RE: ONTAPE as cron script (error)

Paul Yes you can use compress. My original script used compress until I found = that gzip was MUCH, MUCH better. Just replace gzip with compress in the = script. Also you would need to use split if the size of your **compressed** = archive exceeds 2GB (Andreas correct me if I am wrong) because your Unix = lseek will read only 2^31 bytes before returning -ve offsets. Based on = some measurements of actual compressed sizes versus the actual size of = the dbspace, I find that a compressed level 0 backup (for my data) never = exceeds 20% of the total used raw disk space and level 1 and 2s never = exceed 5%. I realize that this depends on your data and your load, but = going by my data, I could have at least a 10 GB database before I needed = to worry about splitting the file. In case you still need your compressed archives split, then replace the = line: gzip - < $DUMPDIR/$bkdev >$DUMPDIR/$bkdev.gz & with gzip - | split -b512m < $DUMPDIR/$bkdev >$DUMPDIR/$bkdev.gz & This will create files xaa, xab, etc (unless you specify a name in = split) of 512MB each in the current directory, and nothing in the .gz = file. You may have to put in extra code for maintaining these files, and = restore will require some extra effort, by linking a TAPEDEV to each of = these devices in turn. HTH Sujit ---------- From: mosserp@wellsfargo.com[SMTP:mosserp@wellsfargo.com] Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 1997 3:50 PM To: andreas.zeugswetter@telecom.at Cc: informix-list@rmy.emory.edu Subject: RE: ONTAPE as cron script (error) =20 Andreas, This looks very promising to solve a big headache that we have right = now!! Environment: -- DEC UNIX ver. 3.2G (soon migrating to 4.0b) -- Informix ODS 7.20.UC3 (soon migrating to 7.23.FC4) Currently, every week night we do a L0 archive to disk. Since the = archive exceeds 2gig, we have to use the following procedure (TAPEDEV set to = /archive/archive.file, with size 2000000): 1) from first telnet session: ln -s file1 /archive/archive.file 2) from second telnet session, start the: ontape -s -L 03) when file1 reaches 2gig, ontape asks for the next "tape"; then = switch back to first session: rm /archive/archive.file ln -s file2 /archive/archive.file 4) switch back to second session, and hit <CR> to continue the archive Naturally, I want to automate this process. But I haven't been able to = figure out how to script the two-session aspect. Your comment below about "split -b512m" makes me think that there is a = way around the 2 gig limit!!?? What exactly do I need to change in = Sujit's script? What do I need to change in Tape parameters in = onconfig? Any other changes needed anywhere (e.g., UNIX config)? Also, = will the standard "compress" work in place of gzip (yes, I've used gzip = at other sites, and I like it, but I'm not sure if our sys. admin. group = would allow gzip to be installed). Many, many TIA! =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D Paul Mosser, Open Systems DBA Wells Fargo Bank Tempe, Arizona, USA mosserp@wellsfargo.com ---------- From: = andreas.zeugswetter@telecom.at[SMTP:andreas.zeugswetter@telecom.at] Reply To: andreas.zeugswetter@telecom.at Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 1997 10:42 AM To: informix-list@rmy.emory.edu Subject: Re: ONTAPE as cron script (error) =20 Hi, We use a very similar approach as you do and since you were so nice to the community I would like to warn you of problems with your script. kill -9 $bgpid is very dangerous, since it could cut off some pages from the end of the backup. You need to replace the line with: wait $bgpid This will wait for gzip to finish after the pipe is closed by ontape. I also use split -b512m after the gzip, because our backups=20 are larger than 2 Gb. We also use gzip --fast because it compresses nearly as good and gives much better performance. best regards Andreas