I ordered NAS backup. I didn't know that it is so "deep". I thought everything is automated under Orbit . I will only go to step 1. I do not want to frighten you away with my silly questions.

I am stuck at the very first step:



I only have APF installed.

1) Which file do I edit, allow_hosts.rules or conf.apf?

2) Which lines and how should I edit ?

If you are using Cpanel/WHM, you can always just set the WHM Backup which would use FTP to access the NAS. That way you have a working backup solution and you do not need to worry about any ports to open for it. I would assume the basic FTP ports would be open by default and that would suffice.

I have a secondary drive for backup. I look into WHM's backup configuration but totally have no idea how to configure it.

What is the smbackup01.servermatrix.com, the username and the password for?

You can see my current WHM backup config screenshot here:

http://www.geocities.com/myscreenshot2006/backup.gif

I believe I have to enter the host, username and password to these fields:

- Ftp Backup Host (Remote Ftp Backup Only)
- Ftp Backup User (Remote Ftp Backup Only)
- Ftp Backup Pass (Remote Ftp Backup Only)

What else should I set?

Once backup is done, how do I access those backups?

You need to set Backup Type as Remote FTP Server and also the FTP Backup Directory to where you want the files to be saved in.

If you have a secondary drive then probably the best method would be to use the WHM Backup to do daily backup to your secondary drive then set up a Script to RSYNC what you want over to the NAS.

Think of the NAS as a remote disk space which you can do anything that you want. When you need to restore, you will need to copy the files to your local drive and use the WHM restore mechanism.

For a more complete solution, DiskSync is way better as everything can be automated through the DiskSync client.

Is DiskSync easier to use? Does it come with a web-based admin interface?

DiskSync doesn't come with a web-based interface but it requires you to install the client on your desktop which you use to determine what and how often the files should be backup. You can then use that to determine which files should be restored. You can restore single files instead of entire folders.

Yes, it is supposed to be quite simple to use. Incidentally, the disk space shown for the DiskSync is compressed space so on a typically server, the 10gb compressed Disksync could probably store anything between 15 to 25gb. Also it saves you on bandwidth usage as it only make incremental backups so basically only changes get backup.

You use NAS if you want your own backup solution.

Edit the allow_hosts.rules and add that IP, so it has all access. Just add it as the IP, no other switches, commas, blahs needed.
Then restart apf

I have done that. How do I ftp under shell? I tried this but got a timeout error:

$ ftp smbackup01.servermatrix.com

OK, got it. The host was wrong. The welcome is terribly misleading!!!

I managed to FTP to the NAS backup and transfer files (from my 2nd hardrive to NAS storage) one by one using PUT. Is there any command that I can use to copy all *.tar.gz file?

Also, do you know any script for automatic backup to NAS?

I finally managed to automate the WHM backup to BOTH my secondary hardisk and NAS, thanks to the mini script "WHG FTP Backup" by Webhostgear at http://www.webhostgear.com/174.html

This is what I am doing:

1) Configure WHM to do daily/weekly/montly backup to my secondary hardrive as before.

2) Set crontab to run ftpbackup_daily.sh to copy all files from /backupdrive/cpbackup/daily to /mybackup/daily (NAS)

3) Set crontab to run ftpbackup_weekly.sh to copy all files from /backupdrive/cpbackup/weekly to /mybackup/weekly (NAS)

Perfect solution!

Glad the script is being put to good use