Laptops :: Automated Restore from USB Drive

Sorry I did not get back in here sooner, I was busy putting DSL on other machines. Also, I'll have to admit I have been wandering around in this board, posting in several locations.
The Laptop was a Toshiba 4015CDS, and it came with Window 98, in one partition, vfat.
I had no idea that the Flash Drives were so delicate. I use mine to restore Mozilla Firebird, and other files and configs such as the fluxbox menu, my .blackboxrc and my web page files that I am working on.
For some strange reason (I don't understand) I could not get the USB drive to work if formatted as vfat, so being a linux fan, I decided to use /ext2, and that worked. I have just today used the drive to restore on a new install, to a two month old Dell, with all the bells and whistles. I had to use
#knoppix vga=normal
to get the LCD screen to respond.
That install is successful, except for the modem being a winmodem.
I can boot off the cd, or a floppy, and then restore Mozilla, etc. from the USB drive, after I mount it. The little drive seems to work on all machines with USB ports that I have encountered. (As long as I mount it first).
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I have been working to revise the restore/backup script (filetool.sh) to allow a backup from a hard drive, but have found that to need a primary partition to work in, other than the one that /knoppix is in. I have usually copied my CDROM's /knoppix folder to the hard drive and run off a boot floppy, as I do not have cdrom drives on all machines. I use a backpack drive to do the copying. The one approach that I use is found in this menu:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/fluxbox_menu_2
That works, and I use it all the time. It only restores /MozillaFirebird, however. The actual script, if I can get it working, would be stored on a floppy, and upon first bootup of DSL, I mount the floppy, and then run the filetool.sh script.
#filetool.sh restore
I find that won't work on logical partitions, so I need to set it up on a box with at least two primary partitions. The menu example shows I  can partly restore from /dev/hdb1, too if a second hard drive is installed. I just make a /DSL folder there, and copy the /MozillaFirebird directory there, and my menu takes care of getting it back each time.. Problem is, I want to not have to restore with a floppy, to get my menu, and then get the /Mozilla Directory from the hard drive. I'd like to do a complete restore from the hard drive, my menu, and Moz, too. I do have a machine here that has three partitions, Windows, SuSE, and Linux Swap. I'll see what I can do to get a floppy with a filetool.sh and a filetool.lst on it (just those two ought to do it), and restore/backup to my /dev/hda2 partition. I suppose the root "/" in the SuSE filesystem will be where the backup.tar.gz will wind up, and perhaps the filetool.lst will have to be there also.  
I work with a lot of computers that do not have USB ports, or for that matter, CDrom drives.
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Since the USB memory sticks have some durability issues, maybe setting up the restore on the hard drive is not such a bad idea. I think I heard that SuSE live does that too., but I only have an older SuSE that isn't a live cd. (I don't know how they do it)
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Some of the elements of my menu's would be useful if DSL had them on first
bootup, mainly, the Floppy and USB mounts.

I finally modified the filetool.sh script to save to my hard drive. It's here:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/filetool_Storage
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It's kinda rough around the edges, but works well enough for me.
I put it on a floppy, by itself, and to stay with the official DSL filename,
I rename it to filetool.sh
So, once I get DSL up and running, rather than use a restore floppy or
USB, I just mount this floppy, with filetool.sh, and:
#./filetool.sh restore
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You can use any of it that is useful, of course. I made it to get me going on
this computer, so old that it has no USB ports. Now, I can restore MozillaFirebird with all the settings, etc. and my background image, menu,
.blackboxrc, local web page for Moz to start with, and my uploaded web page
files.
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Also, I made a menu to go with this setup, and it's here:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/fluxbox_menu_4
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Over the years, I have done a lot of stuff like this for various linux installs,
and I am glad to be able to post these files here for anyone to use, until the
next version of Damn Small Linux is ready for purchase! I'll be first in line to
get my CD!

I cleaned up my filetool.sh a bit, and it's here:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/filetool_Storage
The fluxbox menu to go with that is here:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/fluxbox_menu_3
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If you are running off a /knoppix directory on your hard drive
(I do, and use a boot floppy)
You can copy the filetool.sh script to your /cdrom directory
(use Windows or other Linux OS to do that, DSL won't let you
copy to it's read-only file system at /cdrom)
When you get it copied, it's easier to restore from the hard drives
backup.tar.gz when you first boot up Damn Small Linux. Your
/cdrom directory is already mounted, that's where DSL finds
the /knoppix folder. In a terminal, just:
#sudo su
#cd /cdrom
#./filetool.sh restore
And the filetool.sh script (shown above as filetool_Storage)
in your /cdrom directory will quickly restore your system from the
backup.tar.gz it finds.
There is a menu to go with that here:
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/telegram/fluxbox_menu_4
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The filetool.lst and backup.tar.gz go in one partition, separate from the
one where /knoppix is located, and you may place filetool.sh in the same
partition with /knoppix. If you boot off a CD, then it's easier to have the
filetool.sh on a floppy, mount the floppy, and run filetool.sh. It will find your
partition where you have placed the filetool.lst and backup.tar.gz.
In the first go-around, before you have any backup.tar.gz, just place your
own filetool.lst in the root directory of the partition where you have filetool.sh
write your backup.tar.gz. When you run filetool.sh, your backup.tar.gz will be created.
#./filetool.sh backup