1REAR(8)                                                                REAR(8)
2
3
4

NAME

6       rear - bare metal disaster recovery and system migration tool
7

SYNOPSIS

9       rear [-h|--help] [-V|--version] [-dsSv] [-D|--debugscripts SET] [-c
10       DIR] [-C CONFIG] [-r KERNEL] [--] COMMAND [ARGS...]
11

DESCRIPTION

13       Relax-and-Recover is the leading Open Source disaster recovery
14       solution. It is a modular framework with many ready-to-go workflows for
15       common situations.
16
17       Relax-and-Recover produces a bootable image. This image can repartition
18       the system. Once that is done it initiates a restore from backup.
19       Restores to different hardware are possible. Relax-and-Recover can
20       therefore be used as a migration tool as well.
21
22       Currently Relax-and-Recover supports various boot media (incl. ISO,
23       PXE, OBDR tape, USB or eSATA storage), a variety of network protocols
24       (incl. sftp, ftp, http, nfs, cifs) for storage and backup as well as a
25       multitude of backup strategies (incl. IBM Tivoli Storage Manager,
26       MircoFocus Data Protector, Symantec NetBackup, EMC NetWorker, EMC
27       Avamar, FDR/Upstream, NovaBACKUP DC, Rubrik Cloud Data Management
28       (CDM), Bareos, Bacula, rsync, rbme, Borg). This results in a bootable
29       image that is capable of booting via PXE, DVD/CD, bootable tape or
30       virtual provisioning.
31
32       Relax-and-Recover was designed to be easy to set up, requires no
33       maintenance and is there to assist when disaster strikes. Its
34       setup-and-forget nature removes any excuses for not having a disaster
35       recovery solution implemented.
36
37       Recovering from disaster is made very straight-forward by a 2-step
38       recovery process so that it can be executed by operational teams when
39       required. When used interactively (e.g. when used for migrating
40       systems), menus help make decisions to restore to a new (hardware)
41       environment.
42
43       Extending Relax-and-Recover is made possible by its modular framework.
44       Consistent logging and optionally extended output help understand the
45       concepts behind Relax-and-Recover and help debug during development.
46
47       Relax-and-Recover comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details see
48       the GNU General Public License at: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html
49

OPTIONS

51   GLOBAL OPTIONS
52       -h --help
53           usage information
54
55       -c DIR
56           alternative config directory; instead of /etc/rear
57
58       -C CONFIG
59           additional config file; absolute path or relative to config
60           directory
61
62       -d
63           debug mode (log debug messages to log file - also sets -v)
64
65       -D
66           debugscript mode (log executed commands via set -x - also sets -v
67           and -d)
68
69       --debugscripts SET
70           same as -d -v -D but debugscript mode with set -SET
71
72       -r KERNEL
73           kernel version to use (by default use running kernel)
74
75       -s
76           simulation mode (show what scripts are run without executing them)
77
78       -S
79           step-by-step mode (acknowledge each script individually)
80
81       -v
82           verbose mode (show more output and run many commands in verbose
83           mode)
84
85       -V --version
86           version information
87
88   COMMANDS
89       checklayout
90           check if the disk layout has changed since the last run of
91           mkbackup/mkrescue
92
93       dump
94           dump configuration and system information; please run this to
95           verify your setup
96
97       format
98           format and label USB or tape media to be used with rear;
99
100           first argument is the USB or tape device to use, eg.  /dev/sdX or
101           /dev/stX
102
103       help
104           print full list of commands and options
105
106       mkbackup
107           create rescue media and backup the system (only for internal backup
108           methods)
109
110       mkbackuponly
111           backup the system (only for internal backup methods) without
112           creating rescue media
113
114       mkrescue
115           create rescue media only
116
117       mountonly
118           use ReaR as live media to mount and repair the system
119
120       recover
121           recover the system; can be used only when running from the rescue
122           media
123
124       restoreonly
125           only restore the backup; can be used only when running from the
126           rescue media
127
128       mkopalpba
129           create a pre-boot authentication (PBA) image to boot from TCG Opal
130           2-compliant self-encrypting disks
131
132       opaladmin
133           administrate TCG Opal 2-compliant self-encrypting disks
134
135       validate
136           submit validation information
137
138       Use rear -v help for more advanced commands.
139

