Updating Crashplan on ARM based QNAP

Last month I wrote a quick overview of the process to install Crashplan on and ARM based QNAP NAS. Six weeks (ish) later and it's still going ok. Or, at least I thought it was…

Periodically, the makers of Crashplan update their software. Nothing surprising about that except that as the ARM based QNAPs aren't an officially supported device (that I'm aware of), the automatic update doesn't work and the backup engine on my QNAP kept stopping.

The upgrade itself is pretty straightforward however.

On the QNAP NAS

To get the software on the NAS updated, you first have to download the QPKG file from this thread on the QNAP forum.

Once you've saved it onto your QNAP device (I put it in the “Public” share but the location isn't too important), the update can be performed very simply via an SSH session to the NAS:

[text][/share/Public] # sh ./CrashPlan_3.6.4_31_arm-x19.qpkg
Install QNAP package on TS-NAS…
./
./qinstall.sh
./qpkg.cfg
./package_routines
913+1 records in
913+1 records out
19203+1 records in
19203+1 records out
CrashPlan 3.6.3_30 is already installed. Setup will now perform package upgrading.
Stopping CrashPlan…
kill: Could not kill pid ‘14842': No such process
Link service start/stop script: crashplan.sh
Set QPKG information in /etc/config/qpkg.conf
Cleaning /tmp/*.jna files…
Cleaning /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg/CrashPlan/tmp/ files…
Starting CrashPlan…
Using interface: eth0 (192.168.1.5) – This can be changed in the web interface!
CrashPlan 3.6.4_31 has been installed in /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg/CrashPlan.[/text]

That's literally all you need to do to get your backups running again.

Client Software

Of course though, to configure and manage backups etc on your headless QNAP NAS, you need a client installed somewhere and that will need updating too.

In my case, the client software is on my MacBookPro. Downloading and installing the updated client software is a doddle so I'm not going to go in to any further detail there. However, the update process does wipe out the setting that points the client at your QNAP NAS.

To remake that setting, I had to edit the file /Applications/CrashPlan.app/Contents/Resources/Java/conf/ui.properties and uncomment the line that read:

[text]#serviceHost=127.0.0.1[/text]

and replace the IP address with the one from my NAS.

Job done!