backup and restore: what about device files?
der Mouse
mouse at thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu
Sun Jun 2 07:39:27 AEST 1991
In article <1991May16.233149.15268 at athena.mit.edu>, mlevin at jade.tufts.edu writes:
> I would appreciate some advice about the following. When you use a
> backup and restore utility on a Unix system, does it backup and
> restore device files?
That depends on the utility. BSD dump, for example, does; tar does not
(in any incarnation I am aware of, at least). Depending on what you
are trying to do, sometimes one behavior is appropriate, sometimes the
other.
> If so, any ideas on how? Is the info given by stat() enough to
> recreate the device file (using makenod() or something) for a
> restore?
Yes.
> Any information on getting the attributes of and then re-creating
> device files would be reatly appreciated.
stat(2) (and lstat(2), if you have it) on a device file will return the
device major/minor numbers in the st_rdev element; to recreate it you
hand the device number to mknod(2).
der Mouse
old: mcgill-vision!mouse
new: mouse at larry.mcrcim.mcgill.edu
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