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NAME

       dar_manager - disk archive manager

SYNOPSIS

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -C [<path>/]<database>

       dar_manager  [-v]  [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -A [<path>/]<basename> [
       [<path>/]<archive_basename>]

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -l

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -D <number>[-<number>]

       dar_manager   [-v]   [-j]   -B    [<path>/]<database>    -b    <number>
       <new_archive_basename>

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -p <number> <path>

       dar_manager  [-v]  [-j]  -B  [<path>/]<database> -o [list of options to
       pass to dar]

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -d [<path to dar command>]

       dar_manager  [-v]  [-j]  -B  [<path>/]<database> [-w <date>] [-e <extra
       options to dar>] -r [list of files to restore]

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -u <number>

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -f file

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -s

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -m <number> <number>

       dar_manager [-v] [-j] -B [<path>/]<database> -i

       dar_manager -h

       dar_manager -V

DESCRIPTION

       dar_manager is part of the  Disk  Archive  suite.  Its  purpose  is  to
       simplify  the restoration of a set of few files present in many backup,
       full or differential. This is achieved by gathering  the  catalogue  of
       each  archive  (this has to be done once). At any time you just have to
       give the relative path to the files you want  to  restore,  dar_manager
       will  call  dar with the proper options and restore the last version of
       each  file  (or  the  last  version  before  given  date).  Note   that
       dar_manager  is  to be used when you have remove some files by accident
       some time ago and wish to recover them. It thus not adapted to  restore
       the state a directory tree had at a given time, in particular when some
       files have to be removed. For that you must use dar directly  with  the
       corresponding  archive  to  the  date for which you wish to restore the
       state.

       you can restore any file by hand without dar_manager , but if you  make
       a  lot  of  differential  backup,  you  may spend many time to find the
       archive that contains the last version of your file, as  dar  will  not
       save  it  if  it  has  not  changed since previous backup.  dar_manager
       simplify the process by looking in its internal  database,  built  from
       archive "catalogues".

OPTIONS

       -C, --create [<path>/]<database>
                           creates   an   empty  database  that  will  collect
                           informations about several archives. The <database>
                           is  a  filename  that is required for -B option. To
                           destroy a <database> just remove the file.

       -B, --base [<path>/]<database>
                           specify  the  database  to  read  or  modify.   The
                           <database>  file  must  exist,  and have a database
                           structure (see -C option).

       -i, --interactive   use  a  keyboard  interactive  text  menu   to   do
                           operations  on the given database. So you may avoid
                           reading the other options described in this  manual
                           page,  if  you  wish,  and just use the interactive
                           option. You will however always have to  create  an
                           empty   database  (-C  option)  and  restore  files
                           manually (-r option).

       -A, --add [<path>/]<basename> [ [<path>/]<archive_basename>]
                           add  an  archive  to  the  database.  An   isolated
                           catalogue  can  also  be  used  only if it has been
                           produced by dar  version  1.2.0  or  above.  Why  ?
                           Because,  an  isolated  catalogue produced by older
                           version will always tell that no files are saved in
                           the archive of reference, in that case the solution
                           is to provide the archive itself  as  argument.  An
                           optional  second  argument  is  the basename of the
                           archive if it is different from the first  argument
                           (need  for  extraction  of  files). For example you
                           could have an isolated catalogue in first  argument
                           and  the basename of the original archive (where is
                           stored the data) as second  argument.  By  default,
                           dar_manager  will  look for an archive of reference
                           in the command line used to  create  each  archive,
                           but  in  some cases, it may be necessary to specify
                           the archive name (for example if you’ve changed its
                           name).

       -l, --list          displays   the   informations  about  the  archives
                           compiled in the database. In particular,  a  number
                           is given to each archive, which is required to some
                           other option to design a particular archive  within
                           the  database.  Nothing  avoids  you  to  feed  the
                           database with several archive of the same  basename
                           !  You  will  just have to guess which one is asked
                           under this name. :-)

       -D, --delete <number>[-<number>]
                           removes an archive (or a range of archive) from the
                           database. The number of the archive (or the min and
                           max number or the archive range) is  correspond  to
                           those given by the -l option. Note that all archive
                           number greater than the one(s) to be delete will be
                           decremented  to  keep  continuous  numbering of the
                           archive inside the database.

       -b, --base <number> <new_archive_basename>
                           this  option  allows  you  to  rename  the  archive
                           basename (used when restoring files from it)

       -p, --path <number> <path>
                           this  option allows you to change the location of a
                           given archive (used when restoring files from it)

       -o, --options [list of option to pass to dar]
                           Specify the option to use when  calling  dar.  Each
                           call  erases  the  previous  setting.  Possible dar
                           options are all the available ones except "-x"  and
                           simple arguments (the [list of path]) which will be
                           added by dar_manager itself.

