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Here are some tips from Don Baccus regarding backup strategy:
The need for making backups should be self-explanatory. There are several strategies you can use. My own strategy for minimizing the odds that I'll lose all my data is quite simple:
The database is stored on a mirrored (RAID 1) disk.
The machine has battery backup.
Backups are made nightly onto a third disk on another controller
FTP is used to copy the resulting backup to two separate remote servers in two locations
Rather than making remote copies, you might choose to dump to tape or writeable CD media. Whatever strategy you use, it is important to routinely check dumps to make sure they can be reloaded. The strategy outlined above means that in the case of catastrophic failure, I'll lose at most one day's data. By mirroring disks and using a battery backup, preferably one that can trigger an automatic and controlled shutdown of the system when the battery runs low, you greatly lower the odds of ever having to use your nightly backup. Despite this, it is important to take backups seriously if the data stored at your site is valuable to you or your users.
While you're working with Oracle, you should configure it to do automatic exports. An export is a separate backup copy of the database. This copy includes all of the database's state at the time that the export was initiated. If your database is corrupted, you can restore from one of these backups. You should do this step as root.
Download the backup script. Save the file export-oracle.txt as /tmp/export-oracle.txt
Login as root. The following commands will install the export script:
nsadmin:~$ su - Password: *********** root:~# cp /tmp/export-oracle.txt /usr/sbin/export-oracle root:~# chmod 700 /usr/sbin/export-oracle
Setup the export directory; this is the directory where backups will be stored. We recommend the directory /ora8/m02/oracle-exports.
root:~# mkdir /ora8/m02/oracle-exports root:~# chown oracle.dba /ora8/m02/oracle-exports root:~# chmod 770 /ora8/m02/oracle-exports
Now edit /usr/sbin/export-oracle and change the SERVICE_NAME and DATABASE_PASSWORD fields to their correct values. If you want to use a directory other than /ora8/m02/oracle-exports, you also need to change the exportdir setting.
Test the export procedure by running the command:
root:~# /usr/sbin/export-oracle mv: /ora8/m02/oracle-exports/oraexport-service_name.dmp.gz: No such file or directory Export: Release 8.1.6.1.0 - Production on Sun Jun 11 18:07:45 2000 (c) Copyright 1999 Oracle Corporation. All rights reserved. Connected to: Oracle8i Enterprise Edition Release 8.1.6.1.0 - Production With the Partitioning option JServer Release 8.1.6.0.0 - Production Export done in US7ASCII character set and US7ASCII NCHAR character set . exporting pre-schema procedural objects and actions . exporting foreign function library names for user SERVICE_NAME . exporting object type definitions for user SERVICE_NAME About to export SERVICE_NAME's objects ... . exporting database links . exporting sequence numbers . exporting cluster definitions . about to export SERVICE_NAME's tables via Conventional Path ... . exporting synonyms . exporting views . exporting stored procedures . exporting operators . exporting referential integrity constraints . exporting triggers . exporting indextypes . exporting bitmap, functional and extensible indexes . exporting posttables actions . exporting snapshots . exporting snapshot logs . exporting job queues . exporting refresh groups and children . exporting dimensions . exporting post-schema procedural objects and actions . exporting statistics Export terminated successfully without warnings.
If you don't have any warnings, proceed to automate the backups.
Automating backups is accomplished using the UNIX crontab facility.
While still root, run the following command. You can replace the EDITOR="emacs -nw" portion with whatever editor your prefer, such as EDITOR=vi.
root:~# export EDITOR="emacs -nw" root:~# crontab -e
Now add the following line on a line by itself
0 23 * * * /usr/sbin/export-oracle
Save the file, exit the editor. Verify that the addition succeeded by checking the output of the following command.
root:~# crontab -l | grep export-oracle 0 23 * * * /usr/sbin/export-oracle root:~# exit ; Logout
If you see the line, go ahead and log out.
Dowload this script to /tmp. At the top of the script are several variables that you'll need to customize:
bak - location where you want local backups to be saved
servername - name of your server (and database instance)
ftp_user - username on your ftp account
ftp_password - password on your ftp account
ftp_dir - path on the remote server where your backups will be uploaded
ftp_server - your ftp server
Next, we'll save this file to our server's tcl directory so that it will be loaded on startup. It will automatically be run every night at midnight. Note that this script only backs up the database - not the OpenACS scripts and file content.
nsadmin:~$ cp /tmp/acs-pgbackup-init.txt /web/birdnotes/tcl/acs-pgbackup-init.tcl nsadmin:~$ restart-aolserver birdnotes
That's it! The script will email you with each successful backup (or if it fails, it will send you an email with the reason)
The "vacuum" command must be run periodically to reclaim space. The "vacuum analyze" form additionally collects statistics on the disbursion of columns in the database, which the optimizer uses when it calculates just how to execute queries. The availability of this data can make a tremendous difference in the execution speed of queries. This command can also be run from cron, but it probably makes more sense to run this command as part of your nightly backup procedure - if "vacuum" is going to screw up the database, you'd prefer it to happen immediately after (not before!) you've made a backup! The "vacuum" command is very reliable, but conservatism is the key to good system management. So, if you're using the export procedure described above, you don't need to do this extra step.
