I am trying to backup my home directory. command I am using for first
time is:rysync -axz /home/* /media/Backup11.2/Production/
is this correct command?
Backup11.2 is a 1TB MyBook external drive, usb. Before backing up I
copy /boot to home and also backup mysql. All goes well until it tries
backing up /boot (I am running as user). It gives permission denied on
some /boot files,etc.
I thought rysnc did not worry about permission or did I miss
understand the man page about “support for copying links,
devices,owners, groups, and permissions”. I tried running as root and
it changed the permissions of folders like Documents, Download, Music
and Video to be owned by root:root on the backup media. I thought
rsync would handle the user permissions, etc correctly.
It says in the man pages “does not require super user privileges”.
Do I need to tell the command to preserve these parameters uniquely
with the options?
Hope I’m not a pain. I can back up all of /home except stuff owned by
root as user. trying to do backup before kernel update.
vodoo wrote:
> rsync does not necessarily need root privileges, but you are backing
> up files owned by root and this needs root privileges to write them (as
> root).
correct…upscope you can solve that by wrapping up boot in a archive
(tar, zip, whatever) which you do own…then rsync can access it…
hmmm, since you are ‘zipping’ root owned stuff i guess you may have to
run the archiver as sudo (i’ve not looked at compressors lately—been
years since drives were so expensive!), and then chown the
tarball/whatever so it is yours (so rsync can read it)…
and, don’t forget the great truth: you do not have a backup until you
have proved (to yourself) that what you have safely tucked away can
be used to restore.
Yep. Think about it: if anyone could go onto my machine and “tar,” “rsync” or “cp” my root directory as an unprivileged user, they could simply move the copy to a different machine and then get access to all of those files. That would sort of defeat the whole purpose of ownerships and permissions.
To the original poster: whether you’re using rsync, cp, or any other program, permissions are permissions. Rsync doesn’t need to be run as the superuser, but if you ask it to copy a file that is owned by (and limited to) the superuser, you must be the superuser before that can be permitted. Otherwise, see what I just said.
and, don’t forget the great truth: you do not have a backup until you
have proved (to yourself) that what you have safely tucked away can
be used to restore.
Truer words have never been spoken. The only feeling that’s worse than seeing your hard drive fail is reaching for the backup and realizing that it can’t be restored to the new hard drive!
<snip>
> I am trying to backup my home directory. command I am using for
> first time is:rysync -axz /home/* /media/Backup11.2/Production/
>
> is this correct command?
>
>
> Thanks in advance for any pointers.
</snip>
Thanks for all the responses. I think the easiest way is to do two
backups, ~home and the /Boot as root. Only want /Boot for reference in
case update of kernel or system goes bad.
