[BlueOnyx:03907] Re: Server imaging

[Michael Stauber]

Hi Jason,

> We have an unusual BO server that has a number of tweaks to the OS due to
> issues. We now have an identical server we want to put BO on and by far the
> easiest way to do it would be to take a full image from the live server and
> use that as a base for the new server. So effectively I would like to ghost
> the live server to a replica server. 
> Is there an easy way to do this?

Yeah, there are several ways. If it's a box using software RAID1, then simply 
take a disk out, put an identical (empty) spare disk in. Then take the disk 
you took out and put that one and another (indentical) empty disk into the new 
server. The RAID rebuild will populate the "empty" disks with the data from 
the "full" disks and you have two identical servers.

You can also clone hard disks by using software tools such as the Linux "dd" 
command or various other tools such as Paragon Hardisk Manager and others.

Typically this cloning has to be done with the filesystem being unmounted, 
hence you won't get around to either boot the server with a Linux rescue CD, 
or still have to (temporarily) take the disk out and into another box to do 
the cloning. I used to use the Paragon Hardisk Manager a couple of years ago 
for purposes like that. It's a bootable rescue CD which allows you to clone 
entire HDs or just partitions, allows to resize partitions and it can also be 
used to store images of the partitions over the network.

Another option is to "virtualize" the OS you want to clone. For Aventurin{e} I 
offer a kind of a migration which "rips" the entire OS off a real ("physical") 
server and turns it into a VPS. Once it's turned into a VPS, it can be very 
easily cloned and replicated for future re-usage. It's a simple as stopping 
the VPS, copying its file area and config file and once that's done start both 
the original and the copied VPS. Or if you plan to use the "clone" for more 
than one copy, one could create an "OS template" of the VPS which can then be 
used to deploy future VPS's of the very same kind with all the mods that you 
initially made.

-- 
With best regards

Michael Stauber