-Item h7: Commercial database support
- Origin: Russell Howe <russell_howe dot wreckage dot org>
- Date: 26 July 2006
- Status:
-
- What: It would be nice for the database backend to support more databases.
- I'm thinking of SQL Server at the moment, but I guess Oracle, DB2,
- MaxDB, etc are all candidates. SQL Server would presumably be
- implemented using FreeTDS or maybe an ODBC library?
-
- Why: We only really have one database server, which is MS SQL Server 2000.
- Maintaining a second one for the backup software (we grew out of
- SQLite, which I liked, but which didn't work so well with our
- database size). We don't really have a machine with the resources
- to run postgres, and would rather only maintain a single DBMS.
- We're stuck with SQL Server because pretty much all the company's
- custom applications (written by consultants) are locked into SQL
- Server 2000. I can imagine this scenario is fairly common, and it
- would be nice to use the existing properly specced database server
- for storing Bacula's catalog, rather than having to run a second
- DBMS.
-
- Notes: This might be nice, but someone other than me will probably need to
- implement it, and at the moment, proprietary code cannot legally
- be mixed with Bacula GPLed code. This would be possible only
- providing the vendors provide GPLed (or OpenSource) interface
- code.
-
-Item h8: Incorporation of XACML2/SAML2 parsing
- Date: 19 January 2006
- Origin: Adam Thornton <athornton@sinenomine.net>
- Status: Blue sky
-
- What: XACML is "eXtensible Access Control Markup Language" and "SAML is
- the "Security Assertion Markup Language"--an XML standard for
- making statements about identity and authorization. Having these
- would give us a framework to approach ACLs in a generic manner,
- and in a way flexible enough to support the four major sorts of
- ACLs I see as a concern to Bacula at this point, as well as
- (probably) to deal with new sorts of ACLs that may appear in the
- future.
-
- Why: Bacula is beginning to need to back up systems with ACLs that do not
- map cleanly onto traditional Unix permissions. I see four sets of
- ACLs--in general, mutually incompatible with one another--that
- we're going to need to deal with. These are: NTFS ACLs, POSIX
- ACLs, NFSv4 ACLS, and AFS ACLS. (Some may question the relevance
- of AFS; AFS is one of Sine Nomine's core consulting businesses,
- and having a reputable file-level backup and restore technology
- for it (as Tivoli is probably going to drop AFS support soon since
- IBM no longer supports AFS) would be of huge benefit to our
- customers; we'd most likely create the AFS support at Sine Nomine
- for inclusion into the Bacula (and perhaps some changes to the
- OpenAFS volserver) core code.)
-
- Now, obviously, Bacula already handles NTFS just fine. However, I
- think there's a lot of value in implementing a generic ACL model,
- so that it's easy to support whatever particular instances of ACLs
- come down the pike: POSIX ACLS (think SELinux) and NFSv4 are the
- obvious things arriving in the Linux world in a big way in the
- near future. XACML, although overcomplicated for our needs,
- provides this framework, and we should be able to leverage other
- people's implementations to minimize the amount of work *we* have
- to do to get a generic ACL framework. Basically, the costs of
- implementation are high, but they're largely both external to
- Bacula and already sunk.
-
- Notes: As you indicate this is a bit of "blue sky" or in other words,
- at the moment, it is a bit esoteric to consider for Bacula.
-
-Item h9: Archive data
- Date: 15/5/2006
- Origin: calvin streeting calvin at absentdream dot com
- Status:
-
- What: The abilty to archive to media (dvd/cd) in a uncompressed format
- for dead filing (archiving not backing up)
-
- Why: At work when jobs are finished and moved off of the main
- file servers (raid based systems) onto a simple Linux
- file server (ide based system) so users can find old
- information without contacting the IT dept.
-
- So this data dosn't realy change it only gets added to,
- But it also needs backing up. At the moment it takes
- about 8 hours to back up our servers (working data) so
- rather than add more time to existing backups i am trying
- to implement a system where we backup the acrhive data to
- cd/dvd these disks would only need to be appended to
- (burn only new/changed files to new disks for off site
- storage). basialy understand the differnce between
- achive data and live data.
-
- Notes: Scan the data and email me when it needs burning divide
- into predefined chunks keep a recored of what is on what
- disk make me a label (simple php->mysql=>pdf stuff) i
- could do this bit ability to save data uncompresed so
- it can be read in any other system (future proof data)
- save the catalog with the disk as some kind of menu
- system
-
- Notes: Kern: I don't understand this item, and in any case, if it
- is specific to DVD/CDs, which we do not recommend using,
- it is unlikely to be implemented except as a user
- submitted patch.
-
-
-Item h10: Clustered file-daemons
- Origin: Alan Brown ajb2 at mssl dot ucl dot ac dot uk
- Date: 24 July 2006
- Status:
- What: A "virtual" filedaemon, which is actually a cluster of real ones.
-
- Why: In the case of clustered filesystems (SAN setups, GFS, or OCFS2, etc)
- multiple machines may have access to the same set of filesystems