Hello,

I would like to keep my externall HDD connected and have my HOME directory and my email setttings (I use Thunderbird) backed up automatically. Is this possible?

Yep,

There are backup apps but most people might set up a cron job that has a batch file to run rsync.

You could get wild and run some advanced filesystem too.

I'm sure others have their favorite way also. They might add to the answer.

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks for your reply!

Which of the backup apps is preferred?

BackinTime is a highly recommended frontend for rsync.

Dmitri reviewed it on Sourcetrunk several years ago.

However, I would recommend setting up a script with rsync. Here's an example based on my own backup script, which backs up across my home network to my file server:

Modifying the target path appropriately should make it work to an external drive.

I don't run it as a cron job because, on my home system, I don't make significant changes that often; I run it when I have made changes worth backing up.

1 members found this post helpful.

A few things....

What is rsync and cron?

Also, when you say script, do you mean it will copy files from my HOME directory to the external HDD? So if I were to take the HDD with me to another computer, all I would see is an exact copy of my HOME directory and not a backup file?

rsync stands for remote sync. It's a file copy utility that goes one step further and compares the files at the source and destination before copying. This makes it perfect for backup applications, because the first time you run it it will take forever copying everything over, but any subsequent time you run it it will just copy over those files that have changed since the last copy.

cron is like Windows' Scheduled Tasks. It's a way to schedule programs/commands, such as running your backup utility at 4am every tuesday, or whatever you might want to do.

Yes if you plugged the external hard drive into another computer you would see all of your files as expected.

I perform my backups using rsync on a cron job to copy to two external USB drives. Works great.

2 members found this post helpful.

The rsync program worked great! Two additional questions....

1) I would like to back up my email program, Thunderbird. Is the data stored in my HOME directory? If so, does simply copying the files act as my backup or do I need to take additional steps?

2) I did a comparison between the destination copy and the source directory. There is a large difference in both file count and size. I found the difference to be in the directories that start with a dot, for example, ".themes" or ".ssh". Why didn't these files transfer over?

Thanks!

Mike

2) How did you do the rsync? Did you rsync the directory itself, or all files in the directory by using a wildcard ('*')?

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I used a program called LukcyBackUp. I set it up to sync the destination and source. How do I add the wildcard attribute?

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I thought from your post that you had used rsync, in which case I would have been able to provide some suggestions. I know nothing about that backup utility, however.

1 members found this post helpful.

I am sorry. I wanted to use rsync. But when I went to my package manager, all I found was Luck Back Up. :-) In fact, I just went in to take a screen shot for you, but I cannot even find it. I did find a grsync. How do I find regular rsync?

99.999% chance it was already installed on your system before you even went looking for a backup utility. I have never seen a modern Linux distro that didn't come with rsync pre-installed.

1 members found this post helpful.

You're right. I typed rsync in the terminal. What command do I type to copy everything from my home directory to my external hard drive.

Also, what about backing up my email program, Thunderbird?

Thanks so much for helping me do this!

rsync -a /home/user /mnt/drive

Replacing /home/user with your home directory, and replacing /mnt/drive with the location of your external hard drive.

rsync is very particular when it comes to trailing slashes on the source though, so bear that in mind.
/home/user means sync user and all of its contents to the destination location
/home/user/ means sync user's contents, but not the directory user itself, to the destination location

A subtle, but important difference

/home/user/* would sync every visible directory in user to the destination (directories with a leading . are "hidden" and skipped by the "*" wildcard).

As for Thunderbird, I'm not sure. All of Thunderbird's files are stored in the /home/user/.thunderbird directory, but I'm not sure if simply making a copy of this directory is sufficient or how you would recover the data.

rsync is likely already installed on your system; it's a basic Linux command that ships with most distros--every one that I've ever used. If you open a terminal, enter man rsync, and see a man page, it's already there.

Your Thunderbird mail store is in your home directory. This article should help: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Thunderbird

When I back up my home folder with rsync with the command in post #4 above, it captures all the hidden files and directories, where configuration data, mail store, and so on, are stored.