an important note with installing things on trueNAS this way is when you update trueNAS your going to have to redo the setup and install of the cli tool
Thanks for the guide! I'm trying to follow this on TrueNAS-SCALE-24.10.0.2 but when trying to chmod /usr/bin/apt* I get an error saying it's a read-only file system. Do I need to got he route of having the PBS client running on a docker container as other have mentioned?
I set this up with TrueNAS SCALE RC2, and the RELEASE version has disabled APT because they absolutely hate users using their system like a Linux system. So, you have to re-enable it by making the apt binary executable - chmod +x /usr/bin/apt*
Question: is Proxmox Backup Client backing up all the files in the datastore on each Cron run, or is it backing up the differences? I believe in a TRUENAS replication job or backups up the differences for the dataset. Regardless, this is interesting.
Native TrueNAS replication would use ZFS snapshots, which store the changes at the filesystem level. It's a great way of doing replication as long as both systems fully support ZFS (which Proxmox Backup Server doesn't expose, they use their own chunk based data management system). Proxmox Backup Client should deduplicate the backup at the client, but it's essentially bundling the files into an archive (pxar) and then deduplicating that, so it won't be as efficient as the way ZFS handles it. Also, it queries the server with the hash of each block to see if the server already has it, since the client has no memory of anything it's ever done.
Is this smart to do? In newer versions of TrueNAS SCALE, i'll first have to give +x to /usr/bin/apt commands... is it safe to do that simply to install this proxmox-backup-client package? i need it, but wanna make sure its OK to do with my precious data being safe. :P thanks OP, either way...
@apalrdsadventures even as root truenas wouldn't let me chmod apt... I created a docker container/application that has proxmox backup client. Shrug. Thanks for the reply.
I tried this for my home directory on Manjaro/KDE to PBS but one thing that concerns me (from TrueNas to PBS) is that they could both be ZFS so why not use native send/recv instead? If the content to be backed up is multiple TBs then the proxmox-backup-client is quite resource intensive dealing with the pxar format. In my desktop home dir example I went back to using rsync because it was so much more efficient. The rsync target is a Proxmox VM which can take advantage of the "dirty-bitmap" strategy. There is no "dirty-bitmap" when using proxmox-backup-client directly.
PBS isn't native ZFS though, it's a chunk-based deduplication system on top of a filesystem (which may be ZFS but also isn't required to be). Host-based backup doesn't seem to be the best in PBS yet, compared to the PVE integration
@@apalrdsadventures I know they have to take into account non-ZFS file systems and what PBS offers is a pretty good compromise. However, if you use multi-TB containers then you really bump into the true cost of using pxar. I love Proxmox but it's missing LXD integration, and send/recv for all-ZFS systems. Or maybe just use Ceph and avoid the need for PBS.
If your backup system is also running Proxmox VE and they are clustered, then you can do a zfs replication between them within Proxmox. The replication takes care of the disks and the cluster would already replicate the config files to all nodes. Doesn't deal with snapshots automatically though, just tries to keep the two sides in sync often. If you aren't, I did a video before on setting up TrueNAS for backups using zfs send/recv, since you can absolutely do zfs send/recv to proxmox (there's just not a GUI for it). You just lack the VM config files when you go behind it's back.
@@apalrdsadventures Of course, replication would be using send/recv. I just rebooted one of my small cluster nodes and the ~2 TB backup to PBS is going to take ~10 hours to rebuild the dirty-bitmap files. There is a new Proxmox kernel update at least once a month so I'm not happy about this prolonged initial backup. The following "backups" are excellent, barely 30 seconds but that initial one on a 1 GbE network is a bit of a killer. I am going to get a couple of more small nodes (TerraMaster F2-423) and try out Ceph (which should solve my HA problems) but if that's all too much then simply replicating VM/CTs across 5 nodes should do the same. Thanks for the reminder about replication.
I'm still learning Ceph as well, I made a video of the basics but I haven't gotten into CephFS at all yet. But, in a cluster of decent size / network bandwidth, it's awesome.
The documentation says you can, but I use a mini Apple-layout keyboard that doesn't have an insert key. Why they don't follow standards I have no idea.
Hi, I'm touching this technology only partially. Could you please shortly comment on if it's possible to apply this to freeNAS (older technology) as well - if you're aware... If eventuated, what are the differences... Many thanks in advance.
FreeNAS (and TrueNAS Core) both are based on FreeBSD, so you'd need to compile the tool from source instead of using the deb repos. It's exceedingly difficult to do this since both of those OSes remove the package manager to prevent users from installing things.
The guide on my blog is still valid, although TrueNAS are trying harder and harder to make it work since they removed access to the package manager by default in the final release and I tested this on the release candidate.
@@apalrdsadventures Hi, I'm actually unable to install the pbs-client on a TrueNAS-Scale system. .... can't execute dpkg .... Is there another way, to backup the data on another pbs-server (via zfs-send, ......)?
This is exactly what I was looking for, and much simpler than I expected. Thanks!
That video is AWESOME ! It is exactly what I was searching while I was scripting like crazy to get this to work. Thank you!
an important note with installing things on trueNAS this way is when you update trueNAS your going to have to redo the setup and install of the cli tool
Great video, just dipping my toes into PBS and this helped a lot.
Glad it helped!
Thanks so much for the video, it was so easy setting up a backup with your guide! keep up with the good work!
Glad it helped!
Missing the option/setup of a max number of backups. But a very helpful tutorial on non-native Proxmox backups.
Great Video!
Thanks!
Thanks for the guide! I'm trying to follow this on TrueNAS-SCALE-24.10.0.2 but when trying to chmod /usr/bin/apt* I get an error saying it's a read-only file system. Do I need to got he route of having the PBS client running on a docker container as other have mentioned?
