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Questions tagged [backup]

Backup is the activity of copying files or databases so that they will be preserved in case of equipment failure or other catastrophe. This tag covers restoring from backup as well.

The process of backing up is making copies of data which may be used to restore the original after a data loss event.

  • The primary purpose is to recover data after its loss, be it by data deletion or corruption.

  • The secondary purpose of backups is to recover data from an earlier time, according to a user-defined data retention policy, typically configured within a backup application for how long copies of data are required.

2634 questions
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How do I make rsync delete files that have been deleted from the source folder?

I recently set up a machine with Ubuntu Server to host game servers. I installed a backup plugin for each game server that creates frequent backups of game world files in a particular folder on the machine. I also established a cron task to…
user254251
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Comparison of backup tools

This question exists because it has historical significance, but it is not considered a good, on-topic question for this site, so please do not use it as evidence that you can ask similar questions here. While you are encouraged to help maintain…
8128
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How to backup settings and list of installed packages

If I want to make a backup of everything I have done since the fresh install of Ubuntu, what are the possible options? What all should I backup? I want to get all the settings that I changed, all the packages I installed, etc.
n1kh1lp
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How to make a disk image and restore from it later?

I'm a new Linux user. I've reinstalled my Wubi from scratch at least ten times the last few weeks because while getting the system up and running (drivers, resolution, etc.) I've broken something (X, grub, unknowns) and I can't get it back to work.…
Torben Gundtofte-Bruun
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What's the difference between .tar.gz and .gz, or .tar.7z and .7z?

Recently, I've been backing up a lot of my data, and I noticed that I can save files as .gz or .tar.gz, or .7z and .tar.7z, etcetera. What are the differences between the normal one and the .tar.* variant? Which one of them is adviced when making…
Exeleration-G
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Mount single partition from image of entire disk (device)

I made an image of my entire disk with dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/external_media/sda.img Now the problem is I'd like to mount an ext4 filesystem that was on that disk but mount -t ext4 -o loop /media/external_media/sda.img /media/sda_image obviously…
Nicola Feltrin
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How to back up my entire system?

If I want to make a backup of my entire OS (including but not just my home directory), how do I go about this? Is it as simple as backing up everything in / and then when if I suffer a crash, just copying the files back over? Will this cover grub,…
Will
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How do I extract a specific file from a tar archive?

Is it possible to restore a single file from the .tar backup? I don't want to restore total backup. I just want to restore one single file from the backup.
Raja G
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Moving entire Linux installation to another drive

I have Ubuntu 14.04 with a lot of packages and work-related stuff that I am very happy with it. It is installed on my main SSD drive which is a 120GB one (I had chosen "/" when I installed Ubuntu, so I believe everything should be on this drive). It…
Dumbo
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Where are GNOME keyboard shortcuts stored?

I usually load a new version for every release to keep my OS fresh while preserving the last version on another partition as backup. I also employ a lot of custom key mappings. I've figured out how to transfer the majority of my configuration across…
Evan Plaice
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6 answers

What's a good back-up strategy for 1 desktop PC?

No, this is not a comparison of back-up tools, nor is it a solicitation on What to backup or Why and only a little bit about Where to backup and When to do it. This is basically a strategy question: what, where and when all together. "How" is not…
Fabby
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2 answers

Command pg_dump not found?

I was trying to make a backup in a server and I got the error: pg_dump command not found I thought that if you had postgres installed, it worked. What I have to do to install this command? I do not think that it is possible with apt-get or…
forvas
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How do I move (copy) my entire Ubuntu system to a different hard disk?

The HDD I have my Ubuntu installed is about to fail. I would rather not lose 3 years worth of data, customisation and apps. I am looking for a way to move the complete system (SWAP included, because I'm not sure if I can relink the system to a new…
boywithaxe
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Encrypt tar.gz file on create

I have a script which creates a nightly backup of several directories. It is created using tar -czf, and the destination tar.gz file path is on a mounted network directory. The resulting file is about 1.2Gb large. The network speed is reasonably…
Joel
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What files and directories can be excluded from a backup of the home directory?

Duplicity does already a great job of making efficient backups, but I want still to minimize the amount of files being back-upped. What files or directories can be excluded in a home directory? Please name these explicitly, wildcards allowed, paths…
Lekensteyn
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