Linux Format forums

wyliecoyoteuk · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 8:43 pm Post subject: What do you backup?

I just started organising the backups on my external HDD, and I realised that I only need to backup photos and documents.
Most music I can re-rip from CDs, programs I can re-download, videos I only watch once.
I started with a 720GB backup, and realised that I only really need 15GB. (and I can probably trim that)
I take a 120GB offsite backup disk of my photos and docs everywhere with me in the boot of my car. (paranoid or what!) But I realised how little I really needed.
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Brian Hunter · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:19 pm Post subject:

Video files, music, documents folder. I run rsync once in a while to update my backups I've never been one to take photo's or the like, so I don't really have anything that would be a disaster to lose. Would be a pain in the arse, but that's it.

I used to backup /home, but it was a bit of a waste. When I reinstall a distro I like to start from a clean install.

wyliecoyoteuk · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:29 pm Post subject:

Well, got /home down to 122Gb.
That still includes 4 VMs, several isos and a load of unwatched videos (including the whole of B5)
How did I accumulate so much junk!
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ajgreeny · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:41 pm Post subject:

For ease I regularly rsync my /home to an external ext3 partitioned hard disk. I backup all the hidden files and folders as well as music, docs, videos, etc etc. Luckily I have never needed to restore a complete backup so far, as I have a separate /home partition, but I have occasionally had to get single files or folders that have gone awol, usually because I've done something utterly stupid, of course.
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MartyBartfast · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:49 pm Post subject:

I back up everything, but then I don't have a lot, and I too rsync all the backups off to an external disk on another box.
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Rhakios · Posted: Sat Nov 19, 2011 11:53 pm Post subject:

Documents
Downloads
Music
Pictures
Podcasts
Videos
Are all synched with my sync server and then most of these are synched to my other machines. It takes up about 200G on the server. I suppose if I ever get around to encoding all my CD collection, that will grow by quite a bit.
Other stuff is replaceable or ephemeral and distros are easy enough to reinstall - Documents contains a folder called Archive that has recent tarballs of /etc in it.
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johnhudson · LXF regular Joined: Wed Aug 03, 2005 2:37 pm Posts: 767

I just backup mysql and /home - so I cannot participate in the poll.

mande01 · Joined: Wed Feb 16, 2011 1:03 pm Posts: 20

I actually don't really do much when it comes to back up.

All the small stuff is on dropbox, which I have also set up on a little home server to I have a local copy with me if something goes south. I'm currently using 20% of 3.5 GB, this is important docs and current project work.

Photos are a different story, 67GB of photos.

rsync between ext drive, nas box, and a web hosting site, quite sweet!

App and videos can be downloaded again.

That's me.

nelz · Posted: Wed Nov 23, 2011 3:58 pm Post subject:

/etc
/var
/home

Things that can be replaced, like CD and DVD rips, are stored on separate filesystems, so automatically excluded from the backup process.
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wyliecoyoteuk · Posted: Thu Nov 24, 2011 1:41 pm Post subject:

Maybe we need another poll.
How sure are you that your backups work?

I have upgraded all of my PCs from Ubuntu11.04 to 11.10.
2 netbooks, 3 desktops, 1 laptop.
All upgrades in place, and no problems.

I always leave my Mythbuntu box until last. Lulled into a false sense of security, I didn't do a full backup, all the data is on a separate drive, so I just manually backed up my Zoneminder and MythTV databases, and /etc.

Disaster! after the update, X wouldn't start, in fact I was lucky if I got a command line after a reboot.
Some sort of driver issue, but after messing with xorg.conf, I still had no x screen, and even the CLI wasn't a given.
So I thought "about time for a refresh anyway" this PC has been upgraded every 6 months or so since Mythbuntu first went on it, 8.10 or 9.04.

reinstalled 11.04.
restored zoneminder database backup.
tried to restore MythTV database "unknown object in backup file"

It was around then that I found that all of the recent automated backups were 0 bytes in size.

After some frantic Googling, found that this error can be caused by the restore routine barfing over a large (40M+) file.
split 57M backup into 2 files, restored each- breathe sigh of relief.
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johnhudson · LXF regular Joined: Wed Aug 03, 2005 2:37 pm Posts: 767

The reason I am sure that my backups have worked is that they have only failed once (in 30 years if you count CP/M and DOS) as a result of a faulty CD and, because I use the child/parent/grandparent system, I was able to retrieve everything bar a handful of emails; I have done only a couple of full restores from backups but I have often retrieved a file from a backup when I had accidentally overwritten it and I have had no problems with that.

Since the CD problem I simulate a number of retrieves immediately after backing up to check that the disk is not faulty.

Also every time I install a new distro I have to restore my mysql data to /var and that has not failed so far!

bobthebob1234 · Posted: Fri Nov 25, 2011 9:17 am Post subject:

I have all my uni work on ubuntu one which also helpfully syncs my work between my computers.

That is about the extent of my backups Shocked

Got all my dvds on a raid 1 nas (ok, not a real backup) but don't back up mythbuntu. Also most of my codes are on my svn
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