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From: rick@seismo.CSS.GOV (Rick Adams)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.unix.microport
Subject: Re: dump/restore
Summary: archive vs backup
Keywords: cpio is not a real backup program
Message-ID: <44433@beno.seismo.CSS.GOV>
Date: 30 Oct 88 21:42:38 GMT
References: <178@celerity.UUCP> <12433@steinmetz.ge.com> <77@usl-pc.usl.edu>
Organization: Center for Seismic Studies, Arlington, VA
Lines: 19

cpio is not a backup program. Neither is tar (nor tp for that matter).

cpio and tar are ARCHIVE programs. 

A BACKUP program should be able to restore the disk to the state it
was at the time of the backup. It should also offer incremental backups.

The reason cpio can't handle it is that it has no way to
not restore files that have been removed since the initial backup.

This is real important as anyone who has tried to restore a corrupted
disk from a cpio "backup" and has found that the "backup" is too big to
fit on the disk it came from can tell you.

volcopy barely qualifies as a backup program, but it is much too clumsy
to use in general. (especially if your removable media is smaller
that the filesystem you want to back up)

--rick