Backup Error

[jimmy....@gmail.com]

I'm trying out the backup feature in Qubes but getting an error.

I'm trying to save VMs totaling 22.4GB in size on a USB stick with 63GB free.

At 19% progress is get:
"[Dom0] Backup error!
ERROR: Failed to write the backup, VM output: cat: write error: File too large."

Is there a maximum file size for backups? A RAM limitation (I have 8GB RAM and when I do the backup about 6GB is free)? Something else I'm not thinking of?

I am able to do a small backup, such as just Dom0 itself.

Also a general question about backups: if I do a backup and then restore, will it add what I backed up to what is already on the system? Or completely overwrite everything? For example, if I have 10 VMs and backup 3, then restore the 3, will it just overwrite those three and leave the other 7 alone? Or will I only have those 3 and the other 7 are wiped out?

[Chris Laprise]

Likely the filesystem (FAT?) on the destination cannot handle files over
a certain size. You may want to reformat it with a native Linux fs like
Ext4.

--

Chris Laprise, tas...@openmailbox.org
https://twitter.com/ttaskett
PGP: BEE2 20C5 356E 764A 73EB 4AB3 1DC4 D106 F07F 1886

[Unman]

On Fri, Mar 17, 2017 at 03:31:24PM -0400, Chris Laprise wrote:
> On 03/17/2017 02:55 PM, jimmy....@gmail.com wrote:
> >I'm trying out the backup feature in Qubes but getting an error.
> >
> >I'm trying to save VMs totaling 22.4GB in size on a USB stick with 63GB free.
> >
> >At 19% progress is get:
> >"[Dom0] Backup error!
> >ERROR: Failed to write the backup, VM output: cat: write error: File too large."
> >
> >Is there a maximum file size for backups? A RAM limitation (I have 8GB RAM and when I do the backup about 6GB is free)? Something else I'm not thinking of?
> >
> >I am able to do a small backup, such as just Dom0 itself.
> >
> >Also a general question about backups: if I do a backup and then restore, will it add what I backed up to what is already on the system? Or completely overwrite everything? For example, if I have 10 VMs and backup 3, then restore the 3, will it just overwrite those three and leave the other 7 alone? Or will I only have those 3 and the other 7 are wiped out?
> >
>
> Likely the filesystem (FAT?) on the destination cannot handle files over a
> certain size. You may want to reformat it with a native Linux fs like Ext4.
>

To answer your general question, the restore operation will tell you
there is an existing qube with the same name and wont allow you to
overwrite it.
It certainly wont delete qubes not included in the restore.

As always the command line tool offers many more options and more
granular control - it still wont act on qubes not involved in the
restore operation, (unless you are doing something to their template
obviously.)

unman

[Todd Lasman]

Also, be sure you didn't make the mistake I made once. I (stupidly)
mounted by backup USB stick in Dom0. Then, when backing up Dom0, it
tried to back up all the data on the backup stick, which of course kept
increasing in size as more stuff got backed up onto it. I've since
learned to use a USBVM, and mount the stick in a dedicated BackupVM.

[jimmy....@gmail.com]

> Likely the filesystem (FAT?) on the destination cannot handle files over
> a certain size. You may want to reformat it with a native Linux fs like
> Ext4.
>
> --
>
> Chris Laprise, tas...@openmailbox.org
> https://twitter.com/ttaskett
> PGP: BEE2 20C5 356E 764A 73EB 4AB3 1DC4 D106 F07F 1886

That was indeed the issue, thanks for the insight and suggestion!