Git-based backups with Kup

Get Back

© Lead Image © Rommel Canlas, 123RF.com

© Lead Image © Rommel Canlas, 123RF.com

Article from Issue 178/2015
Author(s):

KDE's Kup tool uses Rsync and techniques from the Git version control environment for sophisticated backup with an easy GUI interface.

As soon as a user reports data loss, the first piece of advice is inevitably to restore from a backup. Almost as inevitably, this advice is often followed by a meek confession from the user that they do not have a bac kup and have never really thought about the concept.

As many users learn too late, backups are an essential part of the desktop computing experience. The hundreds of backup tools available today employ a wide range of strategies for preserving valuable data. An interesting approach is to use the Git version control environment for managing backups. The etckeeper [1] program, for instance, uses Git for monitoring configuration files in /etc/. One problem with this approach is that Git was developed to manage the Linux kernel, and it is designed to oversee large numbers of small files.

Virtual disks from virtual machines, however, quickly reach sizes of 10GB and more. Git uses the xdelta [2] algorithm to determine the differences between two files so that it only needs to store new data incrementally. However, xdelta performance degrades significantly with large files.

[...]

Use Express-Checkout link below to read the full article (PDF).

Buy this article as PDF

Express-Checkout as PDF
Price $2.95
(incl. VAT)

Buy Linux Magazine

SINGLE ISSUES
 
SUBSCRIPTIONS
 
TABLET & SMARTPHONE APPS
Get it on Google Play

US / Canada

Get it on Google Play

UK / Australia

Related content

  • Admin Workshop: Backups

    Data always seems to get lost at exactly the wrong moment, but the right backup strategy can help you restore those missing files.

  • Automatic Backup

    Backing up data is an unpopular task that many users – and even some administrators – consider a chore, prompting us to take a look at some command-line automatic backup programs.

  • BackupPC

    BackupPC handles backups over the network for a ranges of platforms. Find out more about this user-friendly, configurable, high-performance open source backup system.

  • Admin Workshop: Backups with Rsync

    It is often inefficient to fire up a tape drive whenever you need to back up files or restore a backup. The Rsync tool pushes critical files to a second computer, where you can access them easily.

  • Areca Backup

    Sometimes you just need to back up a few directories on a computer, not administer a distributed installation or an array of disks. Areca Backup gives you hassle-free backups of individual hard drives.

comments powered by Disqus
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters

Support Our Work

Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.

Learn More

News