As the subject line suggests, I’m a n00b to EOS from Mint and wanted to see what recommendations EOS-folk have for using system back-up utilities. Given the (potential) risk of a rolling release for installing something that may not work, this seems like a good practice both in general and specifically for this kind of distro.
/home is on a separate partition, which I hope will keep my data, etc., safe(r) from a borked system.
Two questions, then:
(a) In Mint, I used BackInTime, but open to other suggestions for reliable user/n00b-friendly backups; and
(b) Is there a standard way of locking a boot image so that one always keeps a recent but dependable image to successfully boot into if an update (or a user!!) messes something up?
Use the backup-tool you know, it’s always a good coice. If something went wrong, ’eos-shifttime’ may be your friend.
You can install another kernel to have a second one (i.e. LTS or ZEN).
The best practice would be learning how to fix problems when they arise. Reliance on a system backup only lessens one’s motivation to learn problem-solving.
I use backintime GUI. I tried (borg)/volta, (rsync)/grsync, freefilesync before.
Backintime is available in AUR, or much easier, from chaotic-aur repo.
yay -Ss backintime
aur/backintime-cli-git 1.4.3.r54.g50c74444-1 (+28 0.00)
Simple backup/snapshot system inspired by Flyback and TimeVault. CLI version
aur/backintime-git 1.4.3.r54.g50c74444-1 (+28 0.00)
Simple backup/snapshot system inspired by Flyback and TimeVault. Qt6 GUI version
aur/backintime-cli 1.5.3-3 (+300 0.53)
Simple backup system inspired from the Flyback Project and TimeVault. CLI version.
chaotic-aur/backintime-cli-git 1.5.4.rc2.r5.g517182ba-1 (871.0 KiB 3.7 MiB)
Simple backup/snapshot system inspired by Flyback and TimeVault. CLI version
chaotic-aur/backintime-git 1.5.4.rc2.r5.g517182ba-1 (318.7 KiB 1.6 MiB)
Simple backup/snapshot system inspired by Flyback and TimeVault. Qt6 GUI version
chaotic-aur/backintime-cli 1.5.3-3 (827.7 KiB 3.5 MiB)
Simple backup system inspired from the Flyback Project and TimeVault. CLI version.
chaotic-aur/backintime 1.5.3-3 (281.4 KiB 1.4 MiB) (Installiert: 1.5.3-2)
Simple backup system inspired from the Flyback Project and TimeVault. Qt5 GUI version.
aur/backintime 1.5.3-3 (+300 0.53) (Installiert: 1.5.3-2)
Simple backup system inspired from the Flyback Project and TimeVault. Qt5 GUI version.
Timeshift and KBackup.
Timeshift for system image. KBackup for backing up documents and files in $HOME.
As @Omig said if you are comfortable with an existing backup software that is the best option. Use that. BackInTime is available in AUR so if you are comfortable with that use that.
Arch is different than Debian based systems like Mint. The best mechanism that I have learnt from EOS forums is the following
Keep a LTS Kernel (6.12.x or 6.6.x or 6.1.x) along with your daily use kernel on your system. This helps.
Forget about keeping the most recent backup. You are in the rolling release realm now. Inculcate a habit of creating an image say every 10 or 15 days or 20 or 30 days. you can use SystemD-Timer for this.
Why? what is wrong with either of these commands inside home? cp -R ./* /home/backup/path rsync -a ./* /home/backup/path
As far as system files I never back them Up. I’m not on a data critical System I’m on a HOME USER System. So I can spare 10 minutes to fix or at very worse reinstall.
Nothing is wrong with this. If the above works for you then great. In Linux there is no one correct tool or method to achieve an objective. There are multiple ways. I prefer KBackup for the following reasons
It is integrated with KDE and is GUI based. So I can select and omit certain files easily. So in the script that you have given it is possible that some directories and files might also be backed up, which need not. I would not like to backup the .local or .cache or .config and a few other files and directories. KBackup is very similar, though not equivalent, to Microsoft SyncToy.
It creates a single tar file. So the entire backup is present in a tar. Easier to handle the backup. It also allows to specify how many backups need to be created.
Many of us are noobs with scant knowledge on scripting. And re installation takes time.
We want to use EOS to achieve an objective. We would rather not work on EOS. If you get what I am saying. Many of us are not tinkers and tweakers. Install it, configure it and forget it. Then use it, is our moto.
Yeah I know these views will be controversial in Arch and EOS land.
How does one expect to learn without change? Maybe its time to learn if you are going to be on a ‘Terminal Centric Distro’
so does tar tar cf /Backup/Destionation.tar ./
Just the nature of the Beast with a Rolling Release. You can’t just ‘forget it’ An update happens and reminds you quickly of that fact. Honestly I say Learn to Use what your Choosing or choose to use something that isn’t as taxing and settle for the fact it may not be as ‘Cool’
It may not be as cool? I do not think cool as a factor plays a role in selection of the distro. But coming to your comment. Yeah to have a semi-rolling release would help a lot. For example an Arch distro which works on the LTS Kernel plus latest QT/KDE libraries and the latest or stable suite of applications would be the best. And which has releases say every week or alternative Monday would also work.
One minor release is expected approximately every 12 months, aligned with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server Service Packs. We do provide 6 months of overlap support in between releases so Leap users get up to 18 months per individual release.
One major release is expected after approximately 36–48 months, aligned with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server Releases.
I’m using Rescuezilla on a Boot-USB-Stick. Creating backups of my system drive once or twice a week.
Also I’m using BTRFS Assistant with Grub-BTRFS to create snapshots that I’m able to select in Grub and restore a working snapshot in EOS then if something breaks my installation.
Looked into opensuse Tumbleweed. Could not determine what version of Linux LTS kernel they are using and whether they do support 6.12.x and 6.6.x. Ditto for QT6/KDE. Though after going through distro watch have been impressed by the comments that recommend using OpenSuse.
snapshots with BTRFS, restic to backup home folders to NAS. Really haven’t had to disaster recover yet (knock on wood) as most issues in EOS can fixed without resorting to a full restore. I don’t bother backing up the system, it’s simple enough to rebuild if you backup critical config system config files. Always have a bootable usb for emergencies (that I’ve had to use before).
