Please remember to post to the mail list, not in private. If I don't see the post or don't know the answer, you are stuck, while other listers may know the answer.

On 05/10/2019 21:10, Carlos E. R. wrote:

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On 05/10/2019 22.05, Paul Groves wrote:

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My backup failed last night. I have three files which failed with tar error Cannot stat: Bad message

I tried opening the files and the cannot open with bad message error I also checked the permissions which shows a load of question marks instead of the rwx flags

What does this error mean and how can I fix it?

umount and fsck the partition

On 07/10/2019 17.32, Paul Groves wrote:

It is the root partition of a live server. Is there a way I can do this on this system while it is up?

Quick answer is "no". But sometimes you might. If it is the /home partition or other data partition, you could umount it while live. If it is the "/" or root partition, then no; you must reboot, and my preference is to reboot to another partition or to a live system on USB. Note: if the root filesystem is btrfs I can hardly help with a detailed recovery procedure; I mean, if you hit further problems with the fsck itself. I confess my ignorance on btrfs. -- Cheers / Saludos, Carlos E. R. (from 15.0 x86_64 at Telcontar)