ITEM: BX0549L

What is the difference between sysback ver 3 and sysback ver 4.1



Question:

590
customer wants the news version of sysback. 

Response:

Customer Contact

Response:

 ENV:
  AIX 4.1.4
  RISC 590
  
*CUSTOMER REP:  Shannon Sylvia

 PROBLEM:
  Customer wanted to know the differences between version 3 and
  version 4 of sysback

*ACTION TAKEN:

===========================================
AIX System Backup & Recovery/6000 (Sysback)
Version 4.1 Release Notes
===========================================

The purpose of this documente is to describe the differences between 
Sysback Version 4.1 and Sysback Version 3.3. It is assumed that the 
reader is already familiar with Sysback Version 3.3. The information 
contained here will act as a suppliment to, or provide changes to, 
the Sysback Version 3 User and Reference Manual.

AIX Support
-----------
Sysback Verison 4 may be installed only on AIX Version 4.1 and later 
operating systems. Support for AIX Verison 3.2 is no longer provided 
by this version of Sysback.

Backward Compatibility
----------------------
Sysback Version 4 is not compatible with Sysback Version 3. This 
means:

1. Both client and server systems in a network backup environment must 
   be running the same version of Sysback.

2. With the new version of Sysback installed, it will NOT be possible 
   to restore data from Sysback backups created at prior versions.

3. To perform a System Installation from tape, you must boot from a 
   tape created with Sysback Version 4 if you are restoring from a backup 
   created with Sysback Version 4. You cannot boot from a Sysback Version 
   4 tape and install from a Sysback Version 3 backup, and vice-versa.

4. To perform a Sysback Network Install, you must boot from a server 
   running the same version of Sysback as was used to create the backup 
   you will be installing.

What you CAN do:

1. You may still boot and install from your Sysback Version 3 backup 
   tapes.

2. You may re-install the Sysback Version 3 software over Sysback Version 
   4 if it is necessary to restore from backups created with Sysback 
   Version 3. You may later re-install Sysback Version 4 without loss 
   of any customized configuration.


=============================
Changes to Existing Functions
=============================

Sysback SMIT Menus
------------------
The SMIT menus for Sysback Backup, List, Verify, Recreate and Restore 
functions have been simplified. In prior versions, there was a separate 
menu for each backup type (i.e. System, Volume Group, Filesystem, 
etc), used to perform all backup, list, verify, recreate, and restore 
options. The Sysback Main Menu now contains the following option:

      Backup & Recovery Options

When selecting this option, the additional options will appear:

  *********************************************************
  Backup Options
  List Backup Contents
  Verify a Backup
  Recreate Volume Groups, Logical Volumes & Filesystems
  Restore Data from a Backup
  *********************************************************

The "List", "Verify", "Recreate" and "Restore" options may be performed 
on any type of backup performed with Sysback. It is no longer necessary 
to know the backup type or select a different option for each backup 
type. SMIT will determine the type of backup for you and display 
only the subsequent options which apply.

By selecting "Backup Options" on this screen, you will be presented 
with the following additional list of selections:

  *********************************************************
  Backup the System (Installation Image)
  Backup Volume Groups
  Backup Filesystems
  Backup Logical Volumes
  Backup Files or Directories
  *********************************************************

From this screen, you must select the type of backup to be performed. 
The options which follow will differ based on the type of backup 
to be performed.

SMIT Device Selection Screen
----------------------------
When performing Sysback backups from SMIT, you will be given an option 
of a Directory, indicated by the "Dir" prefix, to write the backups 
to. This replaces the previous "File" option, which provided the 
full pathname of a file into which the backup was written. 

Now, a directory option is displayed for each directory for which 
the user has permission to write backups (on both the local and remote 
hosts). After selecting a directory, SMIT will automatically create 
a default filename to create based on the selected directory, backup 
type, hostname, and unique ID as follows:

    /DirectoryPath/Type.hostname.ID

where Type is one of:
    SB    System Backup
    VG    Volume Group Backup
    FS    Filesystem Backup
    LV    Logical VOlume Backup
    FD    File or Directory Backup

and Unique ID is, by default, the date and time expressed as "MMDDhhmm". 
The Unique ID field may be changed in the SMIT dialog screen which 
follows. By using a unique ID, each backup will be written to a different 
file. IB the same ID is used for different backups of the same type, 
the former backup may be overwritten with the new backup.

For all list, verify, recreate, and restore options, you will continue 
to be given the "File" option, displaying the directory and filename 
created as described above.

System and Volume Group Backups
-------------------------------
There have been considerable change to the format of the System backup, 
both when writing to tape or to disk files. In the past, the System 
backup contained a separate image (on tape) for each volume group. 
For disk image backups, a separate backup had to be performed for 
the system (rootvg) and each additional volume group.

