I use rsync to backup an application's file system state to a repository. Later if we want to refresh a test environment with the application's file state at that given point in time, we can use rsync to get the test environment into that state.
Rsync works well for this purpose, but it would be nice if we could rsync to/from a tar (or other archive format) file. Since our use of rsync is to store these FS copies for sparse use, it's cumbersome to have the files stored unarchived since there are alot of files, not to mention they cannot be compressed if they are left in their original state. Tar without rsync is not an option here because we need file deletion, as well as updating new/exisiting files. Tar also updates files even if they have not changed, which puts an undue burden on our file systems' snapshot systems since it then looks like every single file has changed (new inode), rather than only a hand full. My idea for a solution here would be a new feature to the rsync daemon mode that would write out files to an archive format, rather than a target file system. I'm curious if anyone could suggest an alternative approach and/or if there is interest in this feature within rsync. Thanks, Todd -- Please use reply-all for most replies to avoid omitting the mailing list. To unsubscribe or change options: https://lists.samba.org/mailman/listinfo/rsync Before posting, read: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