       -d, --dar [<path>]  Set the path to dar. If no argument is  given,  dar
                           is expected to be located in the PATH

       -r, --restore [list of files to restore]
                           dar_manager  will  restore  all (an only) the given
                           files, asking for the  proper  archive  only.  Last
                           version  of each file over several archive is based
                           on the modification time of the inode, thus if  you
                           have  a  more  recent  backup  that contains an old
                           version of a given file, a older archive  could  be
                           used  to restore the file, if its last modification
                           time (mtime)  is  more  recent.   Note  that  files
                           listed after -r option, must never have an absolute
                           path. They will be  restored  under  the  directory
                           specified  with  -R  option  of  dar (thus using -o
                           option), or by default, in  subdirectories  of  the
                           current directory.

       -w, --when <date>   alters  the  -r option behavior: still restores the
                           files in the most recent version available but only
                           before  the  given  date  (versions  of more recent
                           dates are ignored). The  <date>  must  respect  the
                           following            format           [           [
                           [year/]month/]day-]hour:minute[:second].        For
                           example  "22:10"  for  10 PM past 10 or the current
                           day,  "7-22:10" for 10 PM past 10 the  7th  of  the
                           current month, "3/07-22:10" for the 7th of march at
                           22:10 of the  current  year,  "2002/03/31-14:00:00"
                           the  date of the first dar’s release ;-). The given
                           date must  be  in  the  past,  of  course,  and  is
                           compared  to  the  "last  modification" date of the
                           saved files and not to the date at  which  archives
                           have  been  done.  Thus  if a file has been changed
                           long ago but saved in a recent (full)  archive,  it
                           will  be  elected  for  restoration  even for dates
                           older than the creation  of  the  archive.  In  the
                           other  way, a file saved long time ago with a mtime
                           that was set to a date in the future  will  not  be
                           elected  for  restoration  when  giving the date at
                           which was done the archive.

       -e, --extra <options>
                           pass some more options to dar. While the -o options
                           takes  all  that  follows  on  the  command line as
                           argument to pass to dar  and  write  these  in  the
                           database, the -e option does not alter the database
                           and has only one argument. In other words,  if  you
                           need to pass several options to dar through the use
                           of the -e option, you need to  use  quotes  (simple
                           quotes  ’  or  double  quotes  ")  to enclose these
                           options. Example:

              dar_manager -B database.dmd  -e  "-w  -v  -p  -b  -r  -H  1"  -r
              some/files

       -u, --used <number> list  the files that the given archive owns as last
                           version available. Thus when no file is listed, the
                           given  archive  is  no more useful in database, and
                           can be removed safely (-D option). If  <number>  is
                           zero, all available file are listed.

       -f, --file <file>   displays  in which archive the given file is saved,
                           and what are  the  modification  date  (mtime)  and
                           change date (ctime).

       -s, --stats         show  the  number  of most recent files by archive.
                           This helps to determine which archive can be safely
                           removed from the database.

       -m, --move <number> <number>
                           changes  the order of archives in the database. The
                           first number is the number of the archive to  move,
                           while  the  second  is  the  place where it must be
                           shifted.

                           Archie order is important only in the case  a  file
                           to  be  restored  has  EA that has been saved in an
                           archive and data saved  in  another  archive.  This
                           takes  place  when making a differential backup for
                           file that have no change in data but changes in EA.
                           In  that case, the database must be fed (-A option)
                           with archive in the order they have  been  created.
                           If dar_manager detects such a disorder, it issues a
                           warning is giving the name of the file  that  could
                           not  be  restored  properly  (only EA have not been
                           restored with the last version). Note that, if  you
                           don’t  use EA the order of archives in the database
                           has no importance.

       -Q                  Do not display  any  message  on  stderr  when  not
                           launched from a terminal (for example when launched
                           from an  at  job  or  crontab).  Remains  that  any
                           question to the user will be assumed a ’no’ answer,
                           which most of the time will abort the program.

       -j, --jog           when virtual memory is exhausted, as user  to  make
                           room  before  trying  to continue. By default, when
                           memory is exhausted dar aborts.

       -v, --verbose       displays additional information about  what  it  is
                           doing.

       -h, --help          display help usage

       -V, --version       display software version

EXIT CODES

       dar_manager exits with the following code:

       0         Operation successful.

       1         see dar manual page for signification

       2         see dar manual page for signification

       3         see dar manual page for signification

       7         see dar manual page for signification

       8         see dar manual page for signification

       11 and above
                 dar
                  called  from  dar_manager  has  exited with non zero status.
                 Substract 10 to this exit code to get dar’s exit code.

SIGNALS

       dar_manager acts like dar (see dar man page for list of signals),  upon
       certain signal reception dar aborts cleanly

SEE ALSO

       dar(1), dar_xform(1), dar_slave(1), dar_cp(1)

LIMITATIONS

       at  most  65534  archives  can  be  compiled in a given database, which
       should be enough for most users. Dar_manager does not support encrypted
       archives  for  now and archive cannot neither be encrypted. See the FAQ
       for a workaround.

KNOWN BUGS

       none actually

AUTHOR

       http://dar.linux.free.fr/
       Denis Corbin
       France
       Europe