[2654] in SIPB-AFS-requests
Re: archival AFS backup
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (mhpower@MIT.EDU)
Wed Feb 12 22:58:38 1997
From: mhpower@MIT.EDU
To: yonah@MIT.EDU
Cc: sipb-afsreq@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: "[2651] in SIPB-AFS-requests"
Date: Wed, 12 Feb 1997 22:58:26 EST
>We'd like to do an archival backup. Some questions:
>
> - should it include .nb volumes?
I don't believe it's the business of the sipb to archive the contents
of user.* volumes. It's usually considered reasonable for sipb members
to store some amount of private data (mail, personal zephyr logs, or
whatever) in their sipb-cell volume. I don't have any, but many people
do. In the past, we've created archival backups of some user data but
only because the users weren't around anymore, we were short on disk
space, and we actually deleted the online copy after writing the
tapes. Other than that, I think it's the general belief that we make
backups so files can be recovered shortly after hardware failure or
user/operator error. We don't make backups so that arbitrary (perhaps
appropriate) people can get access to an arbitrary snapshot of old
user files at some arbitrary point in the future. It's true that the
user data may have historical value, but since it isn't the property
of the sipb, the default should be that it is not saved indefinitely.
Matt
