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List:       gentoo-user
Subject:    Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Suggestions for backup scheme?
From:       "J. Roeleveld" <joost () antarean ! org>
Date:       2024-02-07 11:21:20
Message-ID: 3287827.aeNJFYEL58 () iris
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On Tuesday, February 6, 2024 6:22:34 PM CET Grant Edwards wrote:
> On 2024-02-06, J. Roeleveld <joost@antarean.org> wrote:
> > On Tuesday, February 6, 2024 4:38:11 PM CET Grant Edwards wrote:

> >> I presume that boot/root on ext4 and home on ZFS would not require an
> >> initrd?
> > 
> > Yes, that wouldn't require an initrd. But why would you limit this?
> 
> Because I really, really dislike having to use an initrd. That's
> probably just an irrational 30 year old prejudice, but over the
> decades I've found live to be far simpler and more pleasant without
> initrds. Maybe things have improved over the years, but way back when
> I did use distros that required initrds, they seem to be a constant,
> nagging source of headaches.

In the past, initrd's were a nightmare. Even the current tools (dracut, 
genkernel) are a pain and force the user to do it their way.
The only initramfs generator I use is the "bliss-initramfs" one and that is 
because it actually works and doesn't get in the way.
And I don't build a new kernel for the server.

For my desktops and laptops, I embed the initramfs into the kernel using a 
very simple set of files (script with the commands and a config detailing which 
files to include)
the total size of both files is about 8K and was mostly grabbed from a howto 
page about 10 years ago and has stayed unchanged since then. (I added a little 
script to update the config when library versions change, but that is it)

> > ZFS works best when given the FULL drive.
> 
> Where do you put swap?

My swap is a ZFS volume. I find using the recommended method of configuring it 
is safe and I have not seen any kind of lockup due to swap.
Did have some due to a bug in the HBA-driver when some deranged dev decided to 
change sensible defaults though. But it would freeze before even getting to 
enabling swap.

> > For my server, I use "bliss-initramfs" to generate the initramfs and
> > have not had any issues with this since I started using ZFS.
> > 
> > Especially the ease of generating snapshots also make it really easy
> > to roll back an update if anything went wrong. If your
> > root-partition isn't on ZFS, you can't easily roll back.
> 
> True. However, I've never adopted the practice of backing up my root
> fs (except for a few specific directories like /etc), and haven't ever
> really run into situations where I wished I had. It's all stuff that
> can easily be reinstalled.

I did start backup up the full system as restoring from backup (especially 
rolling back a snapshot, but same is true when grabbing the backup from tape) 
is a lot faster than reinstalling all the software and making sure the config 
(which these days isn't just in /etc anymore) is still the same.

--
Joost



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