Backup

  The Law of Backup says "If you don't back up your files, the question is not whether you will lose them, but only when it will happen." That is why a lot of attention is paid to this topic, including on our website. Today we will not talk about well-known commercial harvesters, but about a fairly simple and at the same time powerful professional backup system UrBackup with open source code. With its help, you can set up a backup of the system and files in the office or home network, so to speak, "in a couple of clicks."

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  UrBackup is a cross-platform client-server system and supports various Linux, Windows and Mac OS distributions. It also supports working with databases MySQL and others.

  The system is able to create full and incremental backups of the operating system and files, has compression and deduplication functions, as well as extensive options for configuring scheduled backups. It is possible to create backups over the local network and over the Internet. The use of the system is absolutely free, there is a multilingual interface, including Russian.

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  Since UrBackup is a client / server application, it requires at least two PCs to run. One of them acts as a server and all backups from other computers will be stored on it. The UrBackup Server server application is installed on it. The UrBackup Client client part is installed on the other computers from which backups will be made. There is nothing complicated during the installation process, everything is absolutely standard - choose the language, agree with the license, choose the installation path and that's it. The only thing is that at the end of the installation of the client part, it is suggested to select the files and partitions that you plan to back up.

 

  You can use one of the suggested options or specify the desired paths manually. In general, everything is very simple, as they say, "even a child can handle it." But do not be confused by the ease of installation, there are great possibilities inside!

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  After installing the client part, a shortcut appears in the START menu, and a program icon appears in the system tray, through which all interaction with the application takes place. This is how it will look after the client connects to the server.

  If the computers are on the same local network, the client and server detect each other automatically, without requiring any additional settings. If computers need to be connected via the Internet, then in the client settings you need to check the corresponding box and set the server address.

  You do not need to specify the password, it will appear on its own after connecting to the server. But limiting the maximum speed of the backup via the Internet can be very useful. Note that immediately after the connection, the backup will start and by this moment the paths to the partitions and folders that you want to backup should be configured.

  On the "File backup" settings tab, you can change the intervals and the number of full and incremental backups, as well as specify individual folders or files that you want to exclude or include in backups.

  The latter is very useful for excluding a large amount of data that does not need to be backed up, for example, the "GAMES" folder. True, this is not very convenient - in one line separated by semicolons. On the "Image" settings tab, similar parameters are set for creating images of partitions - the system drive "C" and others as desired, which fits into the corresponding field.

  Please note that the backup schedule is initially not active, which is logical, since it is usually important to save the original system image, plus it takes quite a lot. Well, on the "Client" tab, you can change the computer name, set convenient days and backup times in a simple format , the delay after the system start and limit the backup speed in the local network.

  On this, in general, the client settings end, in principle, the main thing that needs to be done is to specify the sections and files that need to be included in the backup.

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  There are more settings for the UrBackup server, but again, to get started with the system, you need to perform just a few simple steps. Access to the server settings is carried out through the web interface in any browser at the address "localhost: 55414" or using the shortcut in the "START" menu.

  First of all, you need to set the folder on the disk where the backups will be saved.

  Then it is proposed to disable the creation of file names in the obsolete 8.3 format on the disk where the backup will be made, in order to avoid possible problems.

 

  This is done very simply from the command line on behalf of the administrator using the specified command, which can be simply copied from the web interface.

  Don't worry, this can always be rolled back by setting the value "0" instead of "1" at the end of the line. The UrBackup server has many more settings for backing up files, images, access rights, internet, security, notifications, etc. with which you you can check out the following screenshots.

  I think now you understand how wide possibilities this system has and how flexibly it can be customized for yourself.

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  After the initial configuration, the UrBackup server should detect the clients and the backup process will begin, which is reflected in the "Status" tab of the server admin panel.

 

  You can also track the backup process in the Status window on the client.

  You can track the backup activity in more detail in the admin panel on the "In Progress", "Backups" and "Logs" tabs.

  And the "Statistics" tab displays data on disk space usage by various clients.

  UrBackup consumes few computer resources, does not interfere with the user's work and at the same time perfectly copes with its tasks.

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  Disk partition images are stored as files in the "VHDZ" format.

  They can be restored to the original disk in case of failure using the UrBackup Restore utility, which is an image from which you can make a bootable disk or a USB flash drive. The file folders are backed up in an open form, in the same way as they were on the client's computer, which does their recovery is generally hassle-free.