[tahoe-dev] Potential use for personal backup

[Jean Lorchat]

Hello,

I just wanted to add my own little perspective about backups.

I'm living in a country that has been shaken by 2+1 almost simultaneous 
disasters. So I can tell that multiple nodes is not just an advantage, 
it is mandatory. I can't think of something as a backup solution if it 
keeps all eggs in the same geographical basket.

And for me, encryption is mandatory as well. It's the only way to make 
sure that nobody's peeking (think google drive or your typical free 
ad-supported online backup service, ah ah). It allows you to put your 
own personal data in places you wouldn't fully trust otherwise 
(friend/cloud/rented/hosted). Finally, it allows to make sure that the 
data cannot be easily recovered if you lack the key (anyone thinking 
megaupload ?).

I am not very familiar with all the backup solutions mentioned here, but 
I am pretty sure that Tahoe-LAFS can be a backend for most of them. It 
is a very good lower layer for many things !

Cheers,
Jean

On 05/23/2012 05:50 AM, Saint Germain wrote:
> On Tue, 22 May 2012 13:36:24 -0700, Peter Secor<secorp at secorp.net>
> wrote :
>>> On Tue, 22 May 2012 13:01:58 -0600, "Zooko Wilcox-O'Hearn"
>>> <zooko at zooko.com>  wrote :
>> <PS>  Thanks for the kind words, zooko is particularly good at
>> responding well to questions both asked and unasked.
>>
>
> Hello and thanks for your answer.
>
>>>
>>> Indeed what I had in mind was not possible with tahoe. It was mainly
>>> because I couldn't imagine such a radical different approach.
>>>
>>> So as I understand it makes no real sense to have a node on my home
>>> computer and it makes no real sense either to have a single node on
>>> my remote server. So I have indeed to participate in some kind of
>>> VolunteerGrid2 (I don't know anyone else as curious as me).
>>> It's quite a psychological step to "give" your backups to people you
>>> don't know, even if it is encrypted. But I _do_ understand all the
>>> advantages.
>>>
>> <PS>  Here is one idea for a solution in your scenario. The setup
>> would be that you have let's say a laptop that you carry around with
>> you and a home server. You can set up a local node on your laptop
>> that is a non-storage node (one line in the config file - under the
>> [storage] section set "enabled=true"). Then, you can set up a storage
>> node on your home computer server and just make shares.needed=1,
>> shares.happy=1, and shares.total=1, meaning no expansion, just
>> straight 1-to-1 mapping for the encrypted file to shares on the
>> server. Run the introducer on that server as well, and then every
>> time your laptop is awake and you run a "tahoe cp" or "tahoe backup",
>> it will use the local non-storage node on the laptop to encrypt the
>> file and then transfer it over to your home server.
>>
>> For bonus points, if you configure a helper on your home server
>> (again, a one line config file change - under the [helper] section set
>> "enabled=true") and you have enough disk space, it will actually
>> handle partial uploads and restart if your connection dies. This is
>> quite useful when transferring large files. However, none of this
>> handles the big file with a small change (VM) scenario very well, for
>> that you'd need some other method.
>>
>
> Hum yes but in that case I don't see the advantage of tahoe over other
> backup solutions like bup/obnam/backshift/BURP (except maybe
> encryption).
> For backups, the real advantage of tahoe is the multi-node architecture
> I think (many backups software also offer encryption).
>
>>> I suppose that it is possible that I contribute one node to
>>> VolunteerGrid2 which can be used by my whole family and friends,
>>> each having its private encrypted store ?
>>>
>> This could be possible, just contact the volunteer grid group with a
>> description of what you want to do and that will provoke a discussion
>> about it and what the general rules of engagement and use are.
>>
>>>
>>> The only problem I see, is that I will be limited by the storage
>>> capacity. The remote server I intend to rent has 2 TB and I was
>>> already thinking that it was too small for my "group" (5-10
>>> people). I understant that it is better on VolunteerGrid2 if I
>>> contribute between 500 GB and 1 TB ?
>>>
>> <PS>Again, this is probably a good discussion to have with the
>> volunteer grid group, perhaps they will encourage people to start
>> contributing more and you could be a push in that direction.
>>
>
> Ok. I will do that if I decide to go with tahoe-LAFS !
>
> Thanks again
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