DeviceImage Tools

[sarah_b]

Seeing Partimage is no longer being developed, I was looking for a new imagining program and ran onto this. At first I thought I could use the Knoppix Live CD 5.1, but I must have read the article wrong, the CD did not have Zsplit or Unzsplit on it. I did a google and found out that [b]Zsplit[/b] or [b]Unzsplit[/b] is included on a re mastering Knoppix Live CD, I am not to sure exactly what that is. It sounded like a CD that had to be compiled, not sure.

I just wanted to share with you all that I was able to compile the tar.gz, and the install went really well, I normally do not have all that much luck compiling from source. So, that is a good start. I already though have a problem (I think) so I will be posting that later in the proper sub-forum. I am excited about learning to use DeviceImage.

[sarah_b]

Is there still any development activity in progress for DeviceImage. After searching the forums here a bit, I was wondering, there does not seem to be much going on. Please let me know...............

sarah

[sarah_b]

I did some testing, I made an image of three different hard drives with the ext3 file system and did not have any problems and restored without any problems.

I noticed it is slower than Partimage. I have not checked on the compression ratio of each. But I am extremely happy with DeviceImage.

[jurij]

Dear Sarah,

thank you very much for good reference for my tools zsplit/unzsplit. For developer like me it is always very helpful and its leverage me if someone is happy with a solution.
As to your questions:
The development of these tools is now in the stage of sampling new ideas. The main philosophy behind these tools – they must be small and very flexible in order to be used in scripts or as part of other applications. I think that the next step, what I am thinking about and I am still not sure whether this feature really would be helpful, is the progress indicator. Conceptually this feature belongs rather to some sort application with a real user interface, it means the main philosophy could be broken on this place.
Next question: if I understand you well, you would like to know why zsplit/unzsplit take more time for restore as Partimage. The main difference between these solutions is the fact that Partimage tries to save only used sectors – zsplit otherwise goes the safest way and saves all sectors. Therefore there is still this difference in the time consumption.

Regards,
Jurij

[sarah_b]

[quote="jurij"]
The development of these tools is now in the stage of sampling new ideas.

The main philosophy behind these tools – they must be small and very flexible in order to be used in scripts or as part of other applications.[/quote]
That sounds reasonable !

[quote]
I think that the next step, what I am thinking about and I am still not sure whether this feature really would be helpful, is the progress indicator. [/quote]

I believe I seen this in a thread posted here. I do my images when the computer is not being used, like the last thing of the day and in the morning it has been completed for sure.

jurij, thanks for your reply....now I know better what is going on here, I appreciate that !

cheers, sarah

[NigoX2]

hello,

[quote="jurij"]zsplit otherwise goes the safest way and saves all sectors[/quote]
this is allright, but talking about the image size, isn'it possible to blank the unused blocks using the operating system, before using zsplit ? since it uses a zlib compression, this should improve drastically the image size, isn'it ?

I suppose what the G4U doc says about it is valid here
http://www.feyrer.de/g4u/#shrinkimg
another gentoo wiki here
http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Backup#netcat_.2B_dd

[jurij]

Hi NigoX2,

regarding this question please see the following discussion:
[url]http://www.device-image.de/forum/phpBB2/admin/index.php?admin=1&sid=46877155309466c5c5bc4fd57179218e[/url]

Regards,
Jurij

[NigoX2]

your link point to an admin section, I can't access it :wink:

[jurij]

Sorry,

this one should be ok:
[url]http://www.device-image.de/forum/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=18[/url]


Regards,
Jurij