System Administration Guide, Volume 1

Choosing the Type of Backup

With the ufsdump command, you can perform full or incremental backups. The table below lists the differences between these types of backup procedures.

Table 42-6 Differences Between Full and Incremental Backups

Backup Type 

Copies 

Advantages 

Disadvantages 

Full 

A complete file system or directory

Everything is in one place 

Requires large numbers of backup tapes that take a long time to write. Takes longer to retrieve individual files because the drive has to move sequentially to the point on the tape where the file is located. You might have to search multiple tapes. 

Incremental 

Only files in the specified file system that have changed since a previous backup

Easier to retrieve small changes in file systems 

Finding which incremental tape contains a file can take time. You might have to go back to last full dump.