# mount & dump



## daBee (Mar 31, 2017)

Hi folks.

Before updating FreeBSD 10.1 to current stable, I want to dump my current OS to an external USB drive, for future reference.  I would like to be able to mount it on my Mac to poke around.  Or I could `img` the volume to mount on my Mac as I need it.  

So in Disk Utility I formatted the drive as MSDOS.  I've read a bunch of pages on mounting and using `dump` to archive the volume.  Here are some notes:


My current syntax for the dump is `dump -0LS -C 32 / -f /dev/da0/neb_backup.dump`
I don't need to shove this volume into any full-time mounting sequence.  This is a single backup.  
I don't need to compress the backup, as I want it viewable on my Mac.  Compression is not useful here.  
So I've read up on mounting the volume `/dev/da0` and it's still confusing.  I don't need to partition the drive for other operating systems, etc.  I simply want to mount a formatted volume, copy the OS, then remove.  

Anybody have the time to lead me through this?  I'm not sure how to use `mount` to get it mounted, and then where I can find it for the `dump` call.  

Cheers


----------



## Phishfry (Apr 1, 2017)

daBee said:


> I formatted the [usb] drive as MSDOS


I am not sure this is best. For one you have symbolic links and permissions that won't be saved with raw files.
Why not format in FreeBSD with UFS? Is there no mounting tools on Mac for UFS?


----------



## Phishfry (Apr 1, 2017)

I think looking at the crochet copy to emmc script would be worth your time.
It shows another approach to copying a system. Tar and copy.
https://github.com/freebsd/crochet/blob/master/board/BeagleBone/overlay/root/copy-to-emmc.sh


----------



## Phishfry (Apr 1, 2017)

Warren has a good page with options on backup.
http://www.wonkity.com/~wblock/docs/html/backup.html


----------



## daBee (Apr 1, 2017)

Phishfry said:


> I am not sure this is best. For one you have symbolic links and permissions that won't be saved with raw files.
> Why not format in FreeBSD with UFS? Is there no mounting tools on Mac for UFS?



I'm not trying to avoid anything.  Formatting in FreeBSD I tried, and that was even more confusing.  I can mount using UFS just fine on Mac OS.


----------