This new version of Sysback breaks each filesystem and logical volume 
into separate images, both when writing to tape and to disk files. 
This provides several enhancements:

1. Both filesystems and raw logical volumes will be included in the 
   System and Volume Group backups. 

   Because, previously, a volume group backup could contain only one 
   image, only the filesystem data could be included. Now that there 
   is a separate image for each filesystem, a separate image can be 
   as easily added for each raw logical volume.

2. System Backups to disk file may contain multiple volume groups. 

   The actual disk file backup that is created contains multiple files, 
   one for each logical volume or filesystem and one to contain a table 
   of contents for the backup.

3. A single Volume Group Backup may now be performed for multiple volume 
   groups.

   If more than one volume group is specified, the filesystems and logical 
   volumes for all specified volume groups will be combined into a single 
   backup, and later list, verify, recreate or restore operations may 
   be performed separately or collectively for the volume groups included 
   on the backup.

4. Restoring of volume group data becomes more flexible. 

   Since each filesystem and logical volume is in a separate image, 
   it is now possible to exclude certain filesystems or logical volumes 
   from being restored. This is possible by selecting only specific 
   filesystems or logical volumes to restore to an existing volume group, 
   or by selecting not to create certain filesystems or logical volumes 
   during the Sysback System Installation process.

5. Faster restoration of specific filesystems, files or directories. 

   Since filesystems are separate images on a backup, it is not necessary 
   to "read through" all of the unnecessary filesystem data to reach 
   the data to be restored. For tape backups, the tape is "fast-forwarded" 
   past any irrelevant data. For disk file backups, only the actual 
   disk file or files containing the data to be restored need to be 
   read. This is a dramatic improvement over the previous need to read 
   through an entire volume group to find specific files to restore.

6. Better recovery from tape I/O errors

   It is not possible to "read" past an I/O error produced by a tape 
   drive. However, it is possible to "skip" past any images containing 
   an I/O error to the start of the next image. This means, for instance, 
   that, when restoring from a volume group backup, an I/O error may 
   make the remainder of a filesystem unreadable, but the Sysback restore 
   process will skip to the beginning of the next filesystem (or raw 
   logical volume) and continue automatically. Obviously, an I/O error 
   continues to make backup data unreadable, but the amount of data 
   affected is severely limited.

Filesystem and Logical Volume Backups
-------------------------------------
A single Filesystem or Logical Volume backup may now contain more 
than one filesystem or logical volume. If more than one object is 
selected to backup, the backup, similar to the volume group backup, 
will contain multiple images, each containing a separate filesystem 
or logical volume.

This enables the simplicity and flexibility of using a single command 
or operation to backup multiple filesystems or logical volumes, and 
restore only a single object from the backup. 

The Filesystem backup is much different in format than previous versions 
of Sysback. Instead of being backed up using the AIX "backup" by 
inode, the filesystem backups will contain a backup by filename, 
as do other backup types. This was done for the following reasons:

1. Files are are now defragmented during restores. Previous restores 
   from an inode backup preserved filesystem fragmentation which adversely 
   affected I/O performance.

2. More flexibility of selective restores of files to different directories

3. Files or directories may now be excluded from filesystem backups. 
   Previously, the exclude list was ignored for filesystem backups.

4. "Stacking" previous backups on tape was difficult and required multiple 
   rewinds when reading from the backups.

The incremental backups provided by the former filesystem backup 
options are still available as described in the next section.

Incremental Backups
-------------------
Incremental backups may now be performed for both Volume Groups and 
Filesystems. Sysback will keep track of the last time a backup was 
performed at a certain incremental level for each volume group and 
filesystem. Sysback will also keep track of the contents of the filesystem.

If a file has been removed from the system between the time the previous 
and current incremental backup was performed, that file will be automatically 
re-removed by Sysback when the current incremental backup is restored.

As in previous versions, there are multiple incremental backup levels. 
A level "0" indicates a backup of all files. Level "1" indicates 
backup of files since the last level 0. Level "2" indicates backup 
of files since the last level 1, etc.

Individual files or directories may be restored from any incremental 
backup level. When restoring all files from an incremental backup 
level, the user must indicate that this is an incremental restore 
if they wish previously removed files to be re-removed at the end 
of the restore.

To perform an incremental backup, the user must enter the incremental 
backup level in the "Incremental backup level" field in SMIT, or 
use the "-i level" option at the command line. If no incremental 
level is entered, the backup is assumed NOT to replace any previous 
incremental levels performed.

Restore from Backups
--------------------
There have been considerable enhancements to the restore of Sysback 
backups. Instead of having a separate option to restore from each 
backup, a single SMIT option, and a single "sysrestore" command is 
now used to restore any type of data from any backup type. Sysback 
will identify the backup type by reading the header on the backup, 
and SMIT will present a list of applicable types of data to restore 
based on the backup type. The restore data type will be one of the 
following:

    Volume Group
    Logical Volume
    Filesystem
    Directory
    Regular File

When restoring from SMIT, the user must select one of the above data 
types, and will then be presented with a list of the available objects 
of the selected type on the backup. The user may then select one 
or more of those objects to restore.