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

141       The process of bare metal disaster recovery consists of two parts:
142
143       ·   Recreate the system layout
144
145       ·   Restore the data to the system
146
147       Most backup software solutions are very good at restoring data but do
148       not support recreating the system layout. Relax-and-Recover is very
149       good at recreating the system layout but works best when used together
150       with supported backup software.
151
152       In this combination Relax-and-Recover recreates the system layout and
153       calls the backup software to restore the actual data. Thus there is no
154       unnecessary duplicate data storage and the Relax-and-Recover rescue
155       media can be very small.
156
157       For demonstration and special use purposes Relax-and-Recover also
158       includes an internal backup method, NETFS, which can be used to create
159       a simple tar.gz archive of the system. For all permanent setups we
160       recommend using something more professional for backup, either a
161       traditional backup software (open source or commercial) or rsync with
162       hardlink based solutions, e.g. RSYNC BACKUP MADE EASY.
163

RESCUE IMAGE CONFIGURATION

165       The OUTPUT variable defines from where our bootable rescue image will
166       be booted and the OUTPUT_URL variable defines where the rescue image
167       should be send to. Possible OUTPUT settings are:
168
169       OUTPUT=RAMDISK
170           Create only the Relax-and-Recover initramfs.
171
172       OUTPUT=ISO
173           (Default) Create a bootable ISO9660 image on disk as
174           rear-$(hostname).iso
175
176       OUTPUT=PXE
177           Create on a remote PXE/NFS server the required files (such as
178           configuration file, kernel and initrd image
179
180       OUTPUT=OBDR
181           Create a bootable OBDR tape (optionally including the backup
182           archive). Specify the OBDR tape device by using TAPE_DEVICE.
183
184       OUTPUT=USB
185           Create a bootable USB disk (using extlinux). Specify the USB
186           storage device by using USB_DEVICE.
187
188       OUTPUT=RAWDISK
189           Create a bootable image file named "rear-$(hostname).raw.gz", which
190
191           ·   supports UEFI boot if syslinux/EFI or Grub 2/EFI is installed,
192
193           ·   supports Legacy BIOS boot if syslinux is installed,
194
195           ·   supports UEFI/Legacy BIOS dual boot if syslinux and one of the
196               supported EFI bootloaders are installed.
197
198       When using OUTPUT=ISO, RAMDISK, OBDR, USB, or RAWDISK you should
199       provide the backup target location through the OUTPUT_URL variable.
200       Possible OUTPUT_URL settings are:
201
202       OUTPUT_URL=file://
203           Write the image to disk. The default is in /var/lib/rear/output/.
204
205       OUTPUT_URL=nfs://
206           Write the image by mounting the target filesystem via NFS.
207
208       OUTPUT_URL=cifs://
209           Write the image by mounting the target filesystem via CIFS.
210
211       OUTPUT_URL=fish://
212           Write the image using lftp and the FISH protocol.
213
214       OUTPUT_URL=ftp://
215           Write the image using lftp and the FTP protocol.
216
217       OUTPUT_URL=ftps://
218           Write the image using lftp and the FTPS protocol.
219
220       OUTPUT_URL=hftp://
221           Write the image using lftp and the HFTP protocol.
222
223       OUTPUT_URL=http://
224           Write the image using lftp and the HTTP (PUT) procotol.
225
226       OUTPUT_URL=https://
227           Write the image using lftp and the HTTPS (PUT) protocol.
228
229       OUTPUT_URL=sftp://
230           Write the image using lftp and the secure FTP (SFTP) protocol.
231
232       OUTPUT_URL=rsync://
233           Write the image using rsync and the RSYNC protocol.
234
235       OUTPUT_URL=sshfs://
236           Write the image using sshfs and the SSH protocol.
237
238       OUTPUT_URL=null
239           Do not copy the rescue image from /var/lib/rear/output/ to a remote
240           output location.  OUTPUT_URL=null is useful when another program
241           (e.g. an external backup program) is used to save the rescue image
242           from the local system to a remote place, or with
243           BACKUP_URL=iso:///backup when the backup is included in the rescue
244           image to avoid a (big) copy of the rescue image at a remote output
245           location. In the latter case the rescue image must be manually
246           saved from the local system to a remote place.  OUTPUT_URL=null is
247           only supported together with BACKUP=NETFS.
248
249       If you do not specify OUTPUT_URL variable then by default it will be
250       aligned to what was defined by variable BACKUP_URL. And, the rescue
251       image will then be copied to the same location as your backup of the
252       system disk(s).
253
254       The ISO_DEFAULT variable defines what default boot option is used on
255       the rescue image. Possible values are manual, boothd or automatic.
256       Manual will make you boot into the shell directly by default, boothd
257       will boot to the first disk (default) or automatic will automatically
258       start in recovery mode.
259

