Hi, I'm trying to use tar for incremental backups. After reading what I could find on the web, it looks as if I need to use the "--listed-incremental" option. With this option tar creates a file that keeps track of the changes. So if (in /home/ric) I type: tar -cvf /mnt/BACKUP1 --listed-incremental=LIST /home/ric/ to begin my backup, tar will create a file "LIST" in my home directory which keeps track of what is archived on whatever I have mounted at /mnt. I can then do incremental backups by simply modifying the name of the file: tar -cvf /mnt/BACKUP2 --listed-incremental=LIST /home/ric/ and the file LIST is modified in my home directory.
To restore my home directory I would go to /home/ric and type: tar -xvf /mnt/BACKUP1 this creates a home/ric/copy of my original archive. For each incremental backup, I then type: tar -xvf /mnt/BACKUP1 --listed-incremental=LIST which seems to restore my home directory to the state it was in at the last incremental backup. What puzzles me is that the file LIST is restored when I do the first restore from the first tar archive. The listed-incremental option looks at this list when it restores the first incremental update (which has the version of LIST used for that archive). The listed-incremental option looks at the 2nd version of LIST when it restores the 3d incremental archive (which contains the version of LIST that was used to create that archive). So it initially looks as if tar is always one step behind in using the correct file LIST. However, when I try this experimentally, things seem to work out fine. I suppose ideally that I should keep a copy of LIST somewhere independent of the directory being backed up, but then I have to worry about keeping it and the tar archives. I hope this confusion or puzzlement of mine makes sense. I'd appreciate any suggestions on how to use the --listed-incremental option, or comments about this use of it. It doesn't look to me as if it should work, but it seems to do fine. Thanks, Ric -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]