From:	SMTP%"hammond@star.enet.dec.com" 29-MAR-1995 15:03:23.44
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Subj:	Re:  Standalone on an Alpha

From: hammond@star.enet.dec.com ()
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Subject: Re:  Standalone on an Alpha
Date: 29 Mar 1995 16:37:56 GMT
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In article <135872@cup.portal.com>, Chris_F_Chiesa@cup.portal.com writes:  

..
>>Both of these options give you full access to all DCL commands,
>>not just BACKUP.
>
>Neither of which amounts to a hill of beans if you have hundreds of 
>customer systems running OpenVMS Alpha V6.1 with just ONE disk drive,
>and have ONE OpenVMS Alpha OS CD-ROM ...

Well, it's not often that I get to say "Thank you for the flame"
and actually mean it with full sincerity.  But this is such a case.
These comments are not the first I've received on this issue, but they
tripped something in my mind that may just make for a better future 
version of OpenVMS AXP.

So, Chris, THANK YOU!

..and since the future won't help you today, here is the "poor man's" version.

PLEASE NOTE:
    
    THIS IS NOT OFFICIALLY SUPPORTED BY DIGITAL EQUIPMENT CORPORATION.
    IT HAS BEEN MINIMALLY TESTED IN A SMALL Alpha ENVIRONMENT AND WORKED.
    A GREAT DEAL OF FURTHER TESTING IS REQUIRED TO MAKE IT "PRODUCT QUALITY".
    NOTE THAT THIS WILL WORK *ONLY* TO BACK UP A SYSTEM DISK; YOU WILL 
    STILL HAVE TO BOOT FROM A CD IF YOU NEED TO RESTORE A SYSTEM DISK.


That said, give this a try:

Boot conversationaly.  On my system this requires:

    >>> b -fl 0,1

Other systems may require different or additional parameters.

You will see various messages, then you will get the SYSBOOT> prompt.
Enter the following:

    SYSBOOT> SET WLKSYSDSK 1
    SYSBOOT> SET STARTUP_P1 "MIN"
    SYSBOOT> SET WRITESYSPARAMS 0
    SYSBOOT> C

The system will continue booting; you will see various messages, including
some errors because the sytem disk is write locked.

When the system finishes booting, log in to the SYSTEM account -- or whatever
account you want to use to backup your system disk.

Because you did a "MIN" startup, you must now configure devices.
The command is:

    $ MCR SYSMAN IO AUTOCONFIG

If you do a SHOW DEVICE D you will see that only your system disk is mounted,
and it will be WRITE LOCKED.  (Just as the operating system CD-Rom is write 
locked when you booted it.)

Do a MOUNT/FOREIGN of the disk to which you want to back up your system disk.
For example, if your backup disk is DKB200 you might enter:

    $ MOUNT/FOREIGN DKB200:
                   
Now enter the BACKUP command.  For example, to do an image backup of your  
system disk you might enter:

    $ BACKUP /IMAGE SYS$SYSDEVICE: DKB200:

You could also use the actual device rather than SYS$SYSDEVICE.


Please let me know your reaction to this idea, and how/if it works for you.
-- 
      Charlie Hammond -- Digital Equipment Corporation -- Nashua NH USA
      
      All  opinions  expressed are my own and do not necessarily reflect
      my employer's position.