I've tried installing the install-dev-tools but that fails too as there some dependancies that it fails to install
I set this up with TrueNAS SCALE RC2, and the RELEASE version has disabled APT because they absolutely hate users using their system like a Linux system. So, you have to re-enable it by making the apt binary executable - chmod +x /usr/bin/apt*
You also need to make the dpkg binary executable: chmod +x /usr/bin/dpkg
@@pepeshopping How do you learn if you never fail? :)
Any chance of making in updated video on this?
Wondering if we can do it opposite direction: backup pbs to truenas :)
I noticed that when you downloaded the pbs client, it was using the enterprise link. will this work for the free version of PBS?
The client is never licensed, so you can use the client-only repository in this case.
Question: is Proxmox Backup Client backing up all the files in the datastore on each Cron run, or is it backing up the differences? I believe in a TRUENAS replication job or backups up the differences for the dataset. Regardless, this is interesting.
Native TrueNAS replication would use ZFS snapshots, which store the changes at the filesystem level. It's a great way of doing replication as long as both systems fully support ZFS (which Proxmox Backup Server doesn't expose, they use their own chunk based data management system).
Proxmox Backup Client should deduplicate the backup at the client, but it's essentially bundling the files into an archive (pxar) and then deduplicating that, so it won't be as efficient as the way ZFS handles it. Also, it queries the server with the hash of each block to see if the server already has it, since the client has no memory of anything it's ever done.
So in short, it essentially does just back up the differences except in a less efficient way than ZFS?
Is this smart to do? In newer versions of TrueNAS SCALE, i'll first have to give +x to /usr/bin/apt commands... is it safe to do that simply to install this proxmox-backup-client package? i need it, but wanna make sure its OK to do with my precious data being safe. :P thanks OP, either way...
it's data safe, but TrueNAS might uninstall it in the future
@apalrdsadventures even as root truenas wouldn't let me chmod apt... I created a docker container/application that has proxmox backup client. Shrug. Thanks for the reply.
Is it possible to back up your Truenas Data to PBS using Rsync instead of using the PBS client?
no, PBS does deduplication client-side
I tried this for my home directory on Manjaro/KDE to PBS but one thing that concerns me (from TrueNas to PBS) is that they could both be ZFS so why not use native send/recv instead? If the content to be backed up is multiple TBs then the proxmox-backup-client is quite resource intensive dealing with the pxar format. In my desktop home dir example I went back to using rsync because it was so much more efficient. The rsync target is a Proxmox VM which can take advantage of the "dirty-bitmap" strategy. There is no "dirty-bitmap" when using proxmox-backup-client directly.
PBS isn't native ZFS though, it's a chunk-based deduplication system on top of a filesystem (which may be ZFS but also isn't required to be).
Host-based backup doesn't seem to be the best in PBS yet, compared to the PVE integration
@@apalrdsadventures I know they have to take into account non-ZFS file systems and what PBS offers is a pretty good compromise. However, if you use multi-TB containers then you really bump into the true cost of using pxar. I love Proxmox but it's missing LXD integration, and send/recv for all-ZFS systems. Or maybe just use Ceph and avoid the need for PBS.
If your backup system is also running Proxmox VE and they are clustered, then you can do a zfs replication between them within Proxmox. The replication takes care of the disks and the cluster would already replicate the config files to all nodes. Doesn't deal with snapshots automatically though, just tries to keep the two sides in sync often.
If you aren't, I did a video before on setting up TrueNAS for backups using zfs send/recv, since you can absolutely do zfs send/recv to proxmox (there's just not a GUI for it). You just lack the VM config files when you go behind it's back.
@@apalrdsadventures Of course, replication would be using send/recv. I just rebooted one of my small cluster nodes and the ~2 TB backup to PBS is going to take ~10 hours to rebuild the dirty-bitmap files. There is a new Proxmox kernel update at least once a month so I'm not happy about this prolonged initial backup. The following "backups" are excellent, barely 30 seconds but that initial one on a 1 GbE network is a bit of a killer.
I am going to get a couple of more small nodes (TerraMaster F2-423) and try out Ceph (which should solve my HA problems) but if that's all too much then simply replicating VM/CTs across 5 nodes should do the same. Thanks for the reminder about replication.
I'm still learning Ceph as well, I made a video of the basics but I haven't gotten into CephFS at all yet. But, in a cluster of decent size / network bandwidth, it's awesome.
I think you can copy but with control+insert or shift+insert?
The documentation says you can, but I use a mini Apple-layout keyboard that doesn't have an insert key. Why they don't follow standards I have no idea.
@@apalrdsadventures for Mac are Command+c and Command+v.
Hi, I'm touching this technology only partially. Could you please shortly comment on if it's possible to apply this to freeNAS (older technology) as well - if you're aware... If eventuated, what are the differences... Many thanks in advance.
FreeNAS (and TrueNAS Core) both are based on FreeBSD, so you'd need to compile the tool from source instead of using the deb repos. It's exceedingly difficult to do this since both of those OSes remove the package manager to prevent users from installing things.
Questn, the Backup is alleways full right not incrementl?
It's incremental over the network, but it reads all of the files off disk.
you can copy and paste into tn scale shell
Hi does anyone know off a detailed guide to do this??
The guide on my blog is still valid, although TrueNAS are trying harder and harder to make it work since they removed access to the package manager by default in the final release and I tested this on the release candidate.
@@apalrdsadventures Hi, I'm actually unable to install the pbs-client on a TrueNAS-Scale system. .... can't execute dpkg .... Is there another way, to backup the data on another pbs-server (via zfs-send, ......)?
Obsolete, TrueNas SCALE no longer allows apt, update your how to or delete it, regards