for you, but we don't know why. It is also missing some
probably-critical features.
- - It requires python >= 2.5, a C compiler, and an installed git version >=
- 1.5.3.1.
+ - It requires python >= 2.5, a C compiler, and an installed git
+ version >= 1.5.3.1. It also requires par2 if you want fsck to be
+ able to generate the information needed to recover from some types
+ of corruption.
- It currently only works on Linux, MacOS X >= 10.4,
NetBSD, Solaris, or Windows (with Cygwin). Patches to support
other platforms are welcome.
-
+
+ - Any items in "Things that are stupid" below.
+
Getting started
===============
git clone git://github.com/bup/bup
- - Install the needed python libraries (including the development
+ - Install the required python libraries (including the development
libraries).
- On Debian/Ubuntu this is usually sufficient (run as root):
+ On very recent Debian/Ubuntu versions, this may be sufficient (run
+ as root):
- apt-get install python2.6-dev python-fuse
+ apt-get build-dep bup
+
+ Otherwise try this (substitute python2.5-dev or python2.6-dev if
+ you have an older system):
+
+ apt-get install python2.7-dev python-fuse
apt-get install python-pyxattr python-pylibacl
apt-get install linux-libc-dev
-
- Substitute python2.5-dev if you have an older system. Alternately,
- on newer Debian/Ubuntu versions, you can try this:
-
- apt-get build-dep bup
+ apt-get install acl attr
+ apt-get install python-tornado # optional
On CentOS (for CentOS 6, at least), this should be sufficient (run
as root):
yum groupinstall "Development Tools"
- yum install python python-dev
+ yum install python python-devel
yum install fuse-python pyxattr pylibacl
yum install perl-Time-HiRes
On Cygwin, install python, make, rsync, and gcc4.
+ If you would like to use the optional bup web server on systems
+ without a tornado package, you may want to try this:
+
+ pip install tornado
+
- Build the python module and symlinks:
make
make test
(The tests should pass. If they don't pass for you, stop here and send
- me an email.)
+ an email to bup-list@googlegroups.com.)
- You can install bup via "make install", and override the default
destination with DESTDIR and PREFIX.
- pkgsrc (NetBSD, Dragonfly, and others)
http://pkgsrc.se/sysutils/bup
http://cvsweb.netbsd.org/bsdweb.cgi/pkgsrc/sysutils/bup/
+ - Arch Linux:
+ https://www.archlinux.org/packages/?sort=&q=bup
Using bup
---------
- - Try making a local backup as a tar file:
+ - Get help for any bup command:
+
+ bup help
+ bup help init
+ bup help index
+ bup help save
+ bup help restore
+ ...
+
+ - Initialize the default BUP_DIR (~/.bup):
+
+ bup init
+
+ - Make a local backup (-v or -vv will increase the verbosity):
+
+ bup index /etc
+ bup save -n local-etc /etc
+
+ - Restore a local backup to ./dest:
+
+ bup restore -C ./dest local-etc/latest/etc
+ ls -l dest/etc
+
+ - Look at how much disk space your backup took:
+
+ du -s ~/.bup
+
+ - Make another backup (which should be mostly identical to the last one;
+ notice that you don't have to *specify* that this backup is incremental,
+ it just saves space automatically):
+
+ bup index /etc
+ bup save -n local-etc /etc
+
+ - Look how little extra space your second backup used (on top of the first):
+
+ du -s ~/.bup
+
+ - Get a list of your previous backups:
+
+ bup ls local-etc
+
+ - Restore your first backup again:
+
+ bup restore -C ./dest-2 local-etc/2013-11-23-11195/etc
+
+ - Make a backup to a remote server (which must already have the 'bup' command
+ somewhere in the server's PATH (see /etc/profile, etc/environment,
+ ~/.profile, or ~/.bashrc), and be accessible via ssh.
+ Make sure to replace SERVERNAME with the actual hostname of your server):
+
+ ssh SERVERNAME bup init
+ bup index /etc
+ bup save -r SERVERNAME: -n local-etc /etc
+
+ - Restore a backup from a remote server. (FAIL: unfortunately,
+ unlike "bup join", "bup restore" does not yet support remote
+ restores. See both "bup join" and "Things that are stupid" below.)
+
+ - Defend your backups from death rays (OK fine, more likely from the
+ occasional bad disk block). This writes parity information
+ (currently via par2) for all of the existing data so that bup may
+ be able to recover from some amount of repository corruption:
+
+ bup fsck -g
+
+ - Use split/join instead of index/save/restore. Try making a local
+ backup using tar:
tar -cvf - /etc | bup split -n local-etc -vv
- - Try restoring your backup tarball:
+ - Try restoring the tarball:
bup join local-etc | tar -tf -
du -s ~/.bup
- - Make another backup (which should be mostly identical to the last one;
- notice that you don't have to *specify* that this backup is incremental,
- it just saves space automatically):
+ - Make another tar backup:
tar -cvf - /etc | bup split -n local-etc -vv
- - Look how little extra space your second backup