Complete Backup Question

[Jeff Carson]

I'm somewhat of a noob when it comes to FreeNAS but I have been able to create a simple FreeNAS box that fills my needs with only 3Tb of data at the moment (will grow as needs grow). It's a AMD 6300 with 8GB of RAM (data is ZFS if that matters) . I'm looking for a way to back it up in case of any system failure. I want to backup the system itself to keep my plugins, jails, mount points and such and also the data.

I've read endless posts about on-site and off-site, USB vs. building another FreeNAS to backup the first. All were very informative but none really fit my situation.

I think I want to perform a weekly backup of my data/system to a eSATA drive (connected to a Linux machine on the local network), then store the eSATA drive off-site. This way if my server blows up or house burns down, I still have my data and ability to restore the server to its previous state.

Please let me know if I'm way off in my thinking or need to come up with another solution. I've read that USB is not the way to go and thought eSATA would be better. I'm also not in a position to build another FreeNAS system or to pay to backup 3Tb to a commercial off-site solution.

I realize this may not be the optimal solution but seems reasonable and affordable. Please be kind as I am a noob and any assistance is greatly appreciated.

 

[Herman Eggink]

I posted my backup strategy elsewhere but in a nutshell, I have a 3TB disk that I regularly dock in one of those esata docks (sweex in my case) where I use crashplan to backup files I need backed up. Once done, I shutdown the plugin/jail, unmount the disk and store that offline. On top of that, I used cyberjocks recommendations to copy my freenas config every night so I always have a copy in case my startup disk gets buggered up.
For me, my off-site backup is used in case the house burns down, stuff gets stolen and so on. Since my disks are mirrored, I can survive single drive failures meaning I can live with off-site backups being refreshed every couple of months (when I feel I have accumulated too many gopro videos, photos and so on).
Let me know if that helps.
H

 

[Jeff Carson]

Thank you, that is helpful. I also have a mirrored system so a weekly backup should do well. From what you've posted is would seem you are connecting the eSATA drive directly to the FreeNAS box for the backup. I'll have to read up on this and the cyberjocks deal. I just wanted to make sure I was not headed down the wrong path with eSATA and that it was not a potentially faulty idea like USB backups can be. Thank you very much!

 

[Herman Eggink]

Yup. Cannot remember the PCIe adapter but it may be the startech PEXESAT322I. Has 4 sata ports (2 esata, 2 sata) of which 2 can be used at any given point in time (jumper selectable, I use one for esata and one to connect a low end SSD to boot from). It has hot swap as well. I connected my sweex ST050 to it and it works great. The key thing is to edit the crashplan config file such that you don't need to do the ssh tunnel (which is a hassle): https://forums.freenas.org/index.ph...-method-for-offsite-backup.25137/#post-180442

 

[Jeff Carson]

OK, I finally have a eSATA 3TB drive that I can connect to my FreeNAS box. I've connected it and I can see the disk, create volumes, etc. Now I think I'm lost on the whole Crashplan thing. I thought it would be a simple Plugin but when I Google it, it looks like some complex paid for off site deal? I'm on 9.1.1, do I need to upgrade to 9.2.1.9 before I can can use crashplan? I'm sorry I'm such a noob at this, I really thought it would be much more like a selection in the GUI to back up to the eSATA drive and preserve all my data/jails/etc. Any guidance is greatly appreciated.

 

[SweetAndLow]

Crashplan is a option in the GUI, look under the plugin section and you can install it. I also suggest you look into zfs replication for your back solution. This feature is also in the gui and is documented in the FreeNAS manual. When mounting a local disk over esata be careful because those things have been know to cause issues.

 

[Jeff Carson]

I guess I have more issues than I thought. The first place I looked for crashplan was the Plugins but my list is empty. I changed the configuration URL to this http://www.freenas.org/downloads/plugins//9/x64/ as it was the only one I could find in the forums that would bring up a list in my browser but it still won't populate the Plugins list. Could this be because I'm on 9.1.1. and not the latest version?? I wanted to upgrade but really wanted to grab a good backup of my data/jails before hand.

