comp.os.linux.networking

Jack Snodgrass writes:

>On Wed, 19 Mar 2008 00:10:10 -0600, Jim T. Kirk wrote:

>> I'm trying to set up a backup/mirroring system for my home LAN. I
>> want all the computers to mirror certain directories to a "server"
>> machine using rsync.

rsnapshot works well for this kind of backup job. It uses rsync to do the
backup but keeps hard linked past backups too. It is like a differential
backup but without the downside of having to work you way through the
layers.

>>
>> A lot of the web sites out there explaining how to do this kind of
>> thing use inetd on the server to create an rsync daemon. However,
>> I'm not clear what the advantage is of using an rsync daemon over
>> just using rsync directly on the client machines with ssh as the
>> transport. Setting up the daemon seems to be an extra complication,
>> without any advantage I can discern. Yet, many of the web sites
>> don't even discuss the alternative, as if it were obvious that
>> using the daemon were the right approach.
>>
>> Am I missing something?

>There is overhead ( and security ) by using rsh over ssh.

What does rsh over ssh have to do with anything? rsync does not use rsh at
all if you tell it to use ssh (whchI believe it now does by default).


>If you use rsyncd, it's faster ( non-ssh ) and you can do

It is faster because it is unencrypted. Not a great idea if you are backing
up unless you do not care if everyone can read the stuff being transfered.

>things like list rsync directoy resources. I think that you
No, you can list the packages which you have defined in the /etc/rsync.conf
directory on the server. But in backing up you KNOW where you want to put
stuff.

>can mark things as ro too. rsyncd is more for apps that have
>multiple users accessing the server.

Agreed. The question was about backups.


>I use rsync over ssh for 99% of my stuff.