#13 Partclone makes zero progress backing up my RAID partition

[Kevin O'Gorman]

I'm trying to back up an ext4 partition that is a RAID sitting on three 16-TB disks. There are just 7 TB in use. Partclone gets started, and if I turn off --quiet it reports that it has finished the bitmap, but is silent forever after, and the next morning there was still not a single byte in the output file that it created.

The command generated by my home-grown backup maker is
partclone.ext4 --clone --source=/dev/md1p1 --overwrite=plato-raid/20240401-081949/partp1.clone.zst --compresscmd='zstdmt --no-sparse --compress -5'

I retried with a shorter command, with the same result:
partclone.ext4 --clone --source=/dev/md1p1 --overwrite=plato-raid/20240401-081949/partp1.clone.zst

When mounted, the lsblk command returns this (in part):
sda 8:0 0 16.4T 0 disk
└─md1 9:1 0 32.8T 0 raid5
└─md1p1 259:1 0 32.8T 0 part
sdb 8:16 0 16.4T 0 disk
└─md1 9:1 0 32.8T 0 raid5
└─md1p1 259:1 0 32.8T 0 part
sdc 8:32 0 16.4T 0 disk
└─md1 9:1 0 32.8T 0 raid5
└─md1p1 259:1 0 32.8T 0 part

I'm falling back to DAR for the moment, as it has worked in the past.

[Steven Shiau]

Which version of Partclone did you use?
Have you tried the one in Clonezilla live 3.1.2-9 environment?

Steven

[Kevin O'Gorman]

Oops, I missed your reply asking for more information.

I use the partclone in Ubuntu. I do not use clonezilla. I use partclone
as part of a larger script of my own making,
so I did not think clonezilla would be helpful.

--
Kevin O'Gorman (he/him/his)
Explore, enjoy and protect the environment.

[Kevin O'Gorman]

I don't see any activity on this. It continues to be a problem, so I gathered a bit more information, using a more up-to-date OS. I hope this in enough info to help narrow down what you need to look for.

The OS (as reported by /etc/os-release (in part)

PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS"
VERSION="24.04.2 LTS (Noble Numbat)"

The version of partclone in use as reported by partclone.ext4 -v
Partclone : v0.3.27 (0882b2de94f05d3ad81304872cbd3dff02105239)

The command I'm using:

partclone.ext4 --clone --rescue --source=/dev/md1p1 -opartp1.clone

The result: partclone reports finishing calculating the bitmap, then stalls. I verified this by running it under strace(1), and there were thousands of repetitions of lines like these:

write(2, "\r "..., 128) = 128
write(2, "ted: 99.16%", 12) = 12

followed by

write(2, "ted: 99.16%", 12) = 12
close(6) = 0
munmap(0x7db74fe00000, 1098641408) = 0
munmap(0x7db747a00000, 137330688) = 0
write(2, "\r "..., 128) = 128
write(2, "ted: 100.00%", 12) = 12
write(2, "\nTotal Time: 00:02:19, ", 23) = 23
write(2, "100.00% completed!\n", 19) = 19
write(3, "Total Time: 00:02:19, Ave. Rate:"..., 68) = 68

Nothing happened after that -- for DAYS -- until I interrupted with C-c, so presumably it was lost in a loop of some sort.

[Steven Shiau]

Thanks for your feedback. Please use the latest Partclone 0.3.36:
https://github.com/Thomas-Tsai/partclone
You can find the binary one here:
https://free.nchc.org.tw/drbl-core/pool/drbl/unstable/partclone/
Or try to use Clonezilla live >= 3.2.1-19:
https://clonezilla.org/downloads.php

Steven

[Kevin O'Gorman]

Thanks for the links. But I am unsure how to proceed

• I downloaded the git repo. I didn't see instructions on building.
  I'm on Xubuntu (debian-based).
• I looked at your link to a binary one, but was also unsure how to
  proceed with that -- would a binary work on my system (AMD64), and if so,
  which of the several things tagged 0.3.36 should I be using?
• Is clonezilla a standalone? I want something I can write scripts for,
  and run on my server without taking it down. I will look into it a bit
  more, but have my doubts.

--
Kevin O'Gorman (he/him/his)
Explore, enjoy and protect the environment.

[Steven Shiau]

For amd64 arch, you can use this one:
https://free.nchc.org.tw/drbl-core/pool/drbl/unstable/partclone/partclone_0.3.36-drbl-1_amd64.deb

What I meant is Clonezilla live. It's a live CD/USB stick which you can boot it in your machine:
https://clonezilla.org/clonezilla-live.php

Steven

[Kevin O'Gorman]

Thanks. I'm working on recovery from a system failure, but will try that
when I can. (Being 81 years old,
some stuff goes more slowly than I remember.....)

--
Kevin O'Gorman (he/him/his)
Explore, enjoy and protect the environment.

[Kevin O'Gorman]

THANK YOU! That worked, and I am installing it on all my machines, even
the ones without RAID arrays.

--
Kevin O'Gorman (he/him/his)
Explore, enjoy and protect the environment.