[Box Backup] Unclogging data store

[Jonathan Morton]

>>> This must have happened millions of time.  My data store became  
>>> full very quickly because I forgot to exclude media files from  
>>> backup such as mpeg, avi, etc.  I thought that was no problem.  I  
>>> just added the exlcusion and SIGHUP'ed the client.   
>>> Unfortunately, the data store seems to think these files are  
>>> supposed to remain there and does not delete them.
>>
>> It will, though, when the space is needed for newer files. Cleanup  
>> of the backup store does not happen until the space is needed,  
>> AFAIK. I don't use a lot of regexes, though, so I can't say with  
>> 100% certainty.
>>
>>> How do I purge them short of actually deleting them on my  
>>> computers and waiting for data store to sync up?  Thanks.
>>
>> If you are hell-bent on getting rid of the files right away, I  
>> would clear out the store on the server, and restart the backups.  
>> That will stop the files from backing up the next time, and they  
>> won't be backed up on the server. That also means that you don't  
>> have to delete any files on the client machine.
>
> What confuses me is the status indicating no deleted files...

The client might not have deleted the files yet - it may be waiting  
for a timer to expire, having detected their "supposed to be absent"  
nature.  I'm running a test now to see whether this is likely to be  
the case, but it will take quite a while to complete, as it involves  
overloading an existing backup installation.  In the meantime, just  
leave the whole thing alone overnight and see what happens.

--------------------------------------------------------------
from:     Jonathan "Chromatix" Morton
mail:     chromi@chromatix.demon.co.uk
website:  http://www.chromatix.uklinux.net/
tagline:  The key to knowledge is not to rely on people to teach you it.