Edit your crontab:
nsadmin:~$ crontab -e
We'll set vacuum up to run nightly at 1 AM. Add the following line:
0 1 * * * /usr/local/pgsql/bin/vacuumdb birdnotes
Starting another server is simply a matter of configuring another aolserver instance, creating another database and pointing this aolserver instance at a fresh copy of the OpenACS-4 code. We'll call our new server birdnotes-dev
Download another copy of openacs4.tcl.txt into /tmp.
nsadmin:~$ cp /tmp/openacs4.tcl.txt ./birdnotes-dev.tcl nsadmin:~$ chmod 660 birdnotes-dev.tcl nsadmin:~$ emacs birdnotes-dev.tcl
Just like in the section called “Configuring AOLserver”, you'll need to set the server parameters appropriately. Be sure to choose a different port than your original server and to set server to birdnotes-dev.
Create a new database instance called birdnotes-dev. Follow the instructions in Prepare Oracle for OpenACS or Prepare PostgreSQL for OpenACS.
You can either copy your current OpenACS installation:
nsadmin:~$ cd /web nsadmin:~$ cp -r birdnotes birdnotes-dev
Or Download the OpenACS 4 software into /tmp again.
nsadmin:~$ cd /web nsadmin:/web$ tar xzvf /tmp/alpha2.tgz nsadmin:/web$ mv openacs-4 birdnotes-dev
Start your new server!
nsadmin:/web$ cd
nsadmin:~$ /usr/local/aolserver/bin/nsd-postgres -t /usr/local/aolserver/birdnotes-dev.tcl
Visit the site with a web browser (using the port that you set above). You should see the OpenACS installer. Once you install the OpenACS datamodel, you'll also need to add your new aolserver instance to /etc/inittab (or daemontools) so it restarts automatically.
OpenACS uses the OpenFTS package to implement site-wide-search. You'll need to have the Tcl development libraries and headers installed. (Debian users: apt-get install tcl8.3-dev)
As root, download the Search-OpenFTS driver.
nsadmin:~$ su - Password: ********** root:~# cd /tmp root:/tmp# wget http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/openfts/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2.tar.gz root:~# cd /usr/local/src root:/usr/local/src# tar xzf /tmp/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2.tar.gz root:/usr/local/src# chown -R nsadmin.web Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2 root:/usr/local/src# exit
Configure it. Note that you may need to set --with-tcl=(your Tcl library location). For Debian, add this to the end of the ./configure command: --with-tcl=/usr/lib/tcl8.3
nsadmin:~$ cd /usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2 nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2$ ./configure --with-aolserver-src=/usr/local/src/aolserver/aolserver
In order to compile on Debian, I had to edit my Makefile.global. Add -I/usr/include/tcl8.3 to the line where INC is defined, so it looks like this:
INC = ../include -I/usr/include/tcl8.3
Then compile it:
nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2$ make nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2$ cd aolserver nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2/aolserver$ make
Install it. You need to do this step as root since some of the libraries will be installed alongside your TCL libraries and some alongside your PostgreSQL libraries.
nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2/aolserver$ su - Password: *********** root:~# cd /usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2 root:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2# make install root:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2# exit nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2/aolserver$ cp nsfts.so /usr/local/aolserver/bin/
Add the following line to your aolserver config file (in our example: /usr/local/aolserver/birdnotes.tcl) in the "ns_section ns/server/${server}/modules" section:
ns_param nsfts ${bindir}/nsfts.so
Load the openFTS code into your database:
nsadmin:/usr/local/src/Search-OpenFTS-tcl-0.2/aolserver$ cd nsadmin:~$ psql -f /web/birdnotes/packages/openfts-driver/sql/postgresql/load.sql birdnotes nsadmin:~$ restart-aolserver birdnotes
Open a browser and go to your server (http://yourserver:port). Click on the "Package Manager" link in the "Quick Links" section on the right side of the page.
Click on the "Install packages" link and follow the instructions to install the Note package and the OpenFTS Driver 4.2 package.
Restart your server.
nsadmin:~$ restart-aolserver birdnotes
Give the server a few minutes to restart and then go back to your server's front page and click on "Site Map" from the "Quick Links"
Create a "new sub folder" under "Main Site". Call the url "openfts".
Click "mount" to mount the OpenFTS driver at the url "openfts" (despite what the system says about these packages not being meant to be mounted)
Create another folder under "Main Site" at the url "search". Create a "new application". Call the application "Search" and choose the "Search" package from the drop-down list.
Create a third folder under "Main Site" at the url "notes". Create a "new application". Call the application "Notes" and choose the "Note" package from the drop-down list.
Restart the server.
Return to your home page. Near the bottom of the page, Click on the "OpenFTS Driver" link. Then click on "Administration". Finally, click on "Initialize OpenFTS Engine". Accept the defaults and continue.
Click on the "Main Site" link to get back to the home page. Now, click on the "ACS Service Contract" link near the bottom of the home page.
Click on the link to "install" the FtsEngineDriver. Also, click the link to install the Note content provider.
Restart the server. You can try inserting some notes and then going to the search page to search for stuff. Note that the content may not get indexed immediately, so give it a few minutes.