rsync - Oct 2006 - "rsync -z" not working as expected under 2.6.8 and 2.6.9?

I got curious as to how rsync operates, and got a few tests going under
ethereal. The results confused me more.

I created /tmp/test-out/ containing two different text files - one named
"file.txt" and the other "data.gz". ie. data.gz wasn't
actually
compressed - it was actually text. I then created an empty directory on
a rsync server to replicate that data to.

I did a "rsync -av /tmp/test-out/ rsync://server/share/test-in" with
ethereal running. As expected, ethereal shows the uncompressed contents
of both files being sent.

Then I reset and did a "rsync -azv /tmp/test-out/
rsync://server/share/test-in" with ethereal running. Unexpectedly there
was no sign of uncompressed data in the packet trace! Looks like rsync
"decided" to compress data.gz even though /etc/rsyncd.conf had
"*.gz" in
it's "dont compress" section... Looking at the packets, I see no
evidence of the rsyncd server telling the client anything regarding the
filenames.

So is there some smoke-n-mirrors going on in there? Why did the client
compress data.gz - even though it was mentioned on the server as "dont
compress"?

Enquiring minds would like to know :-)

Thanks!

-- 
Cheers

Jason Haar
Information Security Manager, Trimble Navigation Ltd.
Phone: +64 3 9635 377 Fax: +64 3 9635 417
PGP Fingerprint: 7A2E 0407 C9A6 CAF6 2B9F 8422 C063 5EBB FE1D 66D1

On Fri, Oct 13, 2006 at 01:08:54PM +1300, Jason Haar
wrote:
> Looks like rsync "decided" to compress data.gz even though
> /etc/rsyncd.conf had "*.gz" in it's "dont compress"
section...
That setting only affects files being pulled from an rsync daemon, not
pushed to one.  It seems that the manpage section for the option was
written back in the day when an rsync daemon was always read-only,
because it doesn't mention this restriction at all.  I'll update the
manpage.

..wayne..