dd question, what am I doing wrong?

[Daniel B. Thurman]

Patrick O'Callaghan wrote:
> On Fri, 2009-12-04 at 16:13 -0800, Daniel B. Thurman wrote:
>   
>> The problem I have specifically with rsync (or tar, or cp) is that
>> it does not save ACLs, file attributes too well, and so on that I
>> gave up using it.  Perhaps the problem in this case is not to use
>> the -a option but to use the manual options to save everything
>> about the files that you can.
>>
>> Specifically:
>> rsync manual:
>> -a, --archive        archive mode; equals -rlptgoD (no -H,-A,-X)
>> -H, --hard-links   preserve hard links
>> -A, --acls             preserve ACLs (implies -p)
>> -X, --xattrs          preserve extended attributes
>>     
>
> Do you mean that you've tried these (particularly -A and -X) and they
> don't work? If so, have you filed a bug report?
>   
I am not certain that it's a bug per-se, it's just that there are
cases, or so it seems, where it is not clear how to deal with
the issue on my part.  For example, hard links (-H).  How are
hard links handled on one drive to be copied over to another
and is it guaranteed to work?  I could not get my mind around
this one so I did not want to take a chance.  As for ACLs (-A),
what exactly is being handled here and does this work for ALL
Oses concerned - do they follow the same "standard"?  I am thinking
about Vista in particular, so I did not want to experiment on this
one either.  As for extended attributes (-X), I have no clue exactly
what this is.  I guess I have to someday take the time to do more
research before messing around with these rsync options.  This is a
particular reason why I am using dd/rescue & resizing - it works sans
Vista, which I have yet to try.
> Also, have you looked at [1] wrt copying while maintaining SElinux
> contexts?
>
> [1]
> http://docs.fedoraproject.org/selinux-user-guide/f10/en-US/sect-Security-Enhanced_Linux-Working_with_SELinux-Maintaining_SELinux_Labels_.html
>
>   
Yes, I am familiar with SeLinux to a point of creating them and
"permentizing" them.  Symbolic links are one of the nasty ones that
take some getting used to though.

Dan