The thing is, the index can be regenerated. It doesn't make sense to back it up and restore it. And, when it's noticed that the path is different (e.g. restoring, and momentarily visible with a different path), it's going to get invalidated and rebuilt.

Add to that that a file copy (individual) doesn't bring the metadata in the index along with it, and it's just a big mess. This stuff hasn't been well thought out, and "directly injected" metadata -- that is, stuff that's not retrieved from the files, but put in by an app -- is just not well thought out, at least from the perspective of backing up (or any kind of copying).

I think this stuff just has to be fleshed out more. We're doing what we can, given the quirks.