Backups

[Jack]

Well, I've done it again.

My /var partition went south today on my server. I couldn't find my backup media. It wasn't a full backup anyway. For some reason that partition kept my system from booting. Not sure what's going on there, unless I had a link from /usr to /var  (a very real possibility).

Anyway! I've just bought a DVD+RW writer for the server. The goal is to make a complete backup of the system onto a DVD, that can be used to rebuild the system.

Question 1: Is it possible to 'dd' directly onto a DVD medium, so that it could be 'dd'ed back onto a new HD?

Question 2: How would one best copy the entire file structure onto a dvd to make it a bootable media, so that it could be used as a boot device?

Answers must be suitable for a CLI only system as this is a server and has no X.

Thanks,
Brian JD