The following procedures describe how to make an installable image of your system. For more information about backing up the system, see Backing Up the System Image and User-Defined Volume Groups in the AIX 5L Version 5.1 System Management Concepts: Operating System and Devices.
Before backing up the rootvg volume group:
lslpp -l bos.sysmgt.sysbr
If your system has the sysbr fileset installed, continue the backup procedures.
If the lslpp command does not list the sysbr fileset, install it before continuing with the backup procedure. See Installing Optional Software and Service Updates in the AIX 5L Version 5.1 Installation Guide for instructions.
installp -agqXd device bos.sysmgt.sysbr
where device is the location of the software; for example,/dev/rmt0 for a tape drive.
Before backing up a user-defined volume group:
Attention: Executing the savevg command results in the loss of all material previously stored on the selected output medium.
Backing Up Your System Tasks | ||
---|---|---|
Task | SMIT Fast Path | Command or File |
Backing up the rootvg volume group |
|
|
Verify a Backup Tape3 | smit lsmksysb | |
Backing up a user-defined volume group4 | smit savevg |
|
Notes:
- The mksysb command does not back up file systems mounted across an NFS network.
- The mksysb command requires this working space for the duration of the backup. Use the df command, which reports in units of 512-byte blocks, to determine the free space in the /tmp directory. Use the chfs command to change the size of the file system, if necessary.
- This procedure lists the contents of a mksysb backup tape. The contents list verifies most of the information on the tape but does not verify that the tape can be booted for installations. The only way to verify that the boot image on a mksysb tape functions correctly is by booting from the tape.
- If you want to exclude files in a user-defined volume group from the backup image, create a file named /etc/exclude.volume_group_name, where volume_group_name is the name of the volume group that you want to back up. Then edit /etc/exclude.volume_group_name and enter the patterns of file names that you do not want included in your backup image. The patterns in this file are input to the pattern matching conventions of the grep command to determine which files are excluded from the backup.
- If you choose to modify the VGName.data file to alter the size of a file system, you must not specify the -i flag or the -m flag with the savevg command, because the VGName.data file is overwritten.
For more information about installing (or restoring) a backup image, see "Installing BOS from a System Backup" in the AIX 5L Version 5.1 Installation Guide.