If a System or Volume group backup contains multiple volume groups, 
you may select to restore one or more volume groups in a single operation. 
Likewise, from a System or Volume Group backup, you may restore one 
or more filesystems, logical volumes, files or directories.

The following are enhancements to the restore process:

1. Faster restore of individual filesystems, files ore directories from 
   System and Volume Group backups.

2. Restore of multiple objects (i.e. volume groups, logical volumes, 
   filesystems, etc) in a single operation.

3. Recovery of filesystem and logical volume data from System and Volume 
   Group backups even after a tape I/O error.

4. Restore of a select filesystem from System and Volume Group backups 
   restores only the filesystem requested, and not any data for other 
   filesystems mounted beneath the requested filesystem.

Recreate Volume Groups, Logical Volumes, or Filesystems
-------------------------------------------------------
As with the restore options, there is now only one option needed 
to recreate volume groups, logical volumes or filesystems from a 
backup. In addition, one or more objects may now be recreated in 
a single operation.

A new user interface is available for changing the volume group, 
logical volume or filesystem attributes, locations and sizes before 
they are created. This new user interface is identical to that used 
during the System Installation Process documented later.

Exclude List
------------
The exclude list options in SMIT now allow a logical volume name 
to be entered as well as a file or directory name. If a logical volume 
name is entered, the data for that logical volume will be excluded 
from all backup types. 

Backup Sequence Number ("stacking" backups)
-------------------------------------------
The ability to "stack" multiple separate backups to a single tape 
or series of tapes is handled differently in this version of Sysback 
than it was in earlier versions. This need was brought on primarily 
by the differences in the format of the backups. 

A System or volume group backup, for instance, contained only one 
tape "image" on earlier Sysback versions. Since the user had only 
the ability to perform a backup of one volume group at a time, it 
was easy for the user to know that to restore the third volume group 
backup, this was the third image on the tape.

Sysback now places many images on tape for a single volume group 
backup. In addition, a single filesystem backup operation may contain 
multiple filesystems. The user can no longer determine how many "images" 
are on the tape based on the number of backup operations performed.

Therefore, the Sysback List, Verify, Recreate and Restore operations 
allow the user to enter a "Backup Sequence Number". This option replaces 
all instances in which the user was previously asked for the "Image 
number on tape". The user need only know the backup number (i.e. 
the third backup performed), and Sysback will determine the number 
of tape images to skip to move to the correct backup before beginning 
the desired operation.

Read Volume Label
-----------------
This option now appears on the Backup & Recovery Options menu in 
SMIT. This single option replaces both the prior Read Volume Label 
option in the Utilities menu and the List Files on Backup option 
for each backup type. When this option is selected, you will be asked 
whether you wish to: 

1. Display detailed information?  If "yes", the list will include both 
   the main backup header information as well as a list of each image 
   contained in the backup. A separate image is displayed for each filesystem 
   or logical volume included on the backup.

2. Show Filelist? If "yes", and the backup contains any regular files 
   or directories, the list of directories and files (each in a separate 
   list) will be displayed as well.

The readsbheader command is used to list all of the above.

Progress Indicator
------------------
The progress indicator has been improved so that a single indicator 
will be displayed for an entire backup, even if that backup contains 
multiple volume groups, logical volumes or filesystems.

Network Support on Bootable Tapes
---------------------------------
Network installation support is no longer added to bootable tapes 
by default. It is assumed that the system will be installed from 
tape if the system is booted from tape. However, this may be overridden 
by selecting the type of network support to add to the boot tape. 
 This option is now provided separately since the addition of FDDI, 
and the growing size of network support files requires too much memory 
for the System Installation process to be performed.

When choosing the SMIT options to either "Backup the System (installation 
image)" or "Create a Bootable Tape (without data)", an option entitled 
"Network install support to include" will appear. Here you may select 
a network type of either Ethernet, Token-ring or FDDI.


New Features
============

New System Installation Process
-------------------------------
The System installation process has been completely redesigned to 
include the following new features:

1. Improved User Interface

   The menus which display during the installation process have been 
   redesigned to provide a more visual, user-friendly, flexible, and 
   faster way to make and change selections. Help information is provided 
   on-screen for all selections.

   Cursor keys or the tab key may be used to move the highlighted selection, 
   and Enter to select. Refer to the section "New User Interface for 
   Editing LVM Information" below for additional information on the 
   menus provided for changing the installation settings.

