Philip Stubbs wrote:
> * alan c (aeclist@???) wrote:
>> I have a network attached storage unit - a case from Maplin and a
>> spare drive I had. It has a smb server and an ftp server, and
>> they seem to work, at least, basically. (Mobile Landisk). It is
>> intended to use fat32 format and can use its own internal
>> facility for formatting.
>>
>> I would like to aim at using it on my network maybe for backup
>> with a facilty such as rdiff-backup (I think it is based on
>> rsync) for example. I am not sure if the device is it is a
>> perfect implementation of an smb server.
>
> OK. Have you read the man page for rsync? If the backup program
> that you are going to use is based on it, it would help.
>
> I think I am correct that if you want to rsync to another machine,
> then that machine should have sshd running and rsync installed. I
> doubt that your box will have that.
>
> What I think you need to do is mount the drive using samba, as you
> are, and then use rsync or whatever as if you are copying between
> two locations on the same host.
> $ rsync /home /mnt/backup
> Does that make sense?
Yes indeed, thanks. Initially I was unsure and continually failing
with initial attempts to mount with an smb share. The fruits of google
were also a bit too cryptic. And finding that I had to use the IP
address only, not the hostname (which did not work) was very
unsettling. I was not sure for a long time that the NAS box was
actually working satisfactorily. It did say linux on the box - good
for Maplin (note1) :-) but various blog postings suggested that about
half of the purchasers ended up returning them for whatever reason.
I found a useful thread in ubuntu forums covering beginners stuff
which was very useful. For the record:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=280473
quick summary:
install smbfs and smbclient if not already installed, then mount with
such as (simplistic example, use the NAS IP address of course)
sudo smbmount //192.168.1.2/store1 /home/username/temp -o
uid=1000,umask=000,user,rw
Along this same track I later found also that rdiff-backup - my
preferred package to date - did not work with a mounted samba share
(python error of some kind), although rsync does :-) so I am
shifting allegiances. Also it became clear that this NAS box does not
have cifs capability only smb, which I think will be ok for me,
although people seem to prefer cifs mounts I think.
Note1: Maplin (Reading) also were displaying several copies for sale
of a beginners book Linux in Easy Steps. A glossy attractive papaerback
with colour pictures. Nice. :-)
--
alan cocks
Kubuntu user#10391
