1223 - ESE warning: Target referenced by symlink is not selected for backup

Modified on Mon, 21 Jul at 12:50 PM

Symptom

The ESE Agent presents a warning when a symlink is selected for backup, but its target file is not. For example: "Warning: The target ‘C:\ProgramData’ referenced by symlink ‘C:\Users\All Users’ is not selected for backup".

Cause

This is intended behaviour to prevent accidental backup exclusions.

In more recent versions of Windows (such as Windows 10), the C:\Users\All Users folder is actually a symbolic link or junction that points to the C:\ProgramData folder. This is done for compatibility with older software that expects the All Users folder to exist in that location.

By default, Windows hides system files and folders to prevent accidental deletion or modification by users. Therefore, the C:\Users\All Users folder may not be visible in File Explorer unless you have enabled the option to show hidden files and folders.

To show hidden files and folders in File Explorer, you can follow these steps:

Open File Explorer.
Click on the View tab in the ribbon at the top.
Tick the Hidden items checkbox in the Show/hide section of the ribbon.

After enabling this option, you should be able to see the C:\Users\All Users folder, which will appear as a shortcut or link to the C:\ProgramData folder.

Optional workaround

To avoid seeing a warning message with every backup, you can exclude these symlinks. To do this:

Stop the Redstor Pro ESE service.
Open the a5backup.properties file.
Add the following, where the specified paths are the symlinks, not the target files. Colon (:) and backslash (\) characters must always be escaped with a backslash (\).
```
symlink.warning.exclusions="path1","path2"
```
- Windows example:
```
symlink.warning.exclusions="C\:\\Users\\All Users"
```
- Linux example:
```
symlink.warning.exclusions="/etc"
```
Save the file.
Start the ESE Agent service again.

A more detailed example:

The following warnings are seen in a Linux ESE Agent:

WARN : 11:09:08 The target '/proc/self/mounts' referenced by symlink '/etc/mtab' is not selected for backup
WARN : 11:09:08 The target '/run/cups/printcap' referenced by symlink '/etc/printcap' is not selected for backup
WARN : 11:09:08 The target '/run/systemd/resolve/stub-resolv.conf' referenced by symlink '/etc/resolv.conf' is 
not selected for backup

To avoid getting these warnings, excluding the following symlinks:

symlink.warning.exclusions="/etc/mtab","/etc/printcap","/etc/resolv.conf"

You can also simply exclude the following:

symlink.warning.exclusions="/etc"

Or, to disable all symlink warnings on a Linux system, exclude the following:

symlink.warning.exclusions=/

To disable all symlink warnings on a Windows system, you would need to list all the drives, e.g.:

symlink.warning.exclusions="C\:\\","D\:\\"