On Fri, 2006-03-24 at 11:04, Tomasz Chmielewski wrote: > > > So, in theory, it should be enough to make just one full, initial > > > backup, and then only incremental backups. > > > > > > Or do I miss something here? > > > > one reason (there may be others) is that incrementals don't account > > for the removal of files. if a full contains a file that is later > > removed, it will always appear in that "filled" view, even after > > the file is gone from your system. so full backups are necessary > > to reestablish a true image of your current contents. > > > > (this is with tar -- rsync incrementals may actually remove deleted > > files. i don't use rsync.) > > So with rsync it shouldn't be an issue, right? Could anyone comment on that?
They have different issues. I'm not sure about that particular one. Tar/smb backups use only the file timestamps to decide what to take in incremental runs and will thus miss files in a new location because a directory above was renamed and in at least the smb case, files that are back-dated by copy mechanisms that preserve the original timestamp (unzip, etc.). These omissions accumulate until you do the next full. Rsync can always identify new or moved files compared to your backup, but it will always tranfer the changes made since the last full, so the size will keep increasing as you repeat incremental runs. Rsync also bases comparisons on the file size/timestamp during incremental runs but does block checksum comparisons of everything for fulls. In all cases, identical files are collapsed into hard links to the pool copy, so the only down side of full runs is the extra bandwidth for the tar/smb copies and extra time for rsync. -- Les Mikesell [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.Net email is sponsored by xPML, a groundbreaking scripting language that extends applications into web and mobile media. Attend the live webcast and join the prime developer group breaking into this new coding territory! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=110944&bid=241720&dat=121642 _______________________________________________ BackupPC-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/
