[finnix] Replace ddrescue with gddrescue?

Wed Apr 14 20:56:33 PDT 2010

Thanks for the info. Just to note, I was looking at the code, and it appears 
that it is the original gnu ddrescue, then a diff file that makes changes to the 
build options. Didn't see it actually adding new code to the program.

Also, note that the gnu site now has a 1.12 version from this month?
Not sure of the changes it makes.

On 15 Apr 2010 at 2:30, Sylvan Heuser wrote:

From:           	Sylvan Heuser <sylvan.heuser at gmx.net>
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Date sent:      	Thu, 15 Apr 2010 02:30:16 +0200
Subject:        	Re: [finnix] Replace ddrescue with gddrescue?
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> On Thu, 2010-04-15 at 10:00 +1000, Michael D. Setzer II wrote:
> > Does someone has a clear difference between ddrescue and gddrescue?
> I think the Linux Journal article (see below) is enough to get an idea,
> but you can always read the manpages:
> apt://gddrescue, ddrescue: http://manpages.debian.net/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=ddrescue
> apt://ddrescue, dd_rescue: http://manpages.debian.net/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=dd_rescue
> 
> To put it simple: apt://gddrescue is the "advanced" clone of
> apt://ddrescue. As far as I understand, someone adopted the old
> apt://ddrescue code, added functionality - and it ended up in the GNU
> project.
> 
> Also recommended:
> http://www.debianadmin.com/recover-data-from-a-dead-hard-drive-using-ddrescue.html#comment-839
> (The article is about dd_rescue, but the comment sums up some nice
> benefits of ddrescue)
> 
> > Note the ddrescue wasn't that big, but it require the libstdc++ 
> > library, which wasn't part of my image. Perhaps finnix already has that 
> > library.
> Right... dependencies. mh. That could indeed be a problem, although
> Ryan's intentions were to keep Finnix below 185MiB, not below 100MiB,
> weren't they? Haven't checked yet if there is already some 
> 
> > I replaced the older dd_resuce with the ddrescue, and am looking at allowing 
> > using more than the basice ddrescue source destination options.
> basic options? What basic options? They're all just copying files... and
> have the option to control harddisks directly to some extent.
> 
> > Does the gddrescue have additional option that would be helpful in disk / 
> > partition backups?
> Look at the comment to the debianadmin article - I won't paste
> everything in here.
> 
> > As a final thing, can the complied gddrescue be ftped to a running finnix 
> > boot, and then run? In the past I had a method to download an run g4l from 
> > a finnix cd.
> I wouldn't know why to use ftp, but you can certainly use precompiled
> packages under finnix - that's how I currently use apt://gddrescue,
> although I thought about creating my own custom "overlay".
> 
> > > > when you say "more advanced" what do you mean?
> > > 
> > > http://www.linuxjournal.com/magazine/hack-and-when-disaster-strikes-hard-drive-crashes?page=0,1 
> > > > ddrescue or dd_rescue 
> > > > To make things a little confusing, there are two similar tools with
> > > > almost identical names. dd_rescue (with an underscore) is an older
> > > > rescue tool that still does the job, but it works in a fairly basic
> > > > manner. It starts at the beginning of the drive, and when it
> > > > encounters errors, it retries a number of times and then moves to the
> > > > next block. Eventually (usually after a few days), it reaches the end
> > > > of the drive. Often bad blocks are clustered together, and in the case
> > > > when all of the bad blocks are near the beginning of the drive, you
> > > > could waste a lot of time trying to read them instead of recovering
> > > > all of the good blocks.
> > > > 
> > > > The ddrescue tool (no underscore) is part of the GNU Project and takes
> > > > the basic algorithm of dd_rescue further. ddrescue tries to recover
> > > > all of the good data from the device first and then divides and
> > > > conquers the remaining bad blocks until it has tried to recover the
> > > > entire drive. Another added feature of ddrescue is that it optionally
> > > > can maintain a log file of what it already has recovered, so you can
> > > > stop the program and then resume later right where you left off. This
> > > > is useful when you believe ddrescue has recovered the bulk of the good
> > > > data. You can stop the program and make a copy of the mostly complete
> > > > image, so you can attempt to repair it, and then start ddrescue again
> > > > to complete the image.
> > > 
> > > Especially the logfile feature is sometimes crucial, for example when
> > > you need to copy an image in two parts because of limited space on your
> > > transfer medium.
> 
> -- 
> S.
> 
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