Linux – Move files between Linux and OpenBSD and keep file properties

cloningfile-copylinuxopenbsdtar

I would like to move/share some files between Linux and OpenBSD. What would be an easy and simple way to achieve this?

These are the solutions I have found so far and why I am not fully convinced:

  • Using a normal USB drive with a FAT32 partition: It won't preserve permissions.
  • Using another partition type: Which one would work RW on both?
  • Using tar: I am worried about the fact that the tar implementations differ between the BSDs and Linux.

What would be a simple way to share files between Linux and OpenBSD while keeping permissions and timestamps?

Best Answer

I'm using NFS mounts. I have my /home mounted on both Ubuntu and OpenBSD, from an OpenBSD NFS server and have no issues (same UID/GID on both systems!).

If you are dual-booting and just want to transfer a few files every now and again, tar archives on a FAT32 USB stick will work just fine.

I've never tried to share partitions between Linux and OpenBSD (I'd use virtual machines instead of dual-booting). That sounds tricky, but OpenBSD 6.1 has a mount_ext2fs command in the base system, so EXT2 filesystems should be supported to at least a basic degree.

Related Question