[vox-tech] Copying/ Moving Large number of files

[Jeff Newmiller]

Troy Arnold wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 04:48:34PM -0500, ALLO (Alfredo Lopez De Leon)
> wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I need to move a large number of directories whose size ranges from 1GB
>> to 6 GB (multiple files ~400mb each) between two NFS partitions.  Which
>> is the safest way to do it?  Will "mv dir1 /bla/bla/bla/dir1" will
>> suffice?  The data is extremely valuable and I will hate to lose it
>> during the process, should I do "copy" {cp -r dir1 /bla/bla/bla/dir1}
>> instead and then remove the originals?
> 
> 
> mv would be fine because the file isn't unlinked from the source until it
> has successfully been written to the destination.

I strongly disagree, having had problems with mv and large numbers of files.
It isn't that data gets lost... it is simply that sorting out the mess
of directories and files in two different places if there is a problem
is a headache.

> Still, I'd use rsync.  It has the advantage that it can resume if for some
> reason the transfer gets interrupted. 
> 
> rsync -av dir1 /bla/bla/bla

rsync -avr ?

> Note the lack of trailing slash on 'dir1'.  If you include a trailing
> slash, rsync will copy the *contents* of that directory and not the
> directory itself.
> 
> If you're extra paranoid you can use md5sum to compare the files in the
> source and destination.

I agree with the rest of your comments. :)

> p.s. if the data is that valuable, then maybe you should keep it in both
> places :)

Well, in multiple places.

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