[BlueOnyx:00964] Re: What to store on a separate disk

[Scott Hayes]

If I'm not mistaken you can use the snap shot feature to capture the 
current state of your instance so you can bring it backup with all 
the updates or you can use the snap shot for a new virtual server so 
it doesn't require a massive yum update. The updates are persistent 
between restarts. This doesn't seem to be a show stopper since Amazon 
is very reliable and the snap shot feature is your friend.

Julien, I would love to see BlueOnyx running in the cloud. Please 
keep us updated with your progress.

Just my 2 cents.

We currently have a Centos5 and a Windows server running in the cloud 
and have been very happy so far. 1 year later

Scott,

At 12:54 PM 4/1/2009, you wrote:
>Hi Julien,
>
> > as I'm running BX on Amazon Cloud (where persistence of data is
> > guaranteed only if using external volumes/partitions), I have already
> > set my virtual machine to attach and mount a partition /home
> > externally so that, in case the virtual machine gets broken, I don't
> > loose all sites/mails and so on.
> >
> > What I was wondering is:
> > - What other directory are important ?
> >
> > As when you shutdown (terminate) a virtual machine in Amazon Cloud all
> > data stored in the virtual machine after that it has been created gets
> > lost, I was wondering what other dirs/folders are importart to be
> > saved.
>
>I'd say this pretty much eliminates BlueOnyx from being used on an Amazon
>Cloud and would generally advise against using it there.
>
>There is quite a bit of data outside the /home partition that is important -
>and not just MySQL.
>
> >From /etc/ alone you need a ton of stuff, including /etc/mail/, 
> sendmail.cf,
>sendmail.mc, proftpd.conf, webalizer.conf, named.conf, the /etc/named/
>symlink, some stuff from /etc/sysconfig/ and what not. If you run 
>any accounts
>other than admin and/or run sites with or without users, then include
>/etc/passwd, /etc/shadow, /etc/group, /etc/hosts
>
>Ah bloody hell. You almost need half of /etc/ when I think about it.
>
>Then you need /usr/sausalito/codb/ or your BlueOnyx GUI will loose 
>it's brain.
>Assuming you install third party software that brings extra GUI pages aboard
>you will even need more than just /usr/sausalito/codb/
>
>You'll also need /var/lib/mysql/ and if you're running DNS you need the zone
>files from /var/named/chroot/var/named and assuming you run a mailserver you
>also need /var/spool
>
>But this all brings us to the next point: If the OS or the data in the cloud
>is not persistent over reboots: What about YUM updates? If you run a YUM
>update and whatever that brings aboard is not persistant, then what's the
>point in using a cloud?
>
>Even saving the data on a remote volume will you not let get past 
>the obstacle
>that OS updates or patches will sooner or later cause inconsistencies there.
>
>I think you may be better off if you use another approach: Install something
>in the cloud that allows you to virtualize BlueOnyx (VMware, VirtualBox, Xen
>... whatever!) and store the virtualized BlueOnyx on the remotely mounted
>disk. Voila! Problem solved. Because then your BlueOnyx is "stock" again,
>persistance is ensured and it's even "portable" as you wouldn't really depend
>on being stuck with Amazon's cloud. Because if that (for whatever reason) is
>no longer an option, you could simply install your virtualization stuff
>somewhere else and again mount the drive where the virtual server is stored.
>
>--
>With best regards
>
>Michael Stauber
>
>
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