[Dovecot] dsync backup questions

Joe Beaubien joe.beaubien at gmail.com
Mon Feb 4 01:07:59 EET 2013


Hi,

I'm currently trying to setup remote backups of my emails but i'm running
into issues (mdbox format, indexes and storage in the same folder
hierarchy).

Local backup command: dsync -u "my_user" backup /backups/my_user

(1) Recently, I noticed that the local backup takes up twice the size as
the original mail location (8gb vs. 4gb). I purged alot of emails from the
original location, so the size shrunk, but the local backup just keeps on
getting bigger. I couldn't find any dsync option that would delete extra
emails.

- Question: Why isn't the local backup synced properly and remove the extra
emails?


(2) What is the best why to copy this local backup to a remote location
that does NOT have the possibility to run dsync.

- Question 1: is rsync safe to use and will this data work for restore?

- Question 2: Would it be safe to simply rsync the original mail_location
to the remote server?


I searched the net, but it seems that mdbox is tricky to backup.

Thanks in advance,

-Joe


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