 

[Herman Eggink]

Weird. I think I started with 9.1.6 and definitely had the plugins. From what I could see, you should have the plugins. Did notice some issues with plugins being absent.

 

[Herman Eggink]

missing gateway and dns...

 

[Jeff Carson]

missing gateway and dns...

I have a gateway and nameserver identified. I've had items in the plugins window before and I've installed 3 of them (MiniDLNA, ownCloud, and Plex) and everything works fine. I seem to recall I had the plugin window show empty before but have no recollection of how I fixed it.

Found this link in a post and used it in the config and was able to get some plugins! http://test-cafe.ixsystems.com/freenas/json

 

[Herman Eggink]

Sorry I can't help with that. Let me know when you have managed to resolve. More than happy to help set it up. It's has worked very well for me and allows me to track progress from any pc with the client app installed.

 

[Jeff Carson]

I now have crashplan 3.5.3, woooo hoooo!!!!
Now to figure out the configuration and such

 

[Herman Eggink]

Easiest is to follow my posts. Much easier than the standard method redirecting ports. Do check client and server versions as they broke somewhere when crashplan auto-updated the server. Loads of forum posts on that as well. Thats's probably the only tricky thing I can see.. Let me know.

 

[Jeff Carson]

Thank you so much. I'll read up on all your posts and I'm sure I'll have plenty of questions as I am a total noob at this. Seems like I forget as quickly as I learn!!

 

[Herman Eggink]

Np. I struggled as well. Spent too much time anyway [emoji6].

 

[Jeff Carson]

I found this guide (https://gist.github.com/desimone/7073074) but it seems way over my head and I'm not sure it meets my needs either. I'm not interested in a automated backup but rather a manual one that I can run when I feel it's needed.

Your post here seems to be in line with what I want to do but I can't seem to find the process in which you set it up. https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/backup-to-esata-disk.21851/

I've gotten as far as installing crashplan and I can mount my eSATA drive and create a ZFS volume on it. From there I take a short trip into the woods where it gets darker and darker. With all the reading, I'm afraid I will start down a path and end up doing things I don't need to do and that may cause much larger problems with my entire server.

 

[Herman Eggink]

Follow this guide: https://github.com/sirkkalap/freenas-crashplan-howto but only up to step 4

skip the next steps and go to my commend right at the end which says:

Actually, I found elsewhere that you can make crashplan listen on all interfaces rather than localhost. Requires following change on server:


"Using your favorite text editor, edit the following file:


/usr/pbi/crashplan-amd64/share/crashplan/conf/my.service.xml
Within this file, change the from "127.0.0.1" to "0.0.0.0". Save, and then restart the Crashplan service"


No ssh tunneling required to redirect 4243 to 4200. Just change the IP address for the client to direct to your jail and leave the port what it was.

After you edited the xml file and restarted, you should be able to use the crashplan client and connect it straight to the crashplan server. You need to configure your client to connect to your new server. This is also pretty simple by following these directions: http://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/Latest/Configuring/Using_CrashPlan_On_A_Headless_Computer by following JUST step 1 (edit local ui.properties file and fill in BOTH TCP address of your crashplan pbi and making sure the port is the same as the one crashplan is listening on: the one defined in my.service.xml, probably 4200)

In summary:
1) install the crashplan plugin on freenas but skip all the ports stuff
2) edit the server xml file
3) install the client
4) edit the client config file
5) restart everything

Let me know if you managed to get it to work.

 

[Jeff Carson]

... but only up to step 4

skip the next steps... .

I feel like we are in one of those cheesy action films here... "is it go on 3 or 3 then go?!" By up to step 4 do you mean to do 1-3 then jump into yours or 1-4 then jump into yours. Sorry for the really dumb question and thank you again for all the help!!!

 

[Herman Eggink]

Yes, 1-3, no more. Then edit the config files for client and server.

 

[Herman Eggink]

Btw, noticed that crashplan updated itself to 4.2. Luckily, this continues to work with my existing client versions.