Re: [rdiff-backup-users] Error When Backing up to samba share on ubuntu 8.10 via smbfs on Mac OS X

[Andrew Ferguson]

On Mar 29, 2009, at 12:33 PM, Nathan Aschbacher wrote:
> The "rm tgt" fails, well not exactly.  It runs without an error the  
> first time, but some kind of problem occurs on OS X where the file  
> won't stay deleted, it immediately reappears.  Once it reappears two  
> problems occur.  First, if you try to delete it again the system  
> claims it doesn't exist, secondly any check that looks to see if the  
> directory is empty will fail (because "ls" still returns tgt).  The  
> symlink "tgt" has to be delete by logging into the Samba server.  If  
> I connect to the same share from an Ubuntu desktop and try the same  
> set of operations through the GUI it won't let me even create the  
> symlink, claiming that the target volume doesn't support it.  It  
> seems like there's some very strange interaction occurring between  
> Mac OS X and the Samba share.  You gotta love Apple's spectacularly  
> bad Samba implementation.

That description is consistent with the stack trace from rdiff-backup.  
The trace points to a file deletion error when attempting to clear out  
the temporary directory in which it had tested filesystem abilities,  
such as symlinks.

It's certainly a strange situation... I've never heard of that  
sequence of events happening before. Of course, it doesn't help that  
there are so many ways in which the Samba server can be configured.

Have you considered other network filesystems such as NFS or  
Appleshare/Netatalk? Of course, installing rdiff-backup on the server  
and running over SSH will be the fastest, performance-wise.


Andrew