to ensure that everyone is getting regular backups in a way that I
could easily monitor/manage and feel confident in, I started handling them
myself. No charge because while I do put a fair bit of time/effort/money
into running the backups, I'm no 99.999% guaranteed up-time secure data
center and I don't want to be in the position of implying any sort of
service-level guarantee. But I sleep better at night knowing that everyone
is getting regular backups of their critical data.

So...To keep my own costs as low as possible, I scrounged around the
InterWebs to eval some FOSS backup software options. There are several
well-used and well-featured backup options. This was several years ago and
at the time I wasn't a stranger to linux, but wasn't (still not) a linux
guru. I was hoping to find something cross platform and with a low barrier
to entry. Some of the more robust software out there is commercial grade
and very flexible/robust, but has a higher learning curve than I was
looking for. Ultimately, I found and starting using UrBackup (
https://www.urbackup.org):  Low learning curve, runs the back-end on either
Windows or Linux, has Windows and linux agents, does full hard drive image
backups (on Windows targets only) as well as file backups, and is
sufficiently powerful enough to do everything I need it to do to handle
multiple different libraries over the Internet (via a VPN, in my use-case).
It's reliable, well-supported, actively developed, and generally does a
good job.

The moral of the story is:  If you're a multi-branch library, you might be
able to set up a backup server using some decommissioned hardware (and some
new/larger storage) and FOSS backup software at a branch or two and run
your own off-site backups without the ongoing expense of contracting a
3rd-party backup vendor. As with everything though, there are pros and cons
to DIY backups. It works for me, but it may not work out or be cost
effective for you. That's for you to decide!

(I was going to stop there, but I'll toss in this extra tidbit after
re-reading your OP:)
I'm in the process of re-jiggering by back-end storage, so needed to purge
old data, but at the moment, I'm storing about two months worth of backups
for about 32 servers. After the re-jiggering, though, I expect to just let
it pile up and should be able to pretty easily handle quite a few years'
worth of data for all the target servers. I currently run nightly file
backups to grab any file that has changed on any hard drive in the target
device. Every 14 days, I grab an image-level backup of just the boot hard
drive on Windows targets. Both backup types are smart enough to only send
changed data over the wire and the server is smart enough to index/hash the
changed data and not store redundant data. The file backups ensure that I
can easily restore individual files/directories and the image backups allow
me to restore a failed target computer from bare metal and get the OS back
up and running quickly, following up by a file-level restore of the data
volumes. I can pull individual files from the image backups too, so I'm
actually getting redundant backups of some of the targets in some cases.
(But that's ok; safety nets are a good thing, IMO!)

HTH and good luck,
Chad

______________________________
*Chad Neeper*
Senior Systems Engineer

*Level 9 Networks*
740-548-8070 (voice)
866-214-6607 (fax)

*Full IT/Computer consulting services -- Specialized in libraries and
schools*

On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 10:30 AM Fred Miller Jr via OPLINTECH <
oplintech at lists.oplin.org> wrote:

> Good Morning Everyone,
>
>
>
> Was wondering what other library systems are using for their offsite
> backups? We were moving our offsite backups to USB drives and then
> switching them out every week. We have looked at trial cloud software with
> a 14 day retention and I feel $67 a month can add up very quickly over
> time. Maybe I’m wrong and that’s on the cheaper side.
>
>
>
> We’re using a FreeNas Mini 2.0 NAS storage box for our disaster recovery
> backup currently. Our offsite backups size is relatively small and it’s
> just for our File Server and SQL Server.
>
>
>
> Comments or suggestions are appreciated.
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
>
>
> [image: Logo Resized]
>
> *203 Perry Street Wapakoneta, OH 45895*
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>
>
> *Fred Miller Jr*
>
> IT Service Manager
>
> *T*: *419-738-1215* |* E*: *fmiller at auglaizelibraries.org
> <fmiller at auglaizelibraries.org>*
>
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>
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