On Fri, Nov 23, 2012 at 6:23 AM, Stefan Hajnoczi <stefa...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Thu, Nov 22, 2012 at 6:46 PM, Dietmar Maurer <diet...@proxmox.com> wrote: >>> > Did you look at the VMDK "Stream-Optimized Compressed" subformat? >>> >>> We've gone down several sub-threads discussing whether VMDK is suitable. >>> I want to summarize why this is a good approach: >>> >>> The VMDK format already allows for out-of-order data and is supported by >>> existing tools - this is very important for backups where people are >>> (rightfully) paranoid about putting their backups in an obscure format. >>> They >>> want to be able to access their data years later, whether your tool is still >>> around or not. >> >> The VMDK format has strong disadvantages: >> >> - unclear License (the spec links to patents) > > I've already pointed out that you're taking an inconsistent position > on this point. It's FUD. > >> - they use a very slow compression algorithm (deflate), which makes it >> unusable for backup > > I've already pointed out that we can optionally support other algorithms.
To make progress here I'll review the RFC patches. VMDK or not isn't the main thing, a backup feature like this looks interesting. Stefan
