backups with git

backups with git

[Roald de Vries]

Dear all,

I'm thinking of using git as a backup solution for my whole system,  
setting my $GIT_DIR to something like "/backupdisc/backup". Does that  
seem sensible? In his Google tech talk, Linus said that git was not  
good at huge projects; I guess that would apply to backups. On the  
other hand, maybe a backup doesn't need to be as fast as he wants git  
to be for projects. Has anybody used git like this? And was it a good  
experience?

Kind regards,

Roald

Re: backups with git

[John Tapsell]

2009/8/10 Roald de Vries <rdv@roalddevries.nl>:
> Dear all,
>
> I'm thinking of using git as a backup solution for my whole system, setting
> my $GIT_DIR to something like "/backupdisc/backup". Does that seem sensible?
> In his Google tech talk, Linus said that git was not good at huge projects;
> I guess that would apply to backups. On the other hand, maybe a backup
> doesn't need to be as fast as he wants git to be for projects. Has anybody
> used git like this? And was it a good experience?

Perhaps you want something more like btrfs.

John

Re: backups with git

[Martin Langhoff]

On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 4:27 AM, Roald de Vries<rdv@roalddevries.nl> wrote:
> I'm thinking of using git as a backup solution for my whole system, setting

There are lots of little problems. The two main ones are, IMHO

 - permissions & ownership
 - large files

Some ppl use it for their homedir, and it can be a moderate success as
long as they don't deal with large files.

cheers,


m
-- 
 martin.langhoff@gmail.com
 martin@laptop.org -- School Server Architect
 - ask interesting questions
 - don't get distracted with shiny stuff  - working code first
 - http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Martinlanghoff

Re: backups with git

[Sitaram Chamarty]

On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 1:57 PM, Roald de Vries<rdv@roalddevries.nl> wrote:

> I'm thinking of using git as a backup solution for my whole system, setting
> my $GIT_DIR to something like "/backupdisc/backup". Does that seem sensible?

The two questions you have to ask yourself are: will I ever branch and
merge in this "repo", and do I really want versions from weeks and
months ago?

A "no" to the first question means you're essentially using a very
powerful VCS as a mere backup system.  I suggest rdiff-backup or (if
it's mature enough now, not sure) duplicity..

A "no" to the second question means you're needlessly keeping lots of
old data, and have to jump through hoops to get rid of it if you need
to.

There's a limit to how much you can Macgyver git into doing what it is
not intended for :-)

Having said all that, I do use git to manage parts of my $HOME that do
satisfy those constraints (config files, ~/bin, etc) -- I do sometimes
branch and merge, and I do want really old versions.  I do this by
putting all of them in a repo, and symlinking them to $HOME.

Regards,

Sitaram