[ZODB-Dev] zodb best practices

[Tim Peters]

[Paul Winkler]
> ...
> However, keep in mind that a single multi-gigabyte file is
> quite unwieldy for making backups,

Note that in the latest releases of ZODB 3.1 and 3.2, the Tools/repozo.py
script has become quite capable:  it can do incremental backups against a
live Data.fs safely, tucking away only the part that's new since the last
backup.  It can also compress these incrementals, and restore the Data.fs to
the state it had at any of the backup points.  Zope Corp uses it internally
for some of the sites it manages, and it works well.

> and for examination to try to fix corruption if something disastrous
> happens...

That's never fun.  The incremental capability of repozo.py makes a policy of
frequent backups much easier to live with, and fixing corruption via
reverting to a recent version before the corruption is the easiest fix (when
that's acceptable, of course).