Arch Linux

zerophase

Member

Registered: 2015-09-03

Posts: 229

[SOLVED]Rnsapshot backup point quickly filling up.

I have rsnapshot running with hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly backups. It has been fine so far, until I added a 130 GB virtual hard drive for Windows. I'm quickly running out of space on the 3 TB partition from this.

I'm not really sure how to solve this issue, other than getting a larger hard drive (ideal) or just excluding backing up the virtual machine. I definitely want it back up so I don't lose everything on a roll back.

Does anyone have suggestions for how to back up the virtual machine? Just having a separate backup point that runs less frequently for vms?

Last edited by zerophase (2016-06-28 03:26:07)

jasonwryan

Anarchist

From: .nz

Registered: 2009-05-09

Posts: 30,424

Website

Re: [SOLVED]Rnsapshot backup point quickly filling up.

Not a Sysadmin issue, moving to NC...

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Arch + dwm   •   Mercurial repos  •   Surfraw

Registered Linux User #482438

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,355

Re: [SOLVED]Rnsapshot backup point quickly filling up.

rsnapshot makes a new copy if there's any changes. Which will be all the time for VM hard discs. You will end up excluding it anyway.

You could:-

1. Run a separate backup script for the VM hard disc, maybe max 3 copies.
2. Run a backup from within the VM of important data within the VM (preferable if possible).
3. Depending on what VM you're using, there may be an option to make the hard disc read-only. You'd need to disable this for software updates etc. but it would make sense for some of the more common use-cases for virtual machines (running one or two specific softwares). You'd need to reconfigure your VM software to save data in an external location though, a shared folder or network folder.

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zerophase

Member

Registered: 2015-09-03

Posts: 229

Re: [SOLVED]Rnsapshot backup point quickly filling up.

Thanks, I'll just write an rsync script that runs after shutting the VM down.