Essentially I want to backup the / partition. What I want to be able to do is if I reformat and install Ubuntu from the install CD, I want to be able to copy the backed up / partition to the new install so that I effectively start where I am again.

Hope that makes sense.

I just create copies of important config files that I have edited in /var/backups. Check out /etc/cron.daily/standard, which already does this for some files. It is simple to edit and add additional files to back up. Then I back up /var/backups and /home/iball to a CD from time to time.

This way, if I reinstall, I can restore everything as it was before without keeping backups of things that I haven't changed (binaries, etc).

If you want to create an exact copy, try dd. Alternatively, use rsync to a remote computer (if you have one), ie "rsync -avz / root@<remoteServer>:/home/backup" or something.

I hope this helps
--Ian

This is how I will do it

That looks like a good idea. The only thing I would see as a problem would be the size of the backup tarball. You would possibly need to split the backup over several DVDs, depending on how big the tarball actually is.

Maybe it would be worth doing /home separately, so your data is stored separate from the system files.

--Ian

Oh the Ubuntu system i have is quite minimal. The tarball came out at about 1.5GB.

But at least your post sent me in the right direction. Thanks.