[Dovecot] backing up maildir dovecot files

[Reindl Harald]

Am 11.02.2013 22:37, schrieb Steve Litt:
> On Mon, 11 Feb 2013 21:47:57 +0100
> Reindl Harald <h.reindl at thelounge.net> wrote:
> 
>>
>>
>> Am 11.02.2013 21:34, schrieb David Mehler:
>>> I'm having to migrate servers. Both are dovecot2 systems. I'm
>>> wanting to copy over my mail store from one system to the other.
>>> I'd like to preserve dates/times of emails. These are maildir
>>> setups on both boxes, I'd like to be as transparent to the end user
>>> as possible. I currently have the first dovecot system offline and
>>> the second dovecot system is offline.
>>
>> assuming that BOTH servers are down as fro any other transfers
>> like mysql-datadirs and any critical things which should go
>> save and fast by preserve attributes:
>>
>> rsync --force --delete-after -tPrlHpogEAXz /folder/
>> root at newserver:/folder/
>>
>> # -z compress
>> # -t timestamps
>> # -P progress
>> # -r recursive
>> # -l links
>> # -H hard-links
>> # -p permissions
>> # -o owner
>> # -g group
>> # -E executability
>> # -A acls
>> # -X xtended attributes
> 
> That's how I'd do it also. I think if you didn't mind including -D,
> which from my understanding is --special and --devices, neither of
> which I'd expect in a maildir, and if you wanted to do your deletion
> manually after the fact, would this be equivalent?

well, i have them ususally in my "rsync.sh" but did not expect
such files in a maildir, but yes it does not hurt

> rsync  -PaHAX /folder/
> 
> The man page says -a (--archive) is equivalent to -rlptgoD, and you
> have all but D listed up there.
> 
> My thinking on later manually deleting the old maildir, instead of
> letting rsync do it, is that if somehow, some weird thing goes wrong, I
> have the old one for backup. Who knows, maybe I copied the thing on top
> of the wrong other maildir and have to back it out -- I'd have the old
> maildir as a reference of which files.

you missunderstand "--delete-after"

this is for delete files in the TARGET folder which is not
or no longer in the source and IMHO very very important
if you want sync folders 1:1 because old artefacts can have
very bad effects

without you merge folders and if i know "hey my source contains
exactly what i need, not more and lot less" this is not what i
would like and never did in 10 years IT

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