New here and new to btrfs and snapper snapshots. So far I have learned to setup these with snap-pac and grub-btrfs, restoring from it, potential issues, etc.
This is all fine, I feel like I can restore from the snapshots if I break the system. The problem is the device itself, I’m used to working with servers where things like RAID, reproducible builds and DR are set in stone, but for a personal laptop (close to a decade old) I repurposed as my traveling companion it’s quite different. I don’t have any contingencies for device failure.
Let’s say an SSD failure or general h/w failure happens, I would like to restore the snapshot to an entirely new machine. What are the tools to make this happen? I don’t mind paying for a service if it’s easier and budget friendly, but I already have access to block storage and object storage so a DIY solution would be appreciated but not necessary if it’s too much headache.
In order to get snapshots into the cloud, you would need a remote btrfs target.
I was looking into btrfs send and receive. Could this work reliably over a network mount? The Archwiki mentions piping it to a locally mounted hard disk.
A traditional backup might be a better solution here. Something like borg or restic which do de-duplication/compression/encryption.
This is a good idea as I won’t be tied into the btrfs ecosystem should the restore be done on a different filesystem. This might sound stupid, but would there be any inconsistencies or issues when simply copying files over to a btrfs subvolume? Let’s say borg/restic is used to backup to an external SFTP server and then I restore from those snapshots to an entirely new btrfs subvolume, I’m worried about metdata or some other btrfs “things” that might cause it to reject all that new data. Sorry, my knowledge on btrfs is still very limited.
Yes, I use btrfs send/receive over ssh regularly. That being said, I have never tried it across the internet. Only my local network.
No, a mounted btrfs subvolume works just any other filesystem from a functional perspective.
What you get from borg/restic won’t be snapshots. It will be files. That being said, you could certainly either restore them directly to the new location or restore them somewhere else and then use rsync to get them to where you want them.
