getting rid of "permission denied" partial transfer errors

[Jim Salter]

> yeah, except that the directory is not 700 but 600, so even user backup
> cannot traverse it... but root can.

Ah, I see.  Sounds like you're down to either running as root on both 
ends, or ignoring errors.

Have you considered using sudo such that the fileserver isn't actually 
logging into the backupserver as root, but only logging in as a heavily 
*un*privileged account which can do nothing but run a script chmodded 
750 and chowned root.backup, which then sudo's rsync to do your bidding?

When I use an SSH transport, that's how I use it.  My servers won't 
allow remote root login to begin with (and that's the way I like it), 
and by doing it that way there's really nothing that compromising the 
backup account can do other than give someone the ability to run my 
daily backups for me.  Not too scary, that.

Jim Salter