The fourth update to the Mephisto 1.10 series has been released. New features were back-ported from v11 to increase stability because the 1.10 branch is going for stability. This project is also looking for developers for new features and stronger development. If interested, please email phillip.tribble@gmail.com. Documentation engineers are also appreciated.
This program can do simple backups and syncs over a network or locally. Mephisto Backup was made with the Java programming language. The key feature of this program is the ability to backup your system to an image and copy it to a Linux Live DVD for future restoration. The user can then take that cd and move his or her system to any PC.
Location: http://mephistobackup.webhop.org/
Also, test out the v1.11 beta and submit feedback =)
Sweet. I’m going to have to try this out.
So, if you install it in a live cd (or better USB key) you are able to backup ANY X86 computer, including Apple, Windows? and clone to another HW?
Great!
Really Great. But i wonder if one can get around the LVM obstacle. Is there a way out. Better still, is it possible to remove the LVM from your running OS in order to be able to obtain its disk image for backing up as a live CD/DVD/USB. thanks. Pankyu Bootha. nagpur,india.
You can snapshot LVM Logical Volumes (LVs), and backup the snapshot – then remove the snapshot.
That gives one a consistent point-in-time capture of the filesystem, or whatever data is on that LV.
That doesn’t guarantee that, e.g. the filesystem is “clean”, but does essentially guarantee that it should be at least recoverable. Kind’a like someone pulled power, then backed it up cold.
“Of course” the problem with backing up a live rw filesystem or volume, is data inconsistency – no guarantee at all that what’s backed up will be at all recoverable. E.g. one backs up a (large) filesystem or volume or the like, while it’s rw .. things change … and change over time. The data one captured at the start of the backup can be grossly inconsistent with that backed up further along. E.g. what data blocks are allocated and free, what files are/aren’t present, where there data is – with rw and without snapshot or some other way of doing point-in-time image capture, one may end up with nothing more than a jumbled unrecoverable mess.