How to Backup and Restore the UCLA Signa Environment

Indications:

Each time the Signa software is to be re-loaded, the UCLA pulse sequences, protocols and a variety of other utilities must be re-loaded onto the Signa. No procedure for this backup is provided by GE.
 
The backup should be run regularly (perhaps monthly), and immediately prior to a software reload, if possible. The restore is only run immediately after a Signa software reload.

Backing up the UCLA Signa

  1. Get a terminal on the Signa (or telnet to the Signa)
  2. Change to the ucla directory
    type: cd /usr/g/ucla
     
  3. Execute the Backup script
    type: MakeSignaBack
     
  4. Wait for completion. Note any error messages, as it backs up all of the files.

The script will make backups of the /usr/g/anmr, /usr/g/ucla directories, and several key elements of the /etc directory. It will then make a single 'tar' file of this content and move it to a standard backup area. At this time, the backup is placed automatically in /space/SignaBack.tar

Ordinarily, we would then go to porkpie, and compress this file:

Restoring the UCLA Signa environment

This process can only be executed as root!
After a software re-load, the genesis and root passwords may be reverted, or may be manually reset by GE!
Note that this process will reset passwords and accounts to the state that existed at the time the scanner was backed up. If the security of the scanner was compromised, this may not be an ideal move. If there has been a security breach, the environment should be restored from our archives. A copy of the virgin archives exists on our network in:

/usr/users/bin/SignaBack.tar.Z and /usr/users/bin/RestoreUCLASigna

  1. Uncompress the backup file from porkpie
    type: uncompress /space/SignaBack.tar.Z
     
  2. From the Signa, mount the /space volume
    type: mkdir /space
    type: mount 128.97.134.59:/space /space
     
  3. Copy the SignaBack.tar file to the Signa
    type: cp /space/SignaBack.tar /usr/g
     
  4. Copy the RestoreUCLASigna file to the Signa
    type: cp /space/RestoreUCLASigna /usr/g
     
  5. Run the restore program
type: RestoreUCLASigna
 

This command takes some time to complete. It first untars the backup file, then moves the contents of the backup area to the designated areas on the Signa. It then ensures that the file ownership is correct. Finally, it creates soft links to all of the UCLA pulse sequences. On successful completion, it ends by printing

"Cleaning up" and "All Done"

If the process fails to complete, contact Mark Cohen immediately!

Finally, to set the scanner into standard ucla mode, you should get a terminal on the Signa and disable motion of the patient table (which restarts the Signa software)

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This page is maintained by MarkCohen [updated 09.13.00]