[rdiff-backup-users] Suggestion: New features

[Gregor Gorjanc]

Hello!

I'm using rdiff-backup for few months and I think it's great. Really thank
 you for this program. When I implemented rdiff-backup, I found another
 program which also does backups. I found some nice features in it, however
 I'm not willing to give up rdiff-backup. The feature that I think is really
 great could save same space in backup repository (copied from article in
 linuxfocus http://linuxfocus.org/English/January2004/article321.shtml):

In addition, files or directory structures are re-named by users, in
incremental backups they are again (unnecessarily) secured. The solution to
this is to check the backup for files with the same content (possibly
compressed) and to refer to those. The hard link is this reference.
(Explanation: data blocks in Unix systems are administered through inodes.
Many different file names in as many directories may refer to an inode. The
actual file is being deleted with its last hard link (=directory name). (Hard
links may point to a specific file only within one file system.)
With this trick of the hard links, which were already created in existing
backup files, each file is present in each backup although it exists
physically on the harddrive only once. Copying and renaming of files or
directories takes only the storage space of the hard links - nearly nothing.

The feature I would also like to see in rdiff-backup is deletion of some
 files from repository. Once I've downloaded the Oracle developer database
 files to my home. I didn't managed to install it and over the night those
 files were backed up --> backup repository grown a lot! It would be nice
 that those files could be deleted.

Thanks again for goodprogram.
--
With regards,
           Gregor GORJANC