Arch Linux

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,356

Killed my machine, what should I backup?

Hi all,

I managed to kill my 8-month-old laptop, I think. Was working fine last night, today didn't even show the BIOS. Will be bringing it back to the store, but before that I've taken out my harddisk and would like to ask for advise on what's to be backedup.

My regular backup, which is almost completely up to date (except for a bit of stuff from last night) backs up all my work/study/play related data (separate data partition). I also have a complete backup of my home folder, as well as my Wine prefixes, my custom shortcuts and scripts, and some programs that I install to their own directories instead of using pacman.

So, the major thing that's left is Arch itself, its settings, daemons, stuff like that. Would a complete backup (and selective restore) of /etc and /var/cache/pacman/pkg be enough? Are there any other folders (/opt for example) which I need to backup to be able to get my system back to speed as fast as possible once its returned to me? Thanks for the help.

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jasonwryan-Installing Arch is a measure of your literacy. Maintaining Arch is a measure of your diligence. Contributing to Arch is a measure of your competence.
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genisis300

Member

From: Uk

Registered: 2008-01-15

Posts: 284

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

your home folder and /etc minues fsab should get you up and running in no time.

i take it you don't have a custom kernel or custom packages installed?

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"is adult entertainment killing our children or is killing our children entertaining adults?" Marilyn Manson

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,356

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

Those are obviously backed up, since I set them up personally . Thanks for the reminder though.

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Allan-Volunteer on the (topic being discussed) mailn lists. You never get the people who matters attention on the forums.
jasonwryan-Installing Arch is a measure of your literacy. Maintaining Arch is a measure of your diligence. Contributing to Arch is a measure of your competence.
Griemak-Bleeding edge, not bleeding flat. Edge denotes falls will occur from time to time. Bring your own parachute.

FreakGuard

Member

Registered: 2008-04-27

Posts: 103

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

pacman -Qtq for fast package selection

whoops

Member

Registered: 2009-03-19

Posts: 891

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

Maybe easy to forget...

/boot/grup/menu.lst
(me do strange stuff there)

/var/log
(me like to hoard those)

brisbin33

Member

From: boston, ma

Registered: 2008-07-24

Posts: 1,796

Website

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

my backup script does these:

/home and /etc obviously
/usr and /boot for some settings and my menu.lst
/var for the pacman cache (makes restoration waaaay quicker)

and two key package lists
pacman -Qqe | grep -v "$(pacman -Qqm)" > pacman.lst
pacman -Qqm > aur.lst

/edit:

i believe /opt contains things related to OO.o and VirtualBox; barring those, i've got backup and restore scripts that i think (read: hope) would get me automagically up and running in no time after a crash.

thankfully, i haven't had to test (although an untested backup solution is no backup solution at all).

be that as it may, the scripts are backup and restore if anyone's interested.

(backup is pretty generic, but restore does some things specific to my situation)

Last edited by brisbin33 (2009-06-19 13:24:44)

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R00KIE

Forum Fellow

From: Between a computer and a chair

Registered: 2008-09-14

Posts: 4,734

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

If you have lots of space to spare then do a full hd backup with dd then just restore it when you get the pc back from repair.

My previous notebook died exactly like that, one day at night it was working perfectly, turned it off, went to sleep, the next morning when I tried to turn it on it was dead and not under warranty anymore >_<

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R00KIE
Tm90aGluZyB0byBzZWUgaGVyZSwgbW92ZSBhbG9uZy4K

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,356

Re: Killed my machine, what should I backup?

I have a separate boot partition, and have backed it up. I don't (unfortunately) have enough space for dd, and it would take ages! The pacman cache I already have, on a separate machine (two machines both running 64-bit arch). I wonder about the necessity of /usr? What's in there besides easily retrieved stuff like /usr/share/applications shortcuts?

Anyway, the laptop is in the service center. Hope they're honest about it, I don't really trust the people working there not to be taking a look see (honestly, if I worked in that, I would). What's the chances they know about ext4 and how to read it .

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Allan-Volunteer on the (topic being discussed) mailn lists. You never get the people who matters attention on the forums.
jasonwryan-Installing Arch is a measure of your literacy. Maintaining Arch is a measure of your diligence. Contributing to Arch is a measure of your competence.
Griemak-Bleeding edge, not bleeding flat. Edge denotes falls will occur from time to time. Bring your own parachute.