NAME
afserver - the server program of the afbackup package
SYNOPSIS
afserver [ -b ] [ -L <locale> ] [ <configuration-file> ]
DESCRIPTION
The server program. It must be started by the inetd-superdaemon. The
configuration-file is read as /usr/server/lib/server.conf if not given
explicitly.
-b Turns off buffering mode. This reduces performance but seems to
be necessary on some OSes
-L <locale>
Set the locale to the given string. Note, that this option might
not be honoured due to insufficiencies of the gettext
implementation on some systems
FILES
/usr/server/lib/server.conf
Server configuration file (See: afserver.conf(8))
/var/log/afbackup
The directory for logging the server actions
/var/lib/afbackup
Save internal state information of the server here
/var/lib/afbackup/status
This file is updated, whenever a notable server status change
occurs. The file is always removed and created again as status
changes occur often and they are not worth keeping. This file
only serves the purpose to get an information about what is
currently going on. While reading or writing the current
throughput is reported here about every 5 seconds. Logging of
errors or warnings goes to the configured logfile
/var/lib/afbackup/pref_client
This file is maintained to prevent colliding client accesses.
The clients should have a chance to get the server always again,
when querying several times within a certain interval. The
previously served client and a timestamp is saved here to grant
this client preferred service within a certain interval.
Actually since version 3.3.5 this file is obsolete
/var/lib/afbackup/bytes_on_tape
The persistent counters of the server side. A maximum number of
bytes per tape can be configured and the server must remember,
how much he had written to all of the tapes. It makes no sense
to count them all each time a cartridge is loaded. The format
of each line is:
<cartridge-number>: <number-of-bytes-on-tape> <number-of-files-
on-tape> <tape-full-flag> <last-writing-timestamp>
/var/lib/afbackup/tapepos
The name of this file can be configured in the serverside
configuration file, but i think, noone will ever change it. This
file contains entries, that specify tape positions in different
contexts. Lines starting with a number followed by a colon
specify the writing position for the cartridge set specified by
the leading number. Lines starting with a device name field
indicate, what tape in which position is currently in that
drive. Each pair of numbers specifying a position consists of a
cartridge number and a file number
/var/lib/afbackup/precious_tapes
This file contains a line for each client, listing which
cartridges the client needs for restoring everything it saved
and it wants access to. All cartridges listed here are
considered read-only, if they have no more space on tape to
write to. If they have free space, new data is appended at the
end of the last file on tape during write
/var/lib/afbackup/readonly_tapes
This file contains lists of cartridge numbers, that should not
be written to anymore. This file can be edited or modified
sending an appropriate server message (See: afclient, option
-M). The format of this file is simply numbers, ranges or comma-
separated numbers of cartridges. A range can be given as
[<start-number>]-[<end-number>], e.g. 2-4, -2 or 8-. In the
last example the number of cartridges configured in the server
configuration file will be applied for the end of the list
/var/lib/afbackup/cartridge_order
The server must remind, what tape follows which other one,
because their order no longer follows the number of the
cartridge and the server no longer starts writing the first one
after the last one is full. Tapes can be set read-only or marked
crucial for restoring some client. So it may occur, that the
server must skip one or more tapes to find a writable one. Also
in full append mode it might happen, that it is not the first
file on tape, who follows the last one on a full tape. In this
file the order is saved, what file on which tape must be read,
when a certain tape is exhausted. Behind the number of the
cartridge in the first column and the arrow characters -> the
following numbers name the tape and file to be read next. This
file should be saved to some other location, because it is
crucial for restore
/var/lib/afbackup/tape_uses
This file contains a list of cartridge numbers in the first
column, followed by a colon : . The second column contains a
number indicating, how often this tape has become full up to
now. This number is supplied to the configured Tape-Full-Command
, whenever a tape becomes full
/var/lib/afbackup/cartridge_locations
This file contains the database, where the cartridges currently
can be found. The first column is the cartridge number, followed
by a colon. A space follows and the rest of the line either
contains three fields: the device name of the media changer, a
word to specify the location class (drive, slot or loadport),
and a number counting instances of location classes, e.g.
/dev/rmt/stctl0 slot 6 If the rest of the line is not of this
form, it is considered to be a freetext description
/var/lib/afbackup/ever_used_blocksizes
This file contains a list of all the tape blocksizes, that have
ever been used on the the server. The list is used to quickly
find the correct blocksize for reading, when the tape cannot be
read with the configured one. If tapes are used, that come from
another server and have a tape blocksize, that this server has
never seen, the unknown blocksize should be added to this file
manually, one per line
SEE ALSO
afclientconfig(8), xafclientconfig(8), full_backup(8), incr_backup(8),
afverify(8), afrestore(8), xafrestore(8), update_indexes(8),
copy_tape(8), afclient.conf(8), afserver(8), afmserver(8),
afserver.conf(8), cartis(8), cartready(8), label_tape(8), tar(1)
AUTHOR
afbackup was written by Albert Fluegel (af@muc.de). This manpage was
extracted from the text docs by Christian Meder (meder@isr.uni-
stuttgart.de).