NAME

       metastore - stores and restores filesystem metadata

SYNOPSIS

       metastore ACTION [OPTION...] [PATH...]

DESCRIPTION

       Stores  or  restores  metadata  (owner, group, permissions, xattrs and optionally mtime) for a filesystem
       tree. This can be used to preserve the metadata in situations where it is usually not stored (git and tar
       for example) or as a tripwire like mechanism to detect any changes to metadata. Note that  e.g.   SELinux
       stores  its  labels  in  xattrs  so  care should be taken when applying stored metadata to make sure that
       system security is not compromised.

ACTIONS

       -c, --compare
              Shows the difference between the stored and real metadata.

       -s, --save
              Saves the current metadata to ./.metadata or to the specified file (see --file option below).

       -a, --apply
              Attempts to apply the stored metadata to the file system.

       -d, --dump
              Dumps stored (if no PATH is given) or real metadata (if  PATH  is  present,  e.g.  ./)  in  human-
              readable form.

              This  action  is  meant only as a helpful debugging facility or merge conflict helper. Do not ever
              compare its output generated using different metastore version. Do  not  rely  on  current  output
              format (especially in batch scripts), because it may change in future without prior notice.

       -h, --help
              Prints a help message and exits.

OPTIONS

       -v, --verbose
              Causes  metastore  to  print  more  verbose messages. Can be repeated more than once for even more
              verbosity.

       -q, --quiet
              Causes metastore to print less verbose messages. Can be repeated more  than  once  for  even  less
              verbosity.

       -m, --mtime
              Causes metastore to also take mtime into account for the compare or apply actions.

       -e, --empty-dirs
              Also attempts to recreate missing empty directories. May be useful where empty directories are not
              tracked (e.g. by git or cvs).  Only works in combination with the apply option.

       -E, --remove-empty-dirs
              Also  attempts  to  remove  empty directories missing from the metadata. May be useful where empty
              directories are not tracked (e.g. by git or cvs).   Only  works  in  combination  with  the  apply
              option.

       -g, --git
              Prevents metastore from omitting .git directories.

       -f <file>, --file <file>
              Causes the metadata to be saved, read from the specified file rather than ./.metadata.

PATHS

       If  no  path is specified, metastore will use the current directory as the basis for the actions. This is
       the recommended way of executing metastore.  Alternatively, one or more paths can be specified  and  they
       will  each  be  examined.  Later invocations should be made using the exact same paths to ensure that the
       stored metadata is interpreted correctly.

AUTHORS

       metastore was created by David Härdeman in 2007-2008.  Now it is maintained by Przemysław Pawełczyk.  All
       source code contributors are listed in the AUTHORS file.

                                                  January 2016                                      metastore(1)