[rdiff-backup-users] 1) Using samba to backup windows shares 2) sparse files

[Stelios K. Kyriacou]

Hi

First, I would like to thank Ben Escoto for a very useful
program. I use it routinely for backups of our home directories in linux
and also for backing up some data from windows 2000 using samba mounting.
I find the program quite easy to use and easy to restore single files! I
have two issues to discuss:

By the way i use rdiff-backup 0.11.0 and redhat 8.0

First issue: I noticed that somehow the modification time stamp from a
windows 2000
may change by 1/100th of a second (i think it is a fluke and not a real
change) and thus files are being shown as
modified and thus backed up ... anybody has
seen this too? here is an example:
I first restore all the modified backups of a single file to see what is
happening:
for i in HipStructureAnalysis.vbw* ; do rdiff-backup $i trash_$i ; done

The command stat shows:
  File: "trash_HipStructureAnalysis.vbw.2003-04-12T01:02:02-04:00.diff.gz"
  Size: 847             Blocks: 8          IO Block: 4096   Regular File
...
Modify: Fri Apr 11 17:01:59 2003

  File: "trash_HipStructureAnalysis.vbw.2003-04-14T01:02:01-04:00.diff.gz"
  Size: 847             Blocks: 8          IO Block: 4096   Regular File
...
Modify: Fri Apr 11 17:01:58 2003

So I see a 0.01 second difference in file modification date which i think
is a fluke of windows?

The second issue: Is there any interest in getting a --sparse option
similar to rsync so as to save some space? I am dealing with simulated
images backups and it could be 20% savings in space which is a lot. I
would love to have this feature! Now i may have to revert to rsync just
for this reason.

Thanks a lot in advance!
Stelios