System Administration Guide, Volume I

Overview of the Backup and Restore Commands

The ufsdump and ufsrestore commands are the recommended commands for scheduled backups of complete file systems. Table 33-5 lists the tasks you can perform with them. For information on how these commands work and their syntax, see Chapter 36, The ufsdump and ufsrestore Commands (Reference).

Table 33-5 Tasks You Can Perform With the ufsdump and ufsrestore Commands


With This Command ...	You Can ...	Comments
`ufsdump`	Back up complete or partial file systems to local or remote tape drives	The tape device can be on any system in the network to which the user has access. This command works quickly because it is aware of the structure of the UFS file system type, and works directly through the raw device interface.
	Back up incremental file system changes	This enables you to back up only those files that were changed since a previous backup.
	Back up groups of systems over the network from a single system	You can run `ufsdump` from one system on each remote system through a remote shell or remote login, and direct the output to the system on which the drive is located. Or, you can pipe the output to the `dd` command or a file.
	Automate backups	Use the `crontab` utility to run a script that starts the `ufsdump` command.
	Restrict user access to backup tables	Use the `-a` option.
	Determine the size of a backup without actually doing the backup	Use the `-S` option.
	Keep a log of when each file system was backed up	Use the `-u` option.
	Verify the contents of the tape against the source file system	Use the `-v` option.
`ufsrestore`	Restore individual or complete file systems from a local or remote tape drive