[vox-tech] Tar, MySQL, and cron-ed backups

[Mark K. Kim]

On Fri, 5 Dec 2003, Mitch Patenaude wrote:

> > * some combination of these?
>
> yes. if it was half-way through reading the file.. then the first half
> is the old file, and the second half is the new files.  If more than
> one change was made, then more than one file is there.

Hooooooooold on...  are you *sure*?  As I recall, once a file is opened,
it is guaranteed to stay in that form until you close it.  Perhaps that's
not the case for big files as I don't deal much with multitera-size
databases, but at least for small files, the file integrity is guaranteed
by the kernel once you've obtained its handle from opening the file.  I
think it's more likely that tar is complaining not about a single file
being modified in the middle of reading it, but the integrity of the
entire archive as a whole, in case there are inter-file dependencies.

Just my 2 cents...

-Mark

-- 
Mark K. Kim
AIM: markus kimius
Homepage: http://www.cbreak.org/
Xanga: http://www.xanga.com/vindaci
Friendster: http://www.friendster.com/user.jsp?id=13046
PGP key fingerprint: 7324 BACA 53AD E504 A76E  5167 6822 94F0 F298 5DCE
PGP key available on the homepage