Hello, Was thinking it would be wise to backup my server, in case anything "bad" ever happened, so that I could quickly get up to speed. 1. clone the whole drive -- which might be the best to ensure I keep the whole system working. 2. But, what about, if I just wanted to backup my Email server components? Postfix - which I think is just config files, and Dovecot - I think there is a doveadm backup for doing such things. What do you guys do, recommend for backups?? Thanks -- https://www.little-beak.com "Doing what we can."
What I do: 1 - I ran a maildirlock command to my mail folder 2 - I then rsync the folder where my maildirs are, as well as the indexes, to a remote location 3 - I tar.gz the daily backup 4 - I kill the maildirlock process I also use replication of my server so that I keep getting mail when my main server isn't available. As for postfix, I backup the database once a week, since it doesn't get changed that often. Hope that helps! Best, Francis On 09.02.2020 18:26, Esteban L wrote:> Hello, > > Was thinking it would be wise to backup my server, in case anything > "bad" ever happened, so that I could quickly get up to speed. > > 1. clone the whole drive -- which might be the best to ensure I keep > the > whole system working. > > 2. But, what about, if I just wanted to backup my Email server > components? Postfix - which I think is just config files, and Dovecot - > I think there is a doveadm backup for doing such things. > > What do you guys do, recommend for backups?? > > Thanks-------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 0xEE41D33F.asc Type: application/pgp-keys Size: 5544 bytes Desc: not available URL: <https://dovecot.org/pipermail/dovecot/attachments/20200209/940ab85a/attachment.bin>
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 Hi, On 10/2/20 4:59 am, Francis Augusto Medeiros-Logeay wrote:> What I do: > > 1 - I ran a maildirlock command to my mail folder 2 - I then rsync > the folder where my maildirs are, as well as the indexes, to a > remote locationIf rsync is not fast... then how about doing a snapshot and then rsync off the snapshot? (I do rsync over lvm snapshots to back up file systems cleanly) and, btw, perform file system dumps [ufsdump / ufsrestore like, but dump and restore on Linux] of *non-mounted* backup file systems fwiw. I have other rsyncs that happen via rsnapshot during the day, I don't worry about snapshotting them though, but I probably should....> 3 - I tar.gz the daily backup 4 - I kill the maildirlock process > > I also use replication of my server so that I keep getting mail > when my main server isn't available.You mean backup mx?> As for postfix, I backup the database once a week, since it doesn't > get changed that often. > > Hope that helps! > > Best, > > Francis > > > > > On 09.02.2020 18:26, Esteban L wrote: >> Hello, >> >> Was thinking it would be wise to backup my server, in case >> anything "bad" ever happened, so that I could quickly get up to >> speed. >> >> 1. clone the whole drive -- which might be the best to ensure I >> keep the whole system working. >> >> 2. But, what about, if I just wanted to backup my Email server >> components? Postfix - which I think is just config files, and >> Dovecot - I think there is a doveadm backup for doing such >> things. >> >> What do you guys do, recommend for backups?? >> >> ThanksCheers - -- Andrew McGlashan -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- iHUEAREIAB0WIQTJAoMHtC6YydLfjUOoFmvLt+/i+wUCXkBKkAAKCRCoFmvLt+/i +811AQCmzZtw7SLsKHi9bNybOtsuQwT/qqZ9GppCXJWAtRYzkQD+M3ZlXR6v3g9U 5Px4Aayix3mQyil0q7MZIYpNyrBWEjw=YOGn -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 0xA8166BCBB7EFE2FB.asc Type: application/pgp-keys Size: 11231 bytes Desc: not available URL: <https://dovecot.org/pipermail/dovecot/attachments/20200210/65a2f41f/attachment-0001.bin>
Esteban L wrote on Sun, 09 Feb 2020 18:26 +0100:> 2. But, what about, if I just wanted to backup my Email server > components? Postfix - which I think is just config files, and Dovecot - > I think there is a doveadm backup for doing such things.For postfix you should also back up the mail queue (e.g., messages that couldn't be delivered the first time and await further delivery attempts). See `postconf data_directory` and/or `postconf queue_directory`.
What I do: 1 - I ran a maildirlock command to my mail folder 2 - I then rsync the folder where my maildirs are, as well as the indexes, to a remote location 3 - I tar.gz the daily backup 4 - I kill the maildirlock process I also use replication of my server so that I keep getting mail when my main server isn't available. As for postfix, I backup the database once a week, since it doesn't get changed that often. Hope that helps! Best, Francis On 09.02.2020 18:26, Esteban L wrote:> Hello, > > Was thinking it would be wise to backup my server, in case anything > "bad" ever happened, so that I could quickly get up to speed. > > 1. clone the whole drive -- which might be the best to ensure I keep > the > whole system working. > > 2. But, what about, if I just wanted to backup my Email server > components? Postfix - which I think is just config files, and Dovecot - > I think there is a doveadm backup for doing such things. > > What do you guys do, recommend for backups?? > > Thanks-------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 0xEE41D33F.asc Type: application/pgp-keys Size: 5633 bytes Desc: not available URL: <https://dovecot.org/pipermail/dovecot/attachments/20200210/0c03ede9/attachment-0002.bin> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 0xEE41D33F.asc Type: application/pgp-keys Size: 5544 bytes Desc: not available URL: <https://dovecot.org/pipermail/dovecot/attachments/20200210/0c03ede9/attachment-0003.bin>
On Sun, 9 Feb 2020 18:26:25 +0100 Esteban L <esteban at little-beak.com> wrote:> Was thinking it would be wise to backup my server, in case anything > "bad" ever happened, so that I could quickly get up to speed.Thanks for asking (I could not find a lot of threads about it when I looked into it.) I am obsessive so I have a forward-all rule in POSTFIX that pipes to a command line from which I cast to another server where I save (and replicate to another server and so on.) This is what I do ,what I'd recommend is that'd be a feature delivered with POSTFIX (since it's the `first' program to receive the email and tell the sender that it's ok, it's been received. Perhaps that's why I did not find much: I was focusing my search around POSTFIX.) Now I understand one is supposed to have a back up email server but that's for if the internet facing one is down/disconnected ? I think there is something in the standard to say to reasonably retry. I'm here originially to set up my system on my iPhone with server-side rules. (Thus only realizing there seems to be a built-in backup mechanism in Dovecot?) -- Germain Le Chapelain Software Engineer Lanvaux