2. Even More Customizable Installation Options

   When selecting to change the installation settings, the user may 
   now change any of the following information:

   a. Logical volume names - Logical volume data will be restored to the 
      new logical volume name, and the filesystem information, if any, 
      will be updated to reflect the new logical volume.

   b. Logical volumes may be moved to new volume groups. The logical volume 
      or filesystem will be created and restored to the new volume group, 
      and a new journaled filesystem log, if required, will be assigned 
      to the filesystem.

   c. Filesystem Mount points - data for the filesystem will be restored 
      to the new location.

   d. Exclude a logical volume or filesystem from install. Doing so will 
      also prevent the filesystem or logical volume data from being restored.

   e. User may change the filesystem attributes for support of Large Files 
      and Allocation Groups. These options will only appear on AIX Version 
      4.2 or later systems.

   f. User may turn on or off concurrent volume group support (for shared 
      volume groups).

   g. User may now change the logical volume attributes for mirror-write 
      consistency checking, write-verify, bad block relocation, relocatable, 
      and maximum physical volumes.

3. FDDI Network Installation Support

   If booting from tape, it is necessary to explicitly select to include 
   network support on the bootable portion of the tape. For network 
   boot, an FDDI network boot image must be created using the same steps 
   required for other network types.

4. Raw Logical Volume Data

   Raw logical volume data included on the System backup will be restored 
   to the raw logical volumes upon installation. Raw logical volumes 
   may be excluded from the installation by selecting not to create 
   the logical volume, and therefore, the data on the backup will be 
   ignored.

5. Better Recoverability

   The base operating system (root [/] and /usr filesystems) are restored 
   independent of other filesystems. After the restoration of the base 
   operating system data, the system is configured and made bootable. 
   Once this occurs, the system may be booted in normal mode. Therefore, 
   any installation error, even a complete power loss, will not prevent 
   the system from being booted normally. Once a system has been booted 
   normally, any volume groups not created or data not restored during 
   the installation process may be recovered from the backup using the 
   SMIT menus.

   An I/O error occurring during the restoration of a filesystem or 
   logical volume will NOT cause the installation to fail, but the remainder 
   of the filesystem or logical volume data will be skipped and the 
   rest of the data will be restored normally. Once the system is up 
   and running, steps may be taken to recover the data in error.

   Considerable debugging and error recovery facilities have also been 
   implemented to provide information necessary to recovery from other 
   potential installation problems.

Power Installation Process
--------------------------
When creating a System Backup, an option is provided for making the 
backup a "Power" Backup. A Power Backup differs from a System Backup 
in that all filesystems are backed up as "raw" logical volumes. This 
will often double the backup performance. The primary benefit is 
that the installation performance can be as much as 3 times faster, 
since logical volumes are restored as sequential "raw" data rather 
than having to restore to filesystem blocks and frequently update 
the journaled filesystem log.

There are limitations, however, to the flexibility of the installation 
process when using a Power System Backup:

1. Since all filesystems are backed up as raw logical volumes, the entire 
   LV is backed up even if only 1/4 of the filesystem is used. If this 
   were the case with all filesystems, the backup and install would 
   likely take longer than normal.

2. It is only possible to restore raw logical volumes from this backup. 
   Therefore, when choosing to restore select data from the backup, 
   you will only be allowed to restore an entire LV and only if that 
   LV is inactive. This obviously means that you cannot restore any 
   individual files or directories, only entire filesystems, and no 
   filesystems, such as /, /usr and /var can be restored since they 
   are always active.    

3. When installing or recreating VGs or LVs from this backup, you cannot 
   change the following attiritutes: 

   a. any filesystem attributes

   b. logical volume name

   c. logical volume size

   d. the volume group in which an LV is to be created

New User Interface for Changing LVM Information
-----------------------------------------------
A new user interface is provided for changing the LVM information 
used to recreate volume groups, logical volumes and filesystems. 
All features of prior versions of Sysback are still provided. New 
features are also provided as descried in the section "New System 
Installation Process" earlier in this section.

The same process for changing LVM information is used when either 
recreating a volume group or logical volume on an active system or 
when reinstalling the system from a System Backup.

The new user interface uses Curses, a terminal-independent programming 
interface, which allows for screen-wide cursor positioning, use of 
editing keys, etc. The new user interface allow selections to be 
made by moving a highlighted bar with the arrow or tab keys, and 
data fields to be changed using insert and delete keys, etc.

As logical volumes characteristics are changed, or when adding or 
removing physical volumes from a logical volume or volume group, 
the space required and available within a volume group is updated 
to assist the user in making decisions as to logical volume and filesystem 
sizes, etc.

A help box is always shows at the bottom of the screen, displaying 
a description of the current highlighted field, and the available 
options for changing the current value.

Offline Mirror Backups
----------------------
Whenever a backup is performed, the data at the beginning of the 
backup will be considerably older than the data at the end of the 
backup. This could cause considerable problems in a relational database 
environment after the data was restored, since records in different 
files that should be updated concurrently would then show only 
partially-updated transactions.  On the other hand, in an environment 
with large amounts of data that must remain accessible in a 24-hour 
]operation, simply stopping transactions during a backup is also not a 
valid option.

