Quicker way to download backup?

I’m doing a test download of a whole server, and I wanted to (files, not img). Is there a faster way to do this from command line, where it creates a .tar file? Currently its downloading it as a .zip file from the browser - but is pretty slow (3.5mb/sec, and its a 100gb+ file)

Thanks in advance

Andy

Bump?

The zip download is slow and often fails partway through when it’s tens of gigabytes. Annoyingly even when it does download it’s often corrupt.

Subsequently I only use it for smaller folders.

If you want to restore as fast as possible initiate a restore to the client running on the local network.
Remember if the user you are restoring doesn’t already exist on the client you will have to look in the users folder for your restored data.
I’ve never had any issues this way or with an image restore booting from USB.

Thanks. I don’t think the image side of things is working for Ubuntu though? I would love to have an img file that we can restore in the case of going down (I’ve tried with dd and a few other tools, but its prone to issues on a live running system)

There are no image backups in linux but I seem to recall a thread describing how it could be done using start and end scripts…

Restore to a client machine will be your fastest option. You could even create a VM just for that purpose…

What is dattobd? Isn’t that for images? I saw it mentioned on the client install. Not sure how to set it up though

Is there a CLI way on the client-server, to restore a given file/folder from a given backup? I can’t seem to find much documentation on the restoration method (apart from downloading a zip, which as you said on a large folder takes forever and can be corrupt)

I understand the testing branch has some sort of imaging support for Linux, using either dattobd or LVM snapshots, if the system is set up for the latter.

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I’m not sure about CLI but you can initiate a folder restore from the server Web interface. Then authorise it on the client.

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Ah interesting. Will have a look at that. I wasn’t aware you could initiate a restore from the Server.

I looked into the dattobd and LVM stuff but couldn’t get my head around how to set it up :frowning:

Would you mind showing me an example / the documentation? I can’t find the option to “restore” anything from the server interface. I see this in the settings;

Allow clients to start file restores:
Allow clients to start component restores:

(both are ticked)

Click on the Backups tab at the top of the server admin page.
Select the appropriate client and backup.
When you can see the folder you want it should have a restore button to the right…

Actually… I’ve just checked with a linux client and restore button is not there… excuse me, I think I have just found some egg on my face…

haha was gonna say, doesn’t show for me :confused:

Would download as zip not work faster if done on the server itself? Say to USB3 or even internal storage?
I see that option is there in your screenshot.

If quicker the file could then be transmitted via whatever means.

Unfortunately, that was just an example. Some of the dirs I want to restore are 100gb or so. I tried downloading as a ZIP, but it keeps cutting out. I’m trying to find a method of using dd remotely to backup a snapshot of the server - but that comes with its own problems (as its taking it from a live disk, vs a cloned partition that won’t change).

Are you aware of chapter " 9.2 Restoring file backups" in the administration manual? There you will find hints why the restore button may be missing in the UI and also how to restore from cli.

Ah man - I didn’t realise it was that easy!!!

urbackupclientctl restore-start -s -d /path/to/folder -b last

Starting restore. Waiting for backup server... |
Restore completed successfully.

Amazing - thanks :slight_smile: