CentOS - Aug 2006 - Copying files from DOS environment based on archive bit

Hi Folks,

I've a Linux server that has a disk on a Windows NT-based machine mounted
via samba so that it appears as /share/pd on the Linux box.

I am trying to automate a backup procedure that pushes files from the NT
disk to another site as a ZIP file using scp. All is working OK, but I'd now
like to make the backup 'incremental' so can anyone think of a way I can
grab files off the NT server based on whether their archive bit is set (and
then clear the bit) - I can't see that the Linux ZIP command supports this
and can't see a way of doing it with mtools.

I might visit this afresh and host the data files on the Linux server in due
course and then have a look at tar/dar/bacula, but for the moment they must
stay where they are for various technical reasons.

Any ideas?!

Thanks

Nigel Kendrick

> I am trying to automate a backup procedure that pushes files from  
> the NT
> disk to another site as a ZIP file using scp
> [...]
> Any ideas?!
Well, if you don't mind having three copies of the data (one on the  
NT server, one on the server with the share mounted, and one on the  
target server), why not use rsync? rsync can operating over ssh just  
like scp, and it will copy data incremenetally (that is, it will only  
copy data that has changed). You could rsync from the NT server to  
the Linux server and again from the Linux server to the target  
server. Or, maybe even more efficient, just rsync from the NT server  
to the target server (then you only have two copies of the data), if  
you can install rsync on the NT server

See "man rsync" and the various rsync tutorials around the net.