Copy a Disk Image Over SSH
If you'd like to copy a Linode's disk image to a system that resides on a different network, you can easily do so using SSH and a Finnix configuration profile. This may be useful in cases where you'd like to periodically make complete offsite images of your Linode's disk image for backup/archival purposes.
In this example, we'll be copying a Linode's disk image to a local system over SSH. You'll need to make sure your receiving environment has ssh installed (most Linux/Unix-like systems have it installed by default). If you're running Windows locally, you may wish to set up the Cygwin
compatiability layer to provide a reasonably complete Unix-like environmnet.
These instructions work with the Linode platform. If you don't have a Linode yet, sign up for a Linux VPS and get started today.
Create a Finnix Boot Profile
Under your Linode's "Dashboard" tab, click "Create a new Configuration Profile".
Create a configuration profile for Finnix using the values shown below. In this example, we've mounted our Linode's disk image on /dev/xvdb. Once you've selected the correct values, click "Save Profile" to continue.
Use the "Reboot" button for the Finnix Recovery profile to boot into the Finnix environment.
On the "Console" tab in the Linode Manager, click "AJAX Console" and you'll be presented with the Finnix environment.
Set the root password and start the SSH server:
passwd /etc/init.d/ssh start
Copy the Disk Image
Issue the following command to start copying your disk image to the receiving machine. Replace "archive" with an appropriate values for your receiving machine's configuration (this example assumes your local username is "archive"). Replace "12.34.56.78" with your Linode's IP address.
ssh root@12.34.56.78 "dd if=/dev/xvdb | cat" | dd of=/home/archive/linode.img
You'll be presented with output similar to the following session excerpt. Note that it may take a long time to copy your disk image to the receiving machine.
The authenticity of host '12.34.56.78 (12.34.56.78)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is 39:6b:eb:05:f1:28:95:f0:da:63:17:9e:6b:6b:11:4a. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes Warning: Permanently added '12.34.56.78' (RSA) to the list of known hosts. root@12.34.56.78's password: 4096000+0 records in 4096000+0 records out 2097152000 bytes (2.1 GB) copied, 371.632 seconds, 5.6 MB/s 4096000+0 records in 4096000+0 records out 2097152000 bytes (2.1 GB) copied, 364.002 s, 5.8 MB/s
Once the copy job has completed, you may wish to verify it by mounting the image on your receiving machine. You may do so as follows (on the receiving machine, named "backupbox" in this example):
archive@backupbox:~$ mkdir linode archive@backupbox:~$ su Password: backupbox:/home/archive# mount -o loop linode.img linode backupbox:/home/archive# ls linode/ bin dev home lost+found mnt proc sbin srv tmp var boot etc lib media opt root selinux sys usr
Congratulations! You've successfully transferred your Linode's disk image to another host over the Internet using SSH.
License
This guide is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please feel free to redistribute unmodified copies of it as long as attribution is provided, preferably via a link to this page.
http://library.linode.com/linode-platform/migration/copy-disk-image-over-ssh