[geeks] Backup software (yeah, yeah, I know)

[der Mouse]

> The last few times I had to do backups, I wrote my own stuff, but
> that was using tape.

> I prefer tape over just about anything else.  It works.

> The rest of the crap out there doesn't.

> Unfortunately tape drives and media that are actually good are also
> quite expensive, even for business use.

Right.  For most sites, for the price of a tape drive and tapes, you
can buy enough disks to do backups to disk.

>> Amanda 2.6.1 needs glib, which needs pkg-config.  I brought over all
>> three and started trying to make them build.
> What are the issues with glib[?]  I avoid it when possible just
> because I don't like GNU stuff most of the time, but what do you
> dislike about it?

glib is a part of GTK, and, while it's GPLed, I don't recall it looking
like a GNU thing.  (glib != glibc.)

I don't have any particular reason to dislike glib except as I
described in my email.

>> The Makefile uses nonstandard, apparently GNU-make-specific, syntax -
> Just to nitpick... do you know of a make that is standard?

That is standard-and-nothing-but?  No.

> All of them have non-standard features and it's really a bitch to use  
> the nicer features without breaking it for other systems.

True - but so what?  There's no particular reason you have to _use_ the
non-standardisms, unless of course you actually need the additional
expressiveness.

>> (No, I haven't reported any of these.  pkg-config and glib don't
>> provide bug-reporting addresses, only Web-form horrors, and as far
>> as I can tell from grepping for "bug" or "report", amanda doesn't
>> provide even that much.)
> What really ticks me off is when not only is there no email address,
> but you actually have to sign up to do them the favor of a bug
> report.

Yeah.  That's basically my attitude: you make it non-trivial for me
(and for me that includes requiring use of the Web at all) and I simply
won't bother doing you the favour of trying to help you improve your
software.

/~\ The ASCII				  Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
 X  Against HTML		mouse at rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email!	     7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B