[geeks] rsync type backup for Apple machines?

[Nadine Miller]

On Jun 27, 2008, at 12:14 PM, Shannon Hendrix wrote:

> On Jun 27, 2008, at 11:55 , Nadine Miller wrote:
>
>> There is a "tweak" to enable non-supported devices (e.g. a NAS; you  
>> might need to use Samba, haven't investigated it further) for Time  
>> Machine. <http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080420211034137 
>> >
>>
>> Or just use rsync (maybe the rsync snapshot scripts)?
>
> rsync is only good for the raw files.
>
> It will not copy any of the Mac specific file metadata, which many  
> applications depend on.
>
> So, you really can only trust rsync for data, and even some data  
> files have meta information the apps need.
>
> I'm not sure if there is an rsync that will handle that or not.   
> I've had trouble making that part work so I only copy data files to  
> remove machines, everything else goes to Time Machine or one of the  
> Mac backup programs.
>
> I've not found a really good spanning DVD backup program yet, but  
> the one from the Printfolio guys seems promising.

Versions of rsync for extended attributes and resource forks have been  
around for a while (at least since 10.4, and iirc, 10.3).  Apple's  
*is* safe now (man rsync: "-E  --extended-attributes   copy extended  
attributes, resource forks"), but it doesn't perform as well as the  
latest/greatest from compiled from samba.org source.

Bombich specifically addresses this issue in his rsync page here: <http://www.bombich.com/mactips/rsync.html 
 >.  He uses the backup test suite built available at <http://www.n8gray.org/blog/category/projects/backup-bouncer/ 
 >.

=Nadine=