RESCUE IMAGE KERNEL COMMAND LINE OPTIONS

261       When booting the rescue image you can edit the kernel command line.
262       There are some Relax-and-Recover specific kernel command line options:
263
264       debug
265           The rescue system start up scripts in /etc/scripts/system-setup.d/
266           are run one by one each one after pressing Enter and the scripts
267           are run with set -x which prints commands and their arguments as
268           they are executed.
269
270       auto_recover or automatic
271           Launch rear recover automatically (without automated reboot).
272           Together with debug it runs rear recover in debug mode.
273
274       unattended
275           Launch rear recover automatically as with auto_recover plus
276           automated reboot after successful rear recover.
277
278       ip= nm= netdev= gw=
279           If IP address plus optionally netmask (default 255.255.255.0),
280           network device (default eth0), and a default gateway are specified
281           only that single network device is set up. Example:
282
283           ip=192.168.100.2 nm=255.255.255.0 netdev=eth0 gw=192.168.100.1
284
285       noip
286           Skip network devices setup by the rescue system start up scripts
287           (overrides ip= nm= netdev= gw=).
288

BACKUP SOFTWARE INTEGRATION

290       Currently Relax-and-Recover supports the following backup methods.
291       Please distinguish carefully between Relax-and-Recover support for 3rd
292       party backup software and Relax-and-Recover internal backup methods.
293       The latter also creates a backup of your data while the former will
294       only integrate Relax-and-Recover with the backup software to restore
295       the data with the help of the backup software without actually creating
296       backups. This means that for all non-internal backup software you must
297       take care of creating backups yourself (unless otherwise noted).
298
299       Especially the rear mkbackup command can be confusing as it is only
300       useful for the internal backup methods and has usually no function at
301       all with the other (external) backup methods.
302
303       The following backup methods need to be set in Relax-and-Recover with
304       the BACKUP option. As mentioned we have two types of BACKUP methods -
305       internal and external.
306
307       The following BACKUP methods are external of Relax-and-Recover meaning
308       that usually you are responsible of backups being made:
309
310       BACKUP=REQUESTRESTORE
311           (default) Not really a backup method at all, Relax-and-Recover
312           simply halts the recovery and requests that somebody will restore
313           the data to the appropriate location (e.g. via SSH). This method
314           works especially well with an rsync based backup that is pushed
315           back to the backup client.
316
317       BACKUP=EXTERNAL
318           Internal backup method that uses an arbitrary external command to
319           create a backup and restore the data.
320
321       BACKUP=DP
322           Use Micro Focus Data Protector to restore the data.
323
324       BACKUP=FDRUPSTREAM
325           Use FDR/Upstream to restore the data.
326
327       BACKUP=GALAXY
328           Use CommVault Galaxy 5 to restore the data.
329
330       BACKUP=GALAXY7
331           Use CommVault Galaxy 7 to restore the data.
332
333       BACKUP=GALAXY10
334           Use CommVault Galaxy 10 (or Simpana 10) to restore the data.
335
336       BACKUP=NBU
337           Use Symantec NetBackup to restore the data.
338
339       BACKUP=TSM
340           Use IBM Tivoli Storage Manager to restore the data. The
341           Relax-and-Recover result files (e.g. ISO image) are also saved into
342           TSM. There is a (currently experimental) first draft implementation
343           that a TSM backup is created by calling dsmc incremental during
344           rear mkbackup.
345
346       BACKUP=NSR
347           Using EMC NetWorker (Legato) to restore the data.
348
349       BACKUP=AVA
350           Using EMC Avamar to restore the data.
351
352       BACKUP=SESAM
353           Using SEP Sesam to restore the data.
354
355       BACKUP=NBKDC
356           Using Novastor NovaBACKUP DC to restore the data.
