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From: lewis@cel.fmc.COM (Bil Lewis)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: On backups
Message-ID: <7534@brl-adm.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 26-May-87 11:27:39 EDT
Article-I.D.: brl-adm.7534
Posted: Tue May 26 11:27:39 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 28-May-87 02:02:10 EDT
Sender: news@brl-adm.ARPA
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     For facilities like BRL with heavy scientific and engineering applications
     ,
     it is not uncommon for a single scientist to produce 300+ Mbytes of
     "new" (different) data.  Each machine (even the aging VAXen) tends to
     have >2 Gbytes each, and we have serveral dozen machines.
     Your strategy, while nice, does not address this type of environment.

But Mike, you certainly don't mean to claim that each scientist is
typing in at the rate of... 3k/second!  So what you mean is you are
CHANGING 300+ MB.  The real question is the regeneration costs vs. the
archiving costs.  For our vision folks, that cost is zilch.  What is it
for yours?

     When I was visiting Martin Marietta in ~1980, they described their
     backup system (for their PDP-11/70 IS/1 UNIX systems) that is virtually
     the same as your system.  (sorry).

Sorry?  EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD has already been thought of by someone.
The real question is what they do (or don't do) with the ideas.  We're
saving est. $50k/year with it.  We're quite pleased.  

Plus the fact, I have seen absolutely nothing published, so I'll get a
cheap paper out of it too.  My very last act at FMC (I'm leaving Fri) is a
real winner.  No need for sadness here!

Regards
-Bilu