Comment 4 for bug 112909

What is the status on this? I just started using the calendar server package and quickly discovered that I've adopted a ticking time bomb; backups will be completely useless if the extended attributes are not preserved.

I want to do an ext4 reformatting and fresh install of my server, porting much of my existing configuration/data onto it. But the unsatisfied need to copy xattr metadata to another physical location is an arcane hindrance reminiscent of Linux in 1992. It seems almost embarrassing to think there might actually be no feasible way to accomplish such a basic and necessary task.

Are there even any workarounds floating around, like a bash or perl script that recursively copies directories and then copies the metadata, or recursively extracts the metadata from a directory and then re-applies it to another directory with matching contents? Even if the data could not be preserved in a portable format for later restoration, at least that would be something.