357
358       BACKUP=CDM
359           Using Rubrik Cloud Data Management (CDM) to restore the data.
360
361       BACKUP=RBME
362           Use Rsync Backup Made Easy (rbme) to restore the data.
363
364       BACKUP=BAREOS
365           Use Open Source backup solution BAREOS (a fork a BACULA) to restore
366           the data.
367
368       BACKUP=BACULA
369           Use Open Source backup solution BACULA to restore the data.
370
371       BACKUP=DUPLICITY
372           Use encrypted bandwidth-efficient backup solution using the rsync
373           algorithm to restore the data.
374
375       BACKUP=BORG
376           Use BorgBackup (short Borg) a deduplicating backup program to
377           restore the data. Executing rear mkbackup will create a Borg
378           backup, see the section ReaR with Borg back end in the ReaR
379           user-guide Scenarios documentation.
380
381       The following BACKUP methods are internal of Relax-and-Recover:
382
383       BACKUP=NETFS
384           Internal backup method which can be used to create a simple backup
385           (tar archive).
386
387       BACKUP=RSYNC
388           Use rsync to restore data.
389
390       If your favourite backup software is missing from this list, please
391       submit a patch or ask us to implement it for you.
392
393       When using BACKUP=NETFS you must provide the backup target location
394       through the BACKUP_URL variable. Possible BACKUP_URL settings are:
395
396       BACKUP_URL=file://
397           To backup to local disk, use BACKUP_URL=file:///directory/path/
398
399       BACKUP_URL=nfs://
400           To backup to NFS disk, use
401           BACKUP_URL=nfs://nfs-server-name/share/path
402
403       BACKUP_URL=tape://
404           To backup to tape device, use BACKUP_URL=tape:///dev/nst0 or
405           alternatively, simply define TAPE_DEVICE=/dev/nst0
406
407       BACKUP_URL=rsync://
408           When backup method BACKUP=RSYNC is chosen then we need to define a
409           corresponding BACKUP_URL rule:
410
411               BACKUP_URL=rsync://[user@]host[:port]/path
412               BACKUP_URL=rsync://[user@]host[:port]::/path
413
414       BACKUP_URL=cifs://
415           To backup to a Samba share (CIFS), use
416           BACKUP_URL=cifs://cifs-server-name/share/path. To provide
417           credentials for CIFS mounting use a /etc/rear/cifs credentials file
418           and define BACKUP_OPTIONS="cred=/etc/rear/cifs" and pass along:
419
420               username=_username_
421               password=_secret password_
422               domain=_domain_
423
424       BACKUP_URL=usb://
425           To backup to USB storage device, use
426           BACKUP_URL=usb:///dev/disk/by-path/REAR-000 or use a real device
427           node or a specific filesystem label. Alternatively, you can specify
428           the device using USB_DEVICE=/dev/disk/by-path/REAR-000.
429
430           If you combine this with OUTPUT=USB you will end up with a bootable
431           USB device.
432
433       BACKUP_URL=sshfs://
434           To backup to a remote server via sshfs (SSH protocol), use
435           BACKUP_URL=sshfs://user@remote-system.name.org/home/user/backup-dir/
436
437           It is advisable to add ServerAliveInterval 15 in the
438           /root/.ssh/config file for the remote system
439           (remote-system.name.org).
440
441       BACKUP_URL=iso://
442           To include the backup within the ISO image. It is important that
443           the BACKUP_URL and OUTPUT_URL variables are different. E.g.
444
445               BACKUP_URL=iso:///backup/
446               OUTPUT_URL=nfs://server/path/
447
448       When using BACKUP=NETFS and BACKUP_PROG=tar there is an option to
449       select BACKUP_TYPE=incremental or BACKUP_TYPE=differential to let rear
450       make incremental or differential backups until the next full backup day
451       e.g. via FULLBACKUPDAY="Mon" is reached or when the last full backup is
452       too old after FULLBACKUP_OUTDATED_DAYS has passed. Incremental or
453       differential backup is currently only known to work with
454       BACKUP_URL=nfs. Other BACKUP_URL schemes may work but at least
455       BACKUP_URL=usb requires USB_SUFFIX to be set to work with incremental
456       or differential backup.
457

