Rdd

`rdd` - A Modern, Safe, and Fast Replacement for GNU `dd`

About The Project

rdd is a complete rewrite of the venerable GNU dd utility in Rust, designed with three core principles in mind: Safety, Performance, and User Experience.

While dd is powerful, its cryptic syntax (if, of, bs) is notoriously unforgiving, and its lack of feedback can be nerve-wracking during critical operations. rdd aims to solve these problems by providing a modern command-line experience without sacrificing the power that dd is known for.

Key Features

Rich Progress Bar: rdd provides a multi-bar progress display by default, showing transfer rates, total progress, and ETA. No more sending SIGUSR1 signals in the dark!
Safety First:
- Uses clear, verbose argument names like --input and --output to prevent catastrophic typos.
- (Planned) Will include confirmation prompts for potentially destructive operations.
Multithreaded Performance: (Planned) Leverages a producer-consumer model to de-couple read and write operations, allowing rdd to saturate fast NVMe drives and I/O channels.
On-the-fly Verification: (Planned) Calculate a cryptographic hash (BLAKE3, SHA-256) during the copy process to guarantee data integrity without needing a second pass.

`rdd` vs. `dd`

A simple disk-to-image backup demonstrates the clarity of rdd.

GNU `dd` (The Old Way)	`rdd` (The New Way)
`sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=~/backup.img bs=4M status=progress conv=fsync`	`sudo rdd --input /dev/sda --output ~/backup.img --bs 4M`

With rdd, progress is on by default and fsync is guaranteed on completion. The command is clearer and less prone to error.

Installation

From Crates.io (Recommended)

Once published, you can install rdd using cargo:

cargo install rdd

From Source

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/sarang-kernel/rdd.git
cd rdd

Build the release binary:
```
cargo build --release
```
The executable will be located at ./target/release/rdd.

Usage Examples

1. Backing up a hard drive to an image file

rdd --input /dev/sdb --output /mnt/backups/disk_image.img --bs 16M

2. Restoring an image to a USB drive

WARNING: This is a destructive operation and will overwrite all data on the target device (/dev/sdc). Double-check your device names.

sudo rdd --input ~/Downloads/ubuntu-22.04.iso --output /dev/sdc --bs 4M

3. Cloning a disk

WARNING: This is a destructive operation. All data on the output disk (/dev/sdb) will be replaced with data from the input disk (/dev/sda).

sudo rdd --input /dev/sda --output /dev/sdb --bs 64M

4. Copying a file with hash verification (Planned Feature)

rdd --input video.mp4 --output video.backup.mp4 --verify blake3

Development Status

This project is currently under active development.

Phase 1 (Complete): Core dd functionality (input, output, bs, count, skip, seek) is implemented in a robust, single-threaded model.
Phase 2 (In Progress): Enhancements like the progress bar, multithreading, and hash verification are being added.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

rdd - A Modern, Safe, and Fast Replacement for GNU dd