[BBLISA] Help with dump/restore

[Scott Ehrlich]

So I recently installed an Overland Arcvault 12 tape library on a server to 
back up /var/log/ and /home.  The server is an out-of-box RHEL 5 install, with 
all packages selected, in an isolated lan, with no package updates. Also, this 
is a live server that cannot be brought down for backups, and some files may be 
actively in use during the dump - just gotta live with it.

Since I know EL5 and C5 are the same, and the level of support I get from RH is 
actually less effective and slower than resources such as this list, I'm 
looking here, first.

Up to this point I was backing up to a USB-mounted external 1 TB hard drive.

I was using a script containing:

/sbin/dump -0v -z2 -f /media/usb_drive/dump0 /home

I played with restore on that, and it tested fine.

For the tape, I thought it would be nice to add /var/log (should have done it 
before, but didn't think of it...)

Trying to adapt the knowledge to a tape library...

/sbin/dump -0 -v -z2 -f /dev/nst0 /var/log
/sbin/dump -0u -v -z2 -f /dev/nst0 /home

I have a cron job that dumps the results to /var/log/dump.log, and a review of 
the log file claims all went well.  Now for the restore...

I just tried playing with different options of restore, but could not 
successfully restore anything.   I ensured I was in a scratch area so as to 
hopefully not overwrite current files.

What is the proper procedure for dumping and restoring now?  Should I be 
dumping to /dev/nst0/dump?    What restore commands would I use to recall a 
file?

I'd like to keep things as simple as possible - people have suggested legato 
and amanda, but for now, I would think/hope dump and restore would work.

Thanks.

Scott