Backup Bouncer verification?

Has anyone run a thorough Backup Bouncer test for QRecall? Right now I'm running a bit low on disk space to comfortably try it myself, though I'll eventually free up more before upgrading to Leopard and could possibly do it then.

The Technical Features section of the QRecall Features page is encouraging, mentioning the ability to capture and restore Hard Links, POSIX and HFS+ metadata, and ACLs. One thing noticed is file access times (st_atime fields) are modified on files QRecall reads during captures (at least I think that's when it's happening). I don't rely on that information being usefully accurate on OS X as much as on other more traditional Unix systems but it's still something I'd prefer were preserved, though there'd probably be a performance penalty for it.

I've only been using QRecall a couple days so and it's the most intriguing backup/archive utility I've used on OS X, kind of like a power user Time Machine if you'll forgive that analogy. The lack of any search capability was quickly noticeable, which must already be a topic of attention but I haven't had time to search/browser the forum much. And I'd like the trial period to be longer than 14 days to get a better indication for how Rollover Merge and other automatic actions will work over a more extended stretch of time. I might even consider buying it before the trial ends, though my budget can't quite justify that yet.

More feedback after catching up a bit with some previous posts to minimize posting duplicate topics ...

sjk wrote:One thing noticed is file access times (st_atime fields) are modified on files QRecall reads during captures (at least I think that's when it's happening). I don't rely on that information being usefully accurate on OS X as much as on other more traditional Unix systems but it's still something I'd prefer were preserved, though there'd probably be a performance penalty for it.

QRecall doesn't attempt to preserve, capture, or restore the last access time of files. As you surmised, there's a performance hit. It also (oddly) doesn't set, capture, or restore the file's last backup time. Mostly because QRecall doesn't use it and no one else seems to care.

I have these features on the To-Do list. Most likely they would appear as advanced options.

sjk wrote:Has anyone run a thorough Backup Bouncer test for QRecall?

I just wanted to say that I'd be very interested to see how QRecall performs on this test.

I do know of couple of things things that it will fail on, but I'll let that be a surprise.

James Bucanek wrote:QRecall doesn't attempt to preserve, capture, or restore the last access time of files. As you surmised, there's a performance hit.

No worries. Certainly not significant enough of an issue to decide whether or not I'd use QRecall.

With OS X, I'd be more concerned if it updated the Last Opened time though even that's not something I care about too often ... but someone at Apple certainly thinks it's important enough to make it one of the only unmodifiable view option fields in Leopard Spotlight search results. Who the heck cares about sorting their results by Last Opened to the total exclusion of sorting by Last Modified?!

(excuse that mini-rant ... that's one of my biggest gripes with Leopard compared to Tiger)

It also (oddly) doesn't set, capture, or restore the file's last backup time. Mostly because QRecall doesn't use it and no one else seems to care.

Does anything in OS X actually use that? It's always been ignorable to me.

I have these features on the To-Do list. Most likely they would appear as advanced options.

Thanks, for the to-do additions and link. That inspired me to quickly browse through the Cookbook and FAQ subforum, noticing a few things I'll read more thoroughly later.

I just wanted to say that I'd be very interested to see how QRecall performs on this test.

For a moment I thought you were going to ignore my original reason/question for posting this topic. What are we both doing here on Saturday night anyway?

I do know of couple of things things that it will fail on, but I'll let that be a surprise.

Now you've got me curious to run the BB test and of course I'll try guessing where the failures will be, though I've got other priorities before I can get to it.