System backups with BorgBackup and BorgBase
Since my last post on BorgBackup and BorgBase, I have subscribed to a 1 TB annual plan and have my daily and weekly /home backups running.
The next thing to setup is my system backups. For this (for now) I’m using a more weekly manually approach.
Installation
1sudo pacman -S borg
Setup
- Create a new key to use in your backups (leave the password blank, I couldn’t get it to work witch a password)
1sudo ssh-keygen -o -a 100 -t ed25519
- Add your key to BorgBase (Account > SSH Keys)
1sudo cat /root/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub
Create a new ‘desktop-system’ Repository in BorgBase and associate your SSH Key
Initialize the Repository (you can see your repository address in BorgBase)
Here you must choose a strong password.
1sudo borg init --encryption=repokey-blake2 XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo
Backup
Every time you want to create a new backup just execute:
1sudo borg create --list --progress --info --log-json --json --filter=AM -C lz4 --exclude '/root/.ssh/' XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo::desktop-system-{now:%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S} /etc /var /root /opt
Checking your archives
You can list the archives or files you have and mount them to explore the backed up files.
- List the archives
1sudo borg list XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo
- List the files in an archive
1sudo borg list XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo::desktop-system-2020-09-23T17:38:52
- Mount an archive and access your files
1mkdir /tmp/mount
2sudo borg mount XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo::desktop-system-2020-09-23T17:38:52 /tmp/mount
3sudo ls /tmp/mount
4sudo ls -l /tmp/mount/etc/fstab
5sudo borg umount /tmp/mount
Cleaning your archives
It’s also a good idea to prune your repository to clean out older files.
1sudo borg prune -v --list --stats --keep-within=10d --keep-weekly=4 --keep-monthly=6 --keep-yearly=2 XXXXX@XXXXX.repo.borgbase.com:repo