This new process will perform backups of mirrored logical volume 
data after "breaking" off a copy of each logical volume and using 
the offline copy to obtain a backup of non-changing data.  The remaining 
"active" copy of the data remains completely accessible to the users 
without interruption throughout the backup process. When the backup 
is complete, the mirrors are put back together and only the physical 
partitions from the broken mirror that became stale while it was 
offline are updated. 

The resynchronizing of only "stale" partitions is particularly important, 
since resynchronizing all of the partitions after returning the offline 
copy would require a great deal of time and system resource, often 
seriously affecting the overall system performance for several hours. 
In this case, only physical partitions on the disks which were written 
to while the mirrored copies were offline would need to be re-written. 

IMPORTANT NOTE: This process is intended for taking offline inactive 
logical volumes and unmounted filesystems. Only then can we be sure 
that the data contained in those logical volumes and filesystems 
is up to data and no transactions were in process when the logical 
volumes were taken offline.  It is also understandable that it is 
not always possible to make logical volumes and filesystems inactive 
before taking the copies offline. Yet it is important to note that 
the integrity of relational data cannot be guaranteed if applications 
are not quiesced, and the integrity of a filesystem cannot be guaranteed 
if filesystem data is changing at the time the mirror is taken offline. 
 Although unlikely, filesystem integrity compromised by taking a 
mounted filesystem offline may cause system errors or failure.

Selectable Filesystem Data Backend Command
------------------------------------------
The backup command set to use may be changed by selecting the option 
"Select Filesystem Data Backup Command" from the "Utilities" options 
on the Sysback Main SMIT menu. After selecting the command, this 
command will be used for all Sysback backups involving filesystem 
files (not logical volume backups). Upon restore from any Sysback 
backup, Sysback will automatically detect the backup type and use 
the appropriate corresponding restore command to restore the data.

NOTE: The backup command is the default and should not be changed 
unless another command provides needed function that the backup command 
does not.

Although Sysback creates a data format all its own in order to store 
information regarding the backup contents and system information, 
and to allow multi-copy and striped backups, the underlying command 
used to perform filesystem backups in earlier versions of Sysback 
has always been the AIX "backup" command.

The backup command was selected because of its flexibility over other 
commands and because it backs up data regarding files such as the 
access control list (ACL) and the trusted computing base (TCB).

The backup command, however, has changed over time in how it backs 
up and restores "sparse" files.  A sparse file is a file in which 
blocks of data have been written non-sequentially, leaving unallocated 
blocks in the middle of a file. Previous levels of the backup command 
did not preserve this sparseness, and a sparse file, upon restore, 
was expanded to include all blocks in the middle of the file, often 
causing a filesystem to inadvertently run out of space. The backup 
command was later changed to preserve this sparseness, but this is 
often a problem for customers experiencing the opposite affect.

If a file is created and all blocks are allocated by writing nulls, 
or "0"s throughout the file, these blocks of data are not preserved 
during a restore, since the goal is to preserve sparseness, indistinguishable 
from a file containing null blocks. The affect is that a file created 
at a large size could be restored to a very small size.

Sysback resolves this issue by allowing the user to select which 
command is to be used to perform backups. This may be either the 
AIX backup and restore commands (which preserve sparseness) or the 
tar command (which does not). 

Set Network Attributes for Sysback Backups and Restores
-------------------------------------------------------
By tuning certain network parameters, it may be possible to increase 
the performance of Sysback backups and restores. This option makes 
it possible to set certain values which affect network performance 
during Sysback backups and restores without affecting network performance 
of other processes using the same network.

IMPORTANT NOTE: You should not change the network settings using 
this option unless you are familiar with network tuning. Also, it 
is imperative that the same settings be applied to both the Sysback 
server and client hosts or network backups will often lock up.

The changes applied here will affect all backups, verifies, and restores 
performed within Sysback, but will NOT apply to a Sysback system 
installation. This is because it is not possible to query the values 
set during the installation process.

Create or Edit an LVM Information File
--------------------------------------
An LVM information file is created by the mkvginfo command as part 
of all Sysback backups which contain LVM (logical volume manager) 
information. This file is then used either when re-installing the 
system from a backup or recreating a volume group, logical volume 
or filesystem from a backup.

At times you may wish to create your own LVM information file and 
tailor it to your needs. This customized LVM information file may 
then be placed on the backup by using the -g flag to either the sysback, 
mkvgback, mkjfsback or mklvback commands. The customized LVM information 
file may also be used to replace the information on a System Backup 
during a System installation by creating a customized installation 
diskette as described in the next section.

To either edit an existing LVM information file, or to create a new 
LVM information file from the information on the current system and 
edit the new file, select "Create or Edit an LVM Information File" 
from the Utilities Options menu, or refer to the mklvminfo and editlvminfo 
commands.

