Need advice for backup

yekta

I am managing a working server (thanks to hetzner) with plesk; software raid 1. Some php and node.js; mysql and mongodb.

I also have a storage server (thanks to time4vps). Both servers are running ubuntu 16.

1. Is there any software to check the health of the raid disks and warn me in case of failure?

2. What is the easiest way to backup (I prefer automatic ones) the main server, sites and databases?

3. How can I ensure backups are valid and reinstalling work on a different server without original domain names? For example, on a hourly billed vps?

Any link to good tutorials also ok.

thanks;

YokedEgg

Well, imo, the easiest way to backup your server is to virtualize all your instances, then you could make backing up infinitely more easier.

And break down your VM's into VM1, Mongo, VM2, Plesk, etc, etc.

Could use Proxmox for this, Hetzner has an installation via the rescue disk.

qtwrk

Question 2, I use rsync on cronjob and mysql replication and mysqldump to backup server, 2 servers are identical configuration as site path and database, so only thing I have to do is switching DNS record, which I believe it can also be done automatically via cloudflare api where I have my domain on

Ikoula

Hello,

You also can ask the provider of your servers if he has backup solutions.

The backup solution should be on a different Datacenter (than your server) of course.

Hetzner_OL

@yekta Depending on which product you have with us, there are backup solutions available. If you have a cloud server, you can activate a backup feature for your server. Right now there is no automaticed backup feature for the dedicated root servers/auction servers/"old" vServers. However, I have seen that some of our customers say on forums that they use borgbackup together with our storage boxes. And others use backup space. Here's some information:

Hetzner Cloud backup: https://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/CloudServer/en#What_are_snapshots_and_backups.3F
Storage Boxes: https://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Storage_Boxes/en
BorgBackup: https://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/BorgBackup/en
Backup Space for dedicated servers: https://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Backup/en

I hope some of this information has been helpful. --Katie, Marketing

vimalware

@YokedEgg said:
Well, imo, the easiest way to backup your server is to virtualize all your instances, then you could make backing up infinitely more easier.

Yes,

But then you start obsessing about which backing storage , and which thin provisioning tech to use depending on the physical media :qcow2 vs lvm-thin vs zfs zvols.

argh.

But seriously , backup databases and your production-set files inside the VMs separately, in addition to VM backups.

Tr33n

For important systems i do it this way:

1. Virtualize the services into single VMs. Do not install services directly on the hostsystem, run everything in VMs.
2. Create incremental backups of LVM using snapshots + lvmsync
3. Create incremental server backups using rdiff-backup
4. mysqldump for consistent database backups

With this system i can quickly restore a VM or files if something goes wrong and i do not need much backup space. With lvmsync the IO usage is pretty low, compared to a full dd backup of the LVM. rdiff-backup can be controlled with ionice so it does not slow down the server.

For uncritical servers i just do backups with rdiff-backup and one lvm backup per week or month (depending on the size).

Never had problems with my backups and i can sleep good.

realbusiness

Use a script to backup to Google Drive etc?

24x7servermanagement

If you're looking to store the backup on the remote server then Acronis Backup Software & Data Protection Solutions would be the option to go.

vmp32k

yekta said: Is there any software to check the health of the raid disks and warn me in case of failure?

cat /proc/mdstat shows you the state of the software RAID on Linux and (at least for Debian) there is a cron job scheduled (/etc/cron.d/mdadm) that checks the RAID(s) for errors. Reports and errors will be sent to the root user by default so you should probably add your email to /etc/aliases: root: [email protected] followed by running newaliases
That's part of the minimal config for every dedi I setup.

yekta said: What is the easiest way to backup (I prefer automatic ones) the main server, sites and databases?

I just straight up b2 everything, as-is, with duplicity: https://gist.github.com/vmp32k/9c9e24bbe960b50fe8005a7d5bd4c5c8 -- it's not the perfect setup but it's simple and doesn't cost much. I know Plesk has its own backup plugin/facility, that might be more relevant to you.

As with any backup, you should play out any restore scenarios that you imagine will be relevant to your operation. At the very least I would recommend to do a complete trial run (renting an AWS instance for a few hours, restoring your backup completely and getting it to work as required), just so you don't have to go blind if the shit hits the fan.

yekta said: How can I ensure backups are valid and reinstalling work on a different server without original domain names? For example, on a hourly billed vps?

You can just add the domains to your local hosts file or temporarily shadow them using a private nameserver. You'd be able to resolve the domains to the restore-system without impacting the production system.