Image with Linux/Ubuntu

client
1

Hello,

I am new to UrBackup and am very impressed with the software. It works very well with Windows clients.

With Linux (Ubuntu) the image backup does not work.

Are there any instructions on how to install and configure Linux (Ubuntu) clients with image backup of the system partition? I have tried quite a lot now: LVM, ZFS, Dattobd and it won’t work.

I get the error message: Backing up EFI System Partition failed. Image backup failed

When I select ZFS for the system during the installation of Ubuntu 24.04 (Kernel 6.11.0-19-generic) and then install UrBackup, I am not offered ZFS as a snapshot mechanism.

Blockquote
UrBackup_Client_Linux_2.5.25.sh
Verifying archive integrity… All good.
Uncompressing UrBackup Client Installer for Linux 100%
Installation of UrBackup Client 2.5.25 to /usr/local … Proceed ? [Y/n]
y
Uncompressing install data…
Detected Debian (derivative) system
Detected systemd
Detected architecture x86_64-linux-glibc
Installed daemon configuration at /etc/default/urbackupclient…
Info: Restoring from web interface is disabled per default. Enable by modifying /etc/default/urbackupclient.
Installing systemd unit…
Cannot find systemd unit dir. Assuming /usr/lib/systemd/system
Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/urbackupclientbackend.service → /usr/lib/systemd/system/urbackupclientbackend.service.
Starting UrBackup Client service…
Successfully started client service. Installation complete.
+Detected Ubuntu LTS. Dattobd supported
-Detected no btrfs filesystem
-LVM not installed
+dmsetup present
Please select the snapshot mechanism to be used for backups:

  1. dattobd volume snapshot kernel module from GitHub - datto/dattobd: kernel module for taking block-level snapshots and incremental backups of Linux block devices (supports image backups and changed block tracking)
  2. Linux device mapper based snapshots (supports image backups and changed block tracking)
  3. Use no snapshot mechanism. Files will be backed up without creating snapshots of them. Images backups will be not supported.
    Enter choice (number 1-5, then enter):

Blockquote

zfs list

NAME USED AVAIL REFER MOUNTPOINT
bpool 99.1M 1.65G 96K /boot
bpool/BOOT 98.5M 1.65G 96K none
bpool/BOOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh 98.4M 1.65G 98.4M /boot
data 29.0G 1.73T 29.0G /data
data/dataset1 24K 1.73T 24K /data/dataset1
data/dataset2 24K 1.73T 24K /data/dataset2
data/zfs-test 562K 1.73T 562K /data/zfs-test
rpool 4.56G 218G 96K /
rpool/ROOT 4.56G 218G 96K none
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh 4.56G 218G 3.33G /
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh/srv 96K 218G 96K /srv
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh/usr 4.96M 218G 96K /usr
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh/usr/local 4.87M 218G 4.87M /usr/local
rpool/ROOT/ubuntu_ifp5vh/var 1.22G 218G 96K /var
…

Do you have any ideas/support? Many thanks in advance!

2

ZFS is not supported you need to use extX or XFS on linux.

Limitations

  • Image backups only work with NTFS formatted volumes and with the Windows client or with extX and XFS and the Linux client. The drives must be MBR or GPT partitioned, the partition must be a primary one. Dynamic volumes are not supported. Mirrored dynamic volumes work, but are not officially supported.

https://www.urbackup.org/features.html

3

Dear Mike, thank you for your anwer!
ZFS was the last try. Previously I tried ext4 with Dattobd and LVM (on 3 different machines). There I got the error message from UrBackup:

Backing up EFI System Partition failed. Image backup failed

Is it because /boot/efi was formatted with vFat?

UUID=XXXBG-6439 /boot/efi vfat umask=0077

Should I now format “/boot/efi” with ext4 or are there other ways to make an image backup of the system disk?

Best, Uwe

4

Should I now format “/boot/efi” with ext4 or are there other ways to make an image backup of the system disk?

Format everything in ext4 and it should work.

1 Like
5

Thanks Mike. I will try it next week .
Best regards

6

Unfortunately, this does not work. The firmware of the PC cannot handle ext4 or xfs in ‘/boot/efi’, the EFI System Partition (ESP).

Here is the error message:

Stderr: Installing grub to /var/lib/grub/esp.
Mar 11 10:04:50 ubuntu subiquity_log.5460[9320]: x86_64-efi wird für Ihre Plattform installiert.
Mar 11 10:04:50 ubuntu subiquity_log.5460[9320]: grub-install: Fehler: /var/lib/grub/esp scheint keine EFI-Partition zu sein.

The Ubuntu installer does not offer me ext2 or ext3 for formatting the ESP. Otherwise I would have tried both file systems.

Does anyone know a solution to the problem?
I am grateful for any tips!
Kind regards

7

Hello, is there nobody here who makes an image backup of his Linux system disc with UrBackup?
Maybe I’m missing something fundamental? Or does it not work with UrBackup (which I can’t imagine)? It works very well with Windows.

I have not found a solution for formatting the ESP partition (EFI System Partition) unlike with VFat. As already written: Ubuntu only offers only ext4 and not ext2 or ext3. But the computer does not boot with ext4.

Is there a way to install Ubuntu without an ESP with VFat so that all partitions have ext4?

I have now found this link:
Server 2.5.1 WIP/Client 2.5.1 WIP

Unfortunately I don’t see a solution for the ESP partition there either.