You will be provided with a menu-driver interface for changing the 
information in the file. This new user interface is identical to 
that used during the System Installation Process and when recreating 
a volume group or logical volume on an active system. This user interface 
is described earlier in the section "New User Interface for Editing 
LVM Information".

Create Customized Installation Diskette
---------------------------------------
A customized installation diskette may be created which may contain 
any of the following:

1. LVM Information File - You may select to include a customized LVM 
   information file. This will replace the LVM information contained 
   on the backup, and is typically used to apply many changes to the 
   LVM information without requiring the user to do so using the installation 
   menus.

2. Pre-installation script - this script is executed prior to the Sysback 
   menus appearing during the installation process. This may be used, 
   for instance, to restore other information from the diskette, or 
   to perform some special system configuration not ordinarily performed 
   by the installation process.

3. Post-rootvg installation script - this script is executed after the 
   files for the rootvg volume group are restored. This is commonly 
   used to execute the sample script 
   "/usr/lpp/sysback/scripts/install.postroot_hwmigrate", 
   provided with Sysback, to perform an automatic installation of device 
   code from CDROM not already included in the system restored from 
   the backup media.

4. Post installation script - this script is executed at the end of 
   the installation process before the system reboots. This may be used, 
   for instance, to execute the sample script 
   "/usr/lpp/sysback/scripts/install.post_rmnet", 
   which removes the network configuration from the restored system 
   data to prevent any prompts at the end of the Sysback install process.

More information on the installation scripts may be found in the 
Sysback User and Reference Manual in the section entitled "Creating 
Scripts for Customizing the System Backup and Installation Process".

Once this diskette has been created, it need only be inserted into 
the diskette drive during the system boot process. It will be automatically 
read, and any of the above information files provided will be used 
during the installation process, overriding the same information 
on the backup media if it exists..

New AIX and Device Support
--------------------------
Sysback Version 4 will support the following new features of AIX:

1. Large File Support - Sysback will retain the large file support 
   characteristic of a filesystem when recreating a filesystem on a 
   running system or when reinstalling from a Sysback backup.

   In addition, it is now possible to perform a Sysback backup to a 
   disk file that is larger than 2 gigabytes in size, provided that 
   the filesystem being written to was created to support "Large Files". 
   If Large File support is desired for a pre-existing filesystem, the 
   filesystem must be backed up using Sysback, deleted, recreated and 
   restored. During the process of recreating the filesystem, the Large 
   File support may be enabled from the menus.

2. Filesystem Allocation Groups - Filesystem allocation group characteristic 
   of a filesystem will be retained when recreating a filesystem on 
   a running system or when reinstalling from a Sysback backup.

3. FDDI networks - Sysback will support FDDI networks for all backup 
   and restore operations, and for network boots and network installation.

4. Concurrent Volume Groups - This characteristic is used for volume 
   groups shared between more than one system. Sysback will retain or 
   allow changes to this characteristic when recreating a volume group 
   on an active system or when reinstalling from a System Backup. Sysback 
   will also retain the volume group major device number, which must 
   usually be the same between all systems in which a volume group is 
   shared.

===============
Command Changes
===============

Obsolete commands
-----------------
The following commands have been removed from the product as their 
use has been replaced by new function in the product:

1. fsback.pre_lvbackup, install.post_lvrestore

   These "sample" pre-backup and post-installation scripts, found int 
   he /usr/lpp/sysback/scripts directory,  were used in Sysback Version 
   3 to append raw logical volume data to the end of a System Backup 
   and automatically restore that logical volume data at the end of 
   the System Installation process. Since raw logical volume data is 
   now included in the System and Volume Group backups in Sysback, it 
   is no longer necessary for the user to customize the backup and install 
   process to do so.

2. dirrestore, lvrestore, jfsrestore, vgrestore

   These commands were used in Sysback Version 3 for listing, verifying 
   and restoring data from different types of Sysback backups. In Sysback 
   Version 4, the single command, sysrestore, is used to verify or restore 
   from all types of backups, and the readsbheader command is used to 
   list the files contained on the backups. Refer to these commands 
   in the "changes" section below.

Changes to existing commands
----------------------------
The following is a list of  commands in which existing command line 
syntax has changed or new flags and arguments have been added:

1. mkdirback, mklvback, mkjfsback, mkvgback, sysback

   These commands have all been modified with the following changes:

   a. -f [ device | file | directory ] flag and argument changed to allow 
      entry of a directory for the destination. If a directory is specified, 
      the file is written to the directory with the filename constructed 
      as follows:

        Type.Hostname.id

      where "Hostname" is the local host name (or "localhost" if none), 
      id is the ID entered with the -I flag, and "Type" is the type of 
      backup and must be one of one of:
          SB - System Backup (or Power Backup)
          VG - Volume Group backup
          LV - Logical volume Backup
          FS - Filesystem backup
          FD - File/Directory backup