SUPPORT FOR SELF-ENCRYPTING DISKS

459       Relax-and-Recover supports self-encrypting disks (SEDs) compliant with
460       the TCG Opal 2 specification if the sedutil-cli executable is
461       installed.
462
463       Self-encrypting disk support includes
464
465       ·   recovery (saving and restoring the system’s SED configuration),
466
467       ·   setting up SEDs, including assigning a disk password,
468
469       ·   providing a pre-boot authentication (PBA) system to unlock SEDs at
470           boot time.
471
472       To prepare booting from an SED, run rear mkopalpba, then create the
473       rescue system.
474
475       To set up an SED, boot the Relax-and-Recover rescue system and run rear
476       opaladmin setupERASE DEVICE (DEVICE being the disk device path like
477       /dev/sda).
478
479       For complete information, consult the section "Support for TCG Opal
480       2-compliant Self-Encrypting Disks" in the Relax-and-Recover user guide.
481

CONFIGURATION

483       To configure Relax-and-Recover you have to edit the configuration files
484       in /etc/rear/. All *.conf files there are part of the configuration,
485       but only site.conf and local.conf are intended for the user
486       configuration. All other configuration files hold defaults for various
487       distributions and should not be changed.
488
489       In /etc/rear/templates/ there are also some template files which are
490       used by Relax-and-Recover to create configuration files (mostly for the
491       boot environment). Modify the templates to adjust the information
492       contained in the emails produced by Relax-and-Recover. You can use
493       these templates to prepend your own configurations to the configuration
494       files created by Relax-and-Recover, for example you can edit
495       PXE_pxelinux.cfg to add some general pxelinux configuration you use.
496
497       In almost all circumstances you have to configure two main settings and
498       their parameters: The backup method and the output method.
499
500       The backup method defines, how your data is to be saved and whether
501       Relax-and-Recover should backup your data as part of the mkrescue
502       process or whether you use an external application, e.g. backup
503       software to archive your data.
504
505       The output method defines how the rescue system is written to disk and
506       how you plan to boot the failed computer from the rescue system.
507
508       See the default configuration file /usr/share/rear/conf/default.conf
509       for an overview of the possible methods and their options.
510
511       An example to use TSM for backup and ISO for output would be to add
512       these lines to /etc/rear/local.conf (no need to define a BACKUP_URL
513       when using an external backup solution):
514
515           BACKUP=TSM
516           OUTPUT=ISO
517
518       And if all your systems use NTP for time synchronisation, you can also
519       add these lines to /etc/rear/site.conf
520
521           TIMESYNC=NTP
522
523       Do not forget to distribute the site.conf to all your systems.
524
525       The resulting ISO image will be created in /var/lib/rear/output/. You
526       can now modify the behaviour by copying the appropriate configuration
527       variables from default.conf to local.conf and changing them to suit
528       your environment.
529

