Hi,
I have discovered that rsync is not copying the home directories on our server, even though rsync is being executed via a user that is a member of the Backup Operators group.
If you want to backup a data volume on a windows server, you normally make the backup user a member of the Backup Operators group, so that the backup user has access to all the files on the volume for the purposes of copying the files.
On a server where I am using rsync, the user home directories are private (i.e. administrators do not have access). This does not affect the backup program that we use to archive the files. However when we run rsync (using the credentials of a user in the Backup Operators group) rsync does not appear to obtain elevated privileges to read the home directories.
From the investigation that I have done, it seems that to be able to take advantage of the elevated privileges provided by the Backup Operators group, when reading files from the NTFS filesystem you need to use specific "backup" API's.
In other words if you logon to a computer as a member of the Backup Operators group, and try to xcopy all the files on a volume it won't work. Because xcopy does not use the relevant API's necessary to obtain read access to all files on the filesystem.
Presumably this is the same reason that rsync cannot access all files on the filesystem when being run via a user that is a member of the Backup Operators group?
Can anyone confirm and/or is there a workaround.
Thanks
VW
I did try the same once without success. As you say, there should be some specific APIs involved here. Rsync uses POSIX APIs available via cygwin.