This script is used to synchronize (large) files to a local/remote destination using a incremental algorithm. Devices are used as regular files and can be synchronized, too.

blocksync.py is also a workaround for a limitation when using rsync: rsync is unable to synchronize a device using its incremental algorithm. blocksync.py is able to sync a device file bit by bit to a remote SSH destination. When called multiple times it will only copy those blocks which were modified - this will speed up the copy process and save a lot of bandwidth.

• Moving physical machines to virtual ones (p2v)
• Backup failed machines' hard drives
• Synchronize large files to a (remote) destination using a fast and efficent algorithm

• SSH client on source server
• SSH server on destination server, with root permissions (directly using root login or using sudo) if syncing to a device file
• Python on both source and destination server
• blocksync.py in home directory of destination server (executable)

Please make sure that the source file isn't changed during sync, blocksync.py will not notice any changes made at file positions which were already copied. You may want to boot a live linux (grml, knoppix, systemrescuecd etc.) if you want to sync the system drives from a running machine.

root@source# python blocksync.py /dev/source/file user@destination.example.com /path/to/destination/file

root@source# python blocksync.py /dev/source/file localhost /path/to/destination/file

Please run python blocksync.py without any arguments to get a full list of possible options.

Please feel free to leave a bug report here at Github or drop a pull request - every help is welcome!