[Nottingham] File copying filesystem -> filesystem

[Martin]

Rory Holland wrote:
> Why not copy your entire home directory onto an external drive and reinstall?
> That way you get the benefits of reinstallation

And that's the question... How best to do that such that the files are 
optimally arranged onto the new disk (partitions).

Does the ext4 filesystem (and filesystems in general) have an easier 
time arranging the files and directories and inodes on a disk if you 
copy new files to them by following the directory hierarchy depth first, 
or breadth first? Or what? Are some file transfer programs better than 
others?

Eg, use:

cp
tar
rsync
?

Or even use exotic tricks with find and/or xargs to contrive the order 
that the files get copied across.

Should big files be copied across before small files?

Should the directory structure be created before any files are copied? 
(tar and rsync appear to do that at each level of hierarchy.)


Or does it simply not matter? Are filesystems already so highly 
optimised that they perform just as well regardless of any abuse?

Any thoughts folks?


Cheers,
Martin

-- 
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Martin Lomas
martin at ml1.co.uk
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