Restoring individual files from a mksysb image

First of all, go to the directory that contains the mksysb image file:

# cd /sysadm/iosbackup

In this example, were using the mksysb image of a Virtual I/O server, created using iosbackup. This is basically the same as a mksysb image from a regular AIX system. The image file for this mksysb backup is called vio1.mksysb

First, try to locate the file you're looking for; For example, if you're looking for file nimbck.ksh:

# restore -T -q -l -f vio1.mksysb | grep nimbck.ksh
New volume on vio1.mksysb:
Cluster size is 51200 bytes (100 blocks).
The volume number is 1.
The backup date is: Thu Jun  9 23:00:28 MST 2011
Files are backed up by name.
The user is padmin.
-rwxr-xr-x- 10   staff  May 23  08:37  1801 ./home/padmin/nimbck.ksh

Here you can see the original file was located in /home/padmin.
Now recover that one single file:

# restore -x -q -f vio1.mksysb ./home/padmin/nimbck.ksh
x ./home/padmin/nimbck.ksh

Note that it is important to add the dot before the filename that needs to be recovered. Otherwise it won't work. Your file is now restore to ./home/padmin/nimbck.ksh, which is a relative folder from the current directory you're in right now:

# cd ./home/padmin
# ls -als nimbck.ksh
4 -rwxr-xr-x    1 10  staff  1801 May 23 08:37 nimbck.ksh