      If the -f flag is used to specify the full pathname of a file, the 
      prefix of the filename MUST be one of the above types.

   b. -g filename flag added to all commands above except mkdirback for 
      specifying the name of an LVM information file. The LVM information 
      file is not used on a file/directory backup. On all other backups, 
      it is used to store LVM information needed to recreate volume groups, 
      logical volumes and filesystems. Also, see information on the -g 
      flag under the sysback command.

   c. -I id flag and argument added for specifying the "ID" portion of 
      the filename when writing to a disk file. This is used in conjunction 
      with the -f directory option

   d.-O flag added for overwriting existing backups to disk file with 
      same name

2. sysback

   This command has been further modified as follows:

   a. -N [ ent | tok | fddi ] flag and argument added to allow network 
      support to be added to a bootable tape. This flag has no meaning 
      unless writing the backup to tape. In Sysback version 3, network 
      support was always included on tape to allow a user to boot from 
      tape, then perform a network install. This support is now optional, 
      and only one network type may be specified, since only one network 
      adapter may be used to perform a network install. If this flag is 
      omitted when a bootable tape is created, it will only be possible 
      to install from tape.

   b. -g flag now requires a filename to be specified. The -g flag used 
      to take no arguments, and it was assumed that the LVM information 
      file was named /usr/config/vginfo. Now, similar to the other backup 
      commands, the -g flag requires that the name of an LVM information 
      file be specified.

   c. -P flag added to create a Power System Backup. This type of backup 
      stores all filesystem data in raw logical volume format to allow 
      faster backups and restores. -P option should not be used if changes 
      to any filesystem information will be required when reinstalling 
      from the backup.

3. mkjfsback, mkvgback

   For both commands, the "-l level" option may be used to specify an 
   incremental level to backup. The level parameter may be a number 
   between 0 and 9. Level 0 indicates a backup of all files in the filesystems 
   and/or all logical volumes in the volume groups. Level 1-9 indicates 
   only the files in the filesystems and/or logical volumes in the volume 
   groups which have been changed since the last previous level backup 
   will be backed up. A previous level backup can be any level number 
   between 0 and the current level number specified.

   The mkjfsback command now backs up filesystem files similar to other 
   Sysback backup commands, whereas in Sysback Version 3, mkjfsback 
   backed up files using the backup-by-inode format of the AIX backup 
   command.

   In the case of the mkjfsback command, the use of the level option 
   does not differ from Sysback Version 3. However, for either command, 
   if the option is omitted, no incremental backup level will be recorded, 
   and all files in the filesystems and/or logical volumes in the volume 
   groups will be backed up. 

4. mkdirback

   The -D and -F flags have been removed and are no longer valid. The 
   -F flag used to indicate that the backup should not parse into a 
   different filesystem. This is obsolete, since a backup of a filesystem 
   may now performed with the mkjfsback command instead, and the files 
   are backed up in the same format and have the same restore options 
   as with the mkdirback command.

5. remakevg

   The -E flag has been added to indicate that the user wishes to be 
   presented a screen for making changes to the LVM information prior 
   to the actual creation taking place. Without the -E flag, it is assumed 
   that no changes will be made unless there is a requirement due to 
   differences in the device configuration. If the -q flag is also specified, 
   no prompts will be provided, and the creation will take place upon 
   execution of the command without user interaction.

   The -F flag is no longer used. This flag used to indicate if the 
   backup was a System Backup. The remakevg command now detects the 
   type of backup without this flag.

   The remakevg command has also been modified to allow multiple volume 
   groups and or logical volumes and filesystems to be created with 
   one command. The syntax of the command has changed slightly as a 
   result. The -v or -l flags no longer require a logical volume or 
   volume group name be specified after the flag. Instead, you must 
   specify either the -v or -l flag alone, or with other flags, then 
   append the list of volume groups or logical volumes to be created 
   to the end of the command.

   For example, to create the uservg1 and uservg2 volume groups from 
   a System or Volume Group backup in the tape drive, with no prompting, 
   the following command would be used:

      remakevg  -vqf /dev/rmt0  uservg1 uservg2

6. sysrestore

   The sysrestore command has been modified extensively to add new function 
   and to combine the function of numerous previous commands into a 
   single robust command. The changes in this command syntax are likely 
   to require changes to any custom scripts created by users to either 
   list, verify or restore data from backups.

   The sysrestore command replaces the dirrestore, lvrestore, jfsrestore, 
   vgrestore and sysrestore commands in Sysback Version 3. The sysrestore 
   command automatically detects the type of backup, so it is not necessary 
   to have different commands. However, there are different types of 
   data that may be verified or restored from a single backup. Therefore, 
   the -t option must be specified to indicate the type of data to verify 
   or restore.

