rsync --delete with empty source folder for fast snapshot deletion: Permissions of hardlinked files are changed to 644. Workaround?

[Paul Slootman]

On Fri 22 Sep 2023, Kevin Korb via rsync wrote:

> 444 {} +' to make read only files for rsync to want to chmod, then used cp
> -al to make several duplicate trees using hard linked files.  An rm -rf on
> one such tree took .97 seconds while an rsync deletion took 1.25 seconds.

Be sure to drop the caches before such tests every time:
echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches


Paul