Your data center’s backup needs might be able to be met by an open-source backup software package, possibly saving you quite a bit of money and giving you greater control over its functionality. One of the biggest reasons that some are interested in open-source backup software is that they have access to the code. This allows them to bend the product in ways they could not do with a commercial package. Let us have a look at a few open-source backup software packages. All of these provide support for Unix, Linux, Windows, and Mac OS, although to varying degrees.

Amanda is the oldest of the open-source backup software packages. Amanda stands for the Advanced Maryland Disk Archiver. On one level, Amanda is a scheduling, automation, and tracking program. The database that tracks all backups allows you to restore any file from any previous version of that file that was backed up by Amanda. On another level, Amanda is a sophisticated program that has a number of enterprise-level features, like how it automatically determines when to run your full backups, instead of having you schedule them. It’s also the only open-source package to have database agents for SQL Server, Exchange, SharePoint, Oracle, and the only backup package to have an agent for MySQL and Ingress.

Amanda is now backed by Zmanda, which has addressed major limitations in the product.

Bacula was originally written by Kern Sibbald. Bacula also has scheduling, automation and tracking of all backups performed by the product, allowing you to easily restore any file (or files) from any previous version. Like Amanda, it also has media management features that allow you to use automated tape libraries and perform disk-to-disk backups.

Both Amanda and Bacula have support for both disk and tape, scheduled full and incremental backups.

BackupPC is a disk-only backup tool that performs incremental backups, and stores those backups in their native format in a snapshot-like tree structure available via a GUI. Like Bacula, it is a file-only backup tool. It’s single most impressive feature is that it does file-level deduplication.

If you want the least proprietary backup format, you should choose BackupPC. If database agents are required, you’d choose Amanda. If you want the product most designed like a commercial backup application, you should choose Bacula. Amanda and BackupPC require a Linux server to control your backups, where Bacula does have a Windows version of their server. All three products are very popular. You can download a free version and try any of them before deciding to buy commercial support.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 25th, 2009 at 1:23 pm and is filed under Technical Updates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.