   For instance, a volume group backup may contain multiple volume groups, 
   filesystems and raw logical volumes. If it is desired to restore 
   2 specific filesystems from the backup, you must specify the -tF 
   flag, and the data_list argument at the end of the backup would contain 
   the mount points of the filesystems to restore. If you wish to restore 
   only a specific directory from a backup, regardless of the backup 
   type, you must specify the -tD flag, and the data_list argument would 
   be the directory or directories to restore.

   The specific changes from prior use of the sysrestore command is 
   as follows:

   a. -t type flag and argument required to specify type of data to verify 
      or restore.

   b. -F flag added to allow restoration of system directories or files 
      that are not ordinarily replaceable, such as the /usr filesystem 
      or the /etc/objrepos directory. Restoring this type of data can have 
      adverse affect on the system or even cause a system failure, so should 
      be used with extreme caution.

   c. -H flag added, and will display the above usage message on the screen

   d. -L flag used to list the files on the backup. This flag will now 
      list any of the following, depending on the contents of the -t argument:

         -tV   Volume groups
         -tL   Logical volumes
         -tF   Filesystems
         -tD   Directories
         -tR   Regular Files
         -tf   Directories and regular files
         -tl   Filesystems and logical volumes

   e. -T flag queries the type of backup and returns one of the of the 
      following single characters:

        S    System Backup
        P    Power System Backup
        V    Volume Group Backup
        F    Filesystem backup
        L    Logical Volume Backup
        D    File/Directory Backup

   f. -V flag replaces the former -l flag for verifying the backup. When 
      specified, the data on the backup is read but no data is restored. 
      It is still necessary to specify the type and which data to verify.

      For instance, you may wish to verify only a couple of raw logical 
      volumes on a volume group backup. To do so, specify the -V flag, 
      the -tL flag, and the names of the logical volumes to verify for 
      the data_list argument. To verify the entire contents of a System 
      backup, you may specify the -V flag, the -tV flag, and the names 
      of all volume groups to verify.

   g. -y flag added to allow restoration of incremental data. If you wish 
      to restore the entire contents of an incremental backup, this flag 
      must be specified if you want the resulting filesystem(s) to contain 
      the same files as it did at the time the backup was created. This 
      may, in some cases, require files to be re-removed from the filesystem 
      that were deleted prior to the incremental backup level being performed.

   h. -i sequence flag replaces the prior -i image flag for restoring from 
      different "stacked" images on the backup. Since a single Sysback 
      backup often now contains multiple "images", it is not necessary 
      for the user to know which image contains the data they require. 
      Instead, if multiple backups are stacked onto a single tape, the 
      user need only specify the sequence number of the backup to be listed, 
      verified or restored, and this command will automatically forward 
            the required number of images to reach the desired backup.

   i. The data_list argument may be a list of either volume groups, 
      filesystems, logical volume names, directories or file names, 
      depending on the type of data to be listed, verified or restored 
      (as indicated by the -t flag).

7. readsbheader

   The readsbheader command, used to list the header information on 
   a backup, has been expanded to produce additional information. The 
   following flags have been added to this command:

   a. -d flag added to indicate that the user wishes to also produce a 
      list of the logical volumes and/or filesystems contained on the backup, 
      if any.

   b. -l flag added to indicate that the user wishes to also produce a 
      list of files and directories contained on the backup, if any.

   c. -n option added to prevent a tape from rewinding prior to start of 
      this command. This assumes the tape is positioned at the start of 
      the desired backup.

   d. -q option added to produce the requested information without status 
      messages.

New commands
------------
There are numerous new commands provided as part of the Sysback package. 
Of those, only the following will be documented, as others are used 
internal to the product and not intended for customer use.

1. editlvminfo

   This command may be used to edit the contents of an LVM information 
   file.  The command will look at the file to determine its type and 
   contents. The maintenance screens used for changing the LVM information 
   prior to recreating volume groups and filesystems or reinstalling 
   the system will be presented. Refer to "New User Interface for Editing 
   LVM Information" in the New Features section for additional details.

2. sbom_backup

   This command is used to take physical volumes offline in order to 
   gain access to offline mirrored logical volumes. This command is 
   only available if the Offline Mirror Backup feature of Sysback is 
   installed. Once mirrors are taken offline, this command may be called 
   upon to automatically execute a pre-defined backup script and return 
   all mirrors and physical volumes to their original status when complete.

   A query may also be performed to "preview" the status of the physical 
   volumes and volume groups before actually taking the physical volumes 
   offline. In this case, no action will be performed, but the volume 
   groups and physical volumes entered will be checked and a list of 
   errors, if any, or logical volumes for which copies will be taken 
   offline, will be produced.

   Refer to "Offline Mirror Backups" in the New Features section for 
   additional details.

*ACTION PLAN:
  Closing with customer approval

 TEST CASE:


Response:

Response:

Closing with Customer Approval


Support Line: What is the difference between sysback ver 3 and sysback ver 4.1 ITEM: BX0549L
Dated: April 1997 Category: N/A
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