Laurent SIEBENMANN wrote:

> (snip)
>      For my own in-house use I would like to have the FB code
> for a souped up version of Ian's utility so I could add filters
> for date suffix type etc. Is it not true? -- that 95% of the coding
> lore needed to build such a friendly house pet have been
> discussed on this list -- particularly by Rick Brown? It would
> make a great demo program for Rick's rumoured book/manual!
>
>      For starters I confess I do not have the answer just
> sitting here to Ian's implicit query: how to copy a file
> lock stock and barrel. Who has?
>

I have been thinking about writing a "CopyFile" DCOD, and perhaps this is the
motivation I needed.  I have done some routines that do asynchronous i/o
(_much_ faster than synchronous, especially over a network).  I still need to
add a piece that also copies the file comments (as seen in the "Get Info"
box).  I am not promising anything, but if/when I get this ready, I'll make it
publically available.

>
>      Incidentally, what Retrospect calls "Incremental Backup", I
> would call "Tape Backup", and I bet Retrospect is built by
> adding an overdose of menus to venerable tape backup code.
>
>      An "Incremental Backup" that merits the name is a utility
> that starts with a source directory, a target directory, and a
> filter that sees both source and target.  It scans through the
> source directory and copies to the similar position in the
> target directory every file that passes muster in the filter.
> If a file already exists in the target it is up to the filter
> to decide whether to overwrite, not to write, or to write a
> copy.  At least that is the animal I want --- with the FB
> filter code open and modifiable.

I think it might be better to make use of the "Last Backup Date" that is
stamped on every file.  Our hypothetical backup program would stamp the
current date as the "Last Backup" date onto every file that it backs up.  When
it comes time to do the next backup, the program simply checks each file's Mod
date to see whether it's greater than the "Last Backup" date.

- Rick