rsync for transferring harddrive images

[Hardy Merrill]

chris at chrisburkert.de [chris at chrisburkert.de] wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I have a project where I have to backup (copy /dev/hda on a server) and
> recover (copy back) hardrives from the clients. I tried this with rsync
> using:
> 
>   BACKUP:  rsync /dev/hda user at host:/path/to/image
>   RECOVER: rsync user at host:/path/to/image /dev/hda
> 
> There is a problem when accessing devices like /dev/hda. The transfer
> aborts after a few seconds with the error message:
> 
>   write failed on /dev/hda: Success
>   unexpected EOF in read timeout

I'm *NOT* an rsync expert, but here's what I found in the
rsync manpage(man rsync):

              rsync -avz foo:src/bar /data/tmp

   this would recursively transfer all files from the
   directory src/bar on the machine foo into the
   /data/tmp/bar directory on the local  machine.  The
   files  are  transferred in "archive" mode, which
   ensures that symbolic links, devices, attributes,
   permissions, ownerships etc are  preserved  in  the
   transfer. Additionally, compression will be used to
   reduce the size of data portions of the transfer.

Notice where it says "The files are transferred in
"archive" mode, which ensures that symbolic links, devices,
attributes, permissions, ownerships etc are preserved in
the transfer.  My guess is that if you add the "-a"
parameter to your rsync that your device files will
work in the rsync.  The -v will add verbosity to the
output and will help show you what rsync is doing.

> Also I want to save those images zipped at the server. Is this possible? I
> thought of using a pipe or a fifo. Can the algorithm of rsync work
> correctly then?

Not sure about this one - wait for someone else to respond.

HTH.
-- 
Hardy Merrill
Red Hat, Inc.