[Box Backup] Web Management Interface

[Peter Jalajas, GigaLock Backup Services]

Hi Chris,

On Sat, Nov 8, 2008 at 1:49 PM, Chris Wilson <chris@qwirx.com> wrote:
> Hi Pete,
>
> On Sat, 8 Nov 2008, Peter Jalajas, GigaLock Backup Services wrote:
>
> Well I agree that it would be good for me to work on Boxi, but one of the
> best options for me is a partnership with a company that will sell Box
> Backup accounts for me. If they sell enough, it will help to pay for me to
> work on Boxi. But they're not Unix experts and need a better way to manage
> accounts.

Yes, my situation exactly.

> Also, the key management on Windows is really hard at the moment, and this
> is a big part of making it easier (by sorting out the CSR and certificate
> transfer). The other part is a script that I have planned for Windows
> should make it much easier.

I'd offer to help, but I haven't been very good at following up on
such offers.  FWIW, I have a script that I run by hand on my separate
key CA machine that handles much of the process.  My reseller requests
an account via my website, I run the script, and it:
1) chooses an account number,
2) generates the keys and signs the csr,
3) creates the account on the store server via keyless ssh,  and
4) sends the reseller a .7z file, encrypted to the reseller's
pre-shared password (gosh I wish I could get them to use PKI!), that
contains the client keys encrypted in another client .7z, and that
also contains another file with the unique password for that client
.7z file.
The reseller then:
5) unzips their reseller .7z file on their own machine (not the client
machine),
6) obtains the client keys and the client .7z file password inside there,
7) puts the client .7z file in the correct place on the client
machine, and then
8) runs a little batch file I have there that runs 7za.exe to unzip
the client .7z file, prompting for that client .7z password.
Maybe some of that logic(!) can be applied to your tool?
Suggestions welcome!

>> While on the subject, while boxi is still under development, I'm about
>> to hire a java developer buddy to work with me to create a gui wrapper
>> around the boxbackup windows client .exe command lines.  For queries and
>> restores, it would be really handy, if I understand it correctly, to
>> read from bbackupd.dat instead of contacting the server each time. Do
>> you have any suggestions in that regard?  Do we already have a tool for
>> reading that file?  Is bbackupd.dat documented somewhere ('cept in the
>> code)?
>
> Not sure what you mean by bbackupd.dat? Is that the StoreObjectInfoFile?

Yes, sorry.

> I'm afraid it's not documented, I think Chromi wrote the code, I can
> explain the binary format to you if it helps (it's actually quite simple)

Please do.  I'm hoping that my java gui can use that file to quickly
build a snappy interactive file-and-directory tree, including old and
deleted files (instead of having to use 'bbackupquery "list -dotsr"
quit | findstr ...'), for more convenient queries and restores.

> but there's absolutely no guarantee that it won't change in future, or
> even that it will be present at a particular time (e.g. it's deleted at
> the start of a backup and only recreated if/when the backup finishes
> successfully).

Understood.

Thanks,
Pete