Backups Using Tar (Question)

Matey · 02-10-2009, 05:57 AM

Hi;
I found this script (thanks to some cool guy at IBM) which will backup the entire file system into one .tgz file and puts the current time/date as name on it, except I get errors when it tries to tar folders like /sys or /dev etc, (I think). it ends saying:
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors!?
(whatever that means?)
So I put the --exclude in the line;

Code:

#!/bin/sh
tar czvf --exclude='*.tgz' --exclude='/sys' --exclude='/dev' --exclude='lost+found'  $1.$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S).tgz $1
exit $?

As you can see there are too many --exclude= in there and it makes it messy.

Is there any way I could use only one --exclude switch and then put all the files/folders I want to exclude in that one instant?

sorry if it's too easy for some of you , this is new to me.
Thanks!

skuzye · 02-10-2009, 06:02 AM

Have you tried using only one exclude and listing all the folders separated by space?

Skuzye

theYinYeti · 02-10-2009, 06:36 AM

It seems to depend on what you call messy. In my opinion, your solution is more messy than several --exclude…

Yves.

theYinYeti · 02-10-2009, 06:38 AM

You should have a look at --exclude-from=FILE