Re: Backup problem using "cp"

["Thomas Schmitt" <scdbackup@gmx.net>]

Hi,

Richard Owlett wrote:
> richard@debian-jan13:~$ stat / | fgrep Device
> Device: 80eh/2062d      Inode: 2           Links: 22
> richard@debian-jan13:~$ stat /media | fgrep Device
> Device: 80eh/2062d      Inode: 131073      Links: 5

"/media" was not the directory to examine. 
You need to examine the directory which you gave as second argument to cp.
In your initial post of this thread the cp command is quoted as

  cp -ax /  "/media/richard/MISC
  backups/dev_sda14/"

(Dunno whether the line break in that mail is significant.)


> I gather that "cp" is then an inappropriate tool.

That's not decided yet.

If your cp target directory had a different device number, then cp option -x
did not what it is supposed to do.

But if your target directory was not the mount point of the USB disk and
not inside the filesystem of the USB disk, then you made a mistake by
giving that directory as target.


> "tar" is inappropriate for my preferences - I was attempting to use "cp" as
> there would be multiple files &/or directories as input *and* output.

You could use multiple tar commands.
(I doubt that you can talk cp into addressing more than one target.)


Have a nice day :)

Thomas