Re: dump(8) lacks a last-stage incremental dump feature

[David Holland <dholland-current%netbsd.org@localhost>]

On Sun, Feb 28, 2010 at 10:15:32PM -0800, Greywolf wrote:
 > > I'm not sure I understand exactly what you want, or the point - the
 > > intent of the dump levels scheme is that you can do 2^N nightlies
 > > before you need to do a level 0, but only keep N dumps around at any
 > > given time.
 > 
 > erm, if you want to do straight incrementals, no, you really can't do that.
 > Not everyone dumps 0 1 2 1 3 2.  Different people have different ideas about
 > what "the right solution" is.

Where by "straight incremental" you mean each dump is exactly the
changes since the previous one, so after a string of them you have to
scan all of them to restore? I suppose not.

 > > However, doesn't your patch mess up /etc/dumpdates?
 > 
 > I fail to see how.  It simply dumps at level 9 but refers to the
 > previous level 9
 > for the requisite files, then updates /etc/dumpdates with this level 9.

Yes, but it's not really a level 9. I'd be inclined to think there
should be a separate 'i' line.

Perhaps nobody ever assumes they can use the information in
/etc/dumpdates to e.g. check which tape a file is probably on, but I
wouldn't count on it.

-- 
David A. Holland
dholland%netbsd.org@localhost