EXIT STATUS

531       0
532           Successful program execution.
533
534       >0
535           Usage, syntax or execution errors. Check the log file in
536           /var/log/rear/ for more information.
537

EXAMPLES

539       To print out the current settings for BACKUP and OUTPUT methods and
540       some system information. This command can be used to see the supported
541       features for the given release and platform.
542
543           # rear dump
544
545       To create a new rescue environment. Do not forget to copy the resulting
546       rescue system away so that you can use it in the case of a system
547       failure.
548
549           # rear -v mkrescue
550
551       To create a new rescue image together with a complete archive of your
552       local system run the command:
553
554           # rear -v mkbackup
555

FILES

557       /usr/sbin/rear
558           The program itself.
559
560       /etc/rear/local.conf
561           System specific configuration can be set here.
562
563       /etc/rear/site.conf
564           Site specific configuration can be set here (not created by
565           default).
566
567       /var/log/rear/
568           Directory holding the log files.
569
570       /tmp/rear.####
571           Relax-and-Recover working directory. If Relax-and-Recover exits
572           with an error, you must remove this directory manually.
573
574       /usr/share/rear
575           Relax-and-Recover script components.
576
577       /usr/share/rear/conf/default.conf
578           Relax-and-Recover default values. Contains a complete set of
579           parameters and its explanation. Please do not edit or modify. Copy
580           values to local.conf or site.conf instead.
581

BUGS

583       Feedback is welcome, please report any issues or improvements to our
584       issue-tracker at: http://github.com/rear/issues/
585
586       Furthermore, we welcome pull requests via GitHub.
587

SEE ALSO

589       Relax-and-Recover comes with extensive documentation located in
590       /usr/share/doc.
591

AUTHORS

593       The ReaR project was initiated in 2006 by Schlomo Schapiro
594       (https://github.com/schlomo) and Gratien D’haese
595       (https://github.com/gdha) and has since then seen a lot of
596       contributions by many authors. As ReaR deals with bare metal disaster
597       recovery, there is a large amount of code that was contributed by
598       owners and users of specialized hardware and software. Without their
599       combined efforts and contributions ReaR would not be the universal
600       Linux bare metal disaster recovery solution that it is today.
601
602       As time passed the project was lucky to get the support of additional
603       developers to also help as maintainers: Dag Wieers
604       (https://github.com/dagwieers), Jeroen Hoekx
605       (https://github.com/jhoekx), Johannes Meixner
606       (https://github.com/jsmeix), Vladimir Gozora
607       (https://github.com/gozora) and Sébastien Chabrolles
608       (https://github.com/schabrolles). We hope that ReaR continues to prove
609       useful and to attract more developers who agree to be maintainers.
610       Please refer to the MAINTAINERS
611       (https://github.com/rear/rear/blob/master/MAINTAINERS) file for the
612       list of active and past maintainers.
613
614       To see the full list of authors and their contributions please look at
615       the git history (https://github.com/rear/rear/graphs/contributors). We
616       are very thankful to all authors and encourage anybody interested to
617       take a look at our source code and to contribute what you find
618       important.
619
620       Relax-and-Recover is a collaborative process using Github at
621       http://github.com/rear/
622
623       The Relax-and-Recover website is located at:
624       http://relax-and-recover.org/
625
627       (c) 2006-2020
628
629       The copyright is held by the original authors of the respective code
630       pieces as can be seen in the git history at
631       https://github.com/rear/rear/graphs/contributors
632
633       Relax-and-Recover comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details see
634       the GNU General Public License at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html
635
636
637
638                                 17 June 2020                          REAR(8)
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