Extended task logging/erase report

amorris

New Member
Hey, is there somewhere where a details of what sort of erase has been done in each schedule/data-set ?

The Log viewer only shows the session start/end.
(Great for privacy but doesnt give you a summary whats actually been done with which erasure method)
 
If the task is saved, details are given in the task properties window; double-click on the task in the schedule, as if to edit it.

The log only reports errors, warnings and information; it does not give a file by file account of what is done; that can be inferred from the task data. If all you have is start and finish times (which, incidentally, implies that you are using a development build), the task completed successfully)

David
 
amorris said:
So there's no way to increase verbosity?
No; the stated design philosophy was to reduce it ... :)

Logs can in fact be very verbose on occasions. Try doing a free space erase on a system drive, for instance, and you will get thousands of messages relating to files for which the cluster tips could not be erased.

What, specifically did you have in mind? Eraser 6 produces pretty much the same log information as Eraser 5, albeit in a different format. Neither produces explicit file erasing reports; if that is what you wanted, you would need to make a feature request.

David
 
Just need a report confirming specific drives have been securely erased with specific erasing techniques.
DBAN does this, but I need to do this in Windows as DBAN cant see the SCSI controller (drivers).

Where to put in a feature request?
 
amorris said:
Just need a report confirming specific drives have been securely erased with specific erasing techniques.
DBAN does this, but I need to do this in Windows as DBAN can't see the SCSI controller (drivers).
Do you mean erasing free space, file/folder erase, or both?

I also assume that you are trying to erase non-system drives. As Eraser needs windows, it cannot fully erase a system drive.

amorris said:
Where to put in a feature request?
It's best to use Trac, as Joel uses that as his 'to do' list. You'll need to register.

David
 
It's erasing whole disk arrays for the purpose of decommissioning them.
I have to erase an array with around 200 drives and 30 RAID volumes.

So I have to map/mount all 30 volumes, perform a known erase/scrub operation and show some evidence of this.

As this is sort of thing is only done occasionally and eraser seems to fit the bill (except for providing any evidence that I have done it) .

The last time I did this I used DBAN successfully (and saved the logs) as it could see the SCSI controller of the old server I had. This time it's on a bigger
scale and DBAN can't recognise the FC controller.
 
I see the point. In addition to the information you mention, a hardware identifier/drive serial would presumably also be needed.

Are you planning to erase the RAID volumes as such, or as separate drives? Eraser can (apparently - I haven't tried it) work with RAID arrays, but, as it operates at the file system level, it cannot erase space which the RAID sub-system does not make available to the file system

To erase the drives separately, I suppose you'd have to remove the RAID, partition/format each drive for standalone use, then erase it. A long job!

David
 
With managed RAID arrays, you just define LUNs that get mapped to a connected host (whether they are connected via SCSI/iSCSI/SAS or FC).
These generally come up as SCSI disk devices that are, for all intents and purposes, normal disks (the RAID/multipath driver takes care of the usable disk device)

So the pre-existing volumes are mapped to the host (we can also create new volumes from free space in the RAID-set) then you can format/mount them as normal volumes, within the host.

You generally can't go and identify serial/types of the individual disks (from the host) as the array normally virtualizes the LUNs across many disks, but the array does give a unique SCSI array and volume identifier.

I have 29TB of Raw disk I'm scrubbing now (using a trial of a commercial program). I've re-created it with RAID10-sets and 2TB LUNs so it processing 1/2 the addressable space to scrub with decent overall performance. It's running for 4 days, using 2 Windows servers and I'm just over 1/2 way through :)

Most business are getting paranoid about removing old arrays intact, as they sometimes get on eBay, so they are requiring them to be scrubbed with a reasonably decent scheme and artifacts (which will be a profile dump of the Array and reports from the data scrub software) of completion.

In the past I've happily run this with DBAN (and saved reports), but because it doesn't sometimes pick up the disk adapter I need to run it within an OS.
 
You're not the first to request this, please do create a Trac ticket and hopefully I can get it implemented soon...
 
Not at the moment, things are currently going too fast beyond my control. I hope to be able to do some work in the second half of the year, however.
 
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