Commands Reference, Volume 3

lsmksysb Command

Purpose

Lists or restores the contents of a volume group backup on a specified media.

Syntax

lsmksysb [ -b blocks ] [ -f device ] [ -a ] [ -c ] [ -l ] [ -r ] [ -s ] [ -d path ] [ -B ] [ -D ] [ -L ] [ -V ] [ file_list ]

Description

The lsmksysb command lists the contents of a volume group backup from tape, file, CD-ROM, or other source and can be used to restore files from a valid backup source. The lsmksysb command also works for multi-volume backups such as multiple CDs, DVDs, or tapes.

The lsmksysb -r and restorevgfiles commands perform identical operations and should be considered interchangeable.

Flags

-a	Verifies the physical block size of the tape backup, as specified by the -b block flag. You may need to alter the block size if necessary to read the backup. The -a flag is valid only when a tape backup is used.
-b blocks	Specifies the number of 512-byte blocks to read in a single input operation, as defined by the blocks parameter. If the blocks parameter is not specified, the number of blocks read will default to 100.
-B	Prints the volume group backup log to stdout. This flag will display the past 256 backups (roughly). The log is in alog format and is kept in /var/adm/ras/vgbackuplog. Each line of the log is a semicolon-separated list of the file or device name, the command used to make backup, date, shrink size, full size of the backup, and recommended maintenance level (if any). Note The shrink size is the size of the data on all filesystems. The full size is total size of each filesystem (unused + data).
-c	Produces colon-separated output. This flag only works with the -l and -L flags.
-d path	Specifies the directory path to which the files will be restored, as defined by the path parameter. If the -d parameter is not used, the current working directory is used. This can be a problem if the current working directory is root. We recommend writing to a temporary folder instead of to root.
-D	Produces debug output.
-l	Displays useful information about a volume group backup. This flag requires the -f device flag. This flag causes lsmksysb to display information such as volume group, date and time backup was made, uname output from backed up system, oslevel, recommended maintenance level, backup size in megabytes, and backup shrink size in megabytes. The shrink size is the size of the data on all filesystems. The full size is the total size of each filesystem (unused + data). The -l flag also displays the logical volume and filesystem information of the backed up volume group, equivalent to running "lsvg -l vgname".
-L	Displays lpp fileset information about a mksysb backup only. This flag requires the -f device flag and displays the equivalent information to that produced by invoking "lslpp -l" on the running backed up system. This flag does not produce output about any volume group backup other than that produced by mksysb.
-f device	Specifies the type of device containing the backup (file, tape, CD-ROM, or other source) as defined by the device parameter. When -f is not specified, device will default to /dev/rmt0.
-r	Specifies to restore the backup files, as defined by the file-list parameter. If the file-list parameter is not specified, then all files in the backup will be restored. If the -r flag is not used, then executing the lsmksysb command only lists the files in the specified backup.
-s	Specifies that the backup source is a user volume group and not rootvg.
-V	Verifies a tape backup. This flag requires the -f device flag and works for tape devices only. The -V flag causes lsmksysb to verify the readability of the header of each file on the volume group backup and print any errors that occur to stderr.

Parameters

file_list

Identifies the list of files to be restored. This parameter is used only when the -r flag is specified. The full path of the files relative to the current directory should be specified in the space-separated list. All files in the specified directory will be restored unless otherwise directed. If you are restoring all files in a directory, we recommend writing to a temporary folder instead of to root.

Examples

To list the contents of the system backup located on the default device /dev/rmt0, enter:
```
lsmksysb
```
To list the contents of the system backup located on device /dev/cd1, enter:
```
lsmksysb -f /dev/cd1
```
To list the contents of the system backup located on device /dev/cd1, which is a user volume group that is not rootvg, enter:
```
lsmksysb -f /dev/cd1 -s
```
To restore /etc/filesystems from the system backup located on device /dev/cd1, enter:
```
lsmksysb -f /dev/cd1 -r ./etc/filesystems
```
To restore all files in the /myfs/test directory of the non-rootvg backup, which is located on device /dev/cd1, and write the restored files to /data/myfiles, enter:
```
lsmksysb -f /dev/cd1 -r -s -d /data/myfiles ./myfs/test
```
To display colon separated lpp information about a mksysb backup tape located on /dev/rmt0, enter the following:
```
lsmksysb -Lc -f /dev/rmt0
```
To display the volume group backup log to stdout, enter:
```
lssavevg -B
```
To list volume group and general backup data about a backup located at /tmp/mybackup, enter:
```
lsmksysb -l -f /tmp/mybackup
```
To verify the readability of each header on a volume group backup tape in /dev/rmt0, enter:
```
lsmksysb -V -f /dev/rmt0
```

Files

/usr/bin/lsmksysb

Contains the lsmksysb command

Related Information

The restorevgfiles command.