[Box Backup] System Backups?

[Joe Krahn]

OK, it seems that boxbackup is not really a system backup tool, but a 
"user data" backup tool, based on the fact that it recommends NOT to 
backup the root directory. Is it intended NOT to be for full system 
backups? Or is it just not that far along yet?

Even though it's lacking in features, the core data design is very good, 
and all of the mature backup systems are tape based (though I can't 
understand why...)

Here's my wish list:

1) Full system backups, including disk partitioning info, and filesystem 
configuration data. (An advanced version of this could take advantage of 
redundancy across systems, where the level zero backup is also a diff 
against some reference system).

2) A utility for doing a full or partial restore from outside the native 
OS (i.e. a mini-Linux recovery CD that can do full backups and restores).

3) An idea I just thought of: user-land RAID across separate servers. I 
think of what would happen if a RAID server caught on fire and burned 
multiple disks. That's why I like the idea of using RAID for backups, 
rather than trying to set up a live RAID to run on.

4) don't use just "box" for boxbackup related filenames because it's not 
very unique or descriptive.  -- /etc/boxbackup is better than /etc/box.
Actually, I would probably modify the project name to include something 
about disk-based, redundant, secure backup. One could make a nice 
acronym from "Scabbard", for example; more unique but also not very 
descriptive.

Are these in line with the general plans for the future of boxbackup?
(Except #4 -- which is just an opinion.)

Joe