Re: [rdiff-backup-users] Re: What happens if you add a --exclude to an existing rdiff-backup?

[Dominic Raferd]

I agree that makes sense in terms of the question in the body of your 
posting. But the subject of your posting was a slightly different 
question: 'What happens if you add a --exclude to an existing rdiff-backup?'

If a week ago you added  --exclude /home/fred to your rdiff-backup line 
backing up /home, will /home/fred now be removed from the destination by 
a "--remove-older-than 5D" run?

In other words, if you add exclusion criteria to an existing 
rdiff-backup run, are the copies of the newly-excluded files removed 
from the main repository and placed in the increments folder [in which 
case they *would* be removed by a subsequent --remove-older-than 
command], or are they just left where they were [in which case they 
*wouldn't* be]?

I don't know the answer, but if someone does I would be interested.

Dominic

On 07/01/11 21:31, Chris G wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 07, 2011 at 02:38:45PM -0500, address@hidden wrote:
> > When the files are deleted, they are copied to the increments folder and
> > kept till they are removed by --remove-older-than.
> That makes sense, thank you.
>
> > Chris G<address@hidden>  wrote:
> >
> > > If you delete files/directories from the 'source' of an rdiff-backup
> > > will they get removed from the destination with an appropriate
> > > "--remove-older-than" run?
> > >
> > > For example if rdiff-backup has been backing up a hierarchy with a
> > > directory called 'tmp' for a while and then the 'tmp' directory is
> > > removed can one get rdiff-backup to remove the 'tmp' backups 7 days
> > > later by "--remove-older-than 7D".
> > >
> > >  From the man page it sounds as if deleted files *will* be removed:-
> > >
> > >                Note that snapshots of deleted files are covered by this  opera-
> > >                tion.  Thus if you deleted a file two weeks ago, backed up imme-
> > >                diately afterwards, and then  ran  rdiff-backup  with  --remove-
> > >                older-than  10D  today,  no  trace  of  that  file would remain.
> > >                Finally, file selection options such as --include and  --exclude
> > >                don't affect --remove-older-than.
> > >
> > > But this bit from the examples section of the documentation worries me
> > > slightly:-
> > >
> > >      Note that an existing file which hasn't changed for a year will still be
> > >      preserved. But a file which was deleted 15 days ago cannot be restored
> > >      after this command is run.
> > >
> > > --
> > > Chris Green
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > rdiff-backup-users mailing list at address@hidden
> > > http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users
> > > Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
> > --
> > Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
> > How do
> > you spend it?
> >
> >           John Covici
> >           address@hidden
> >
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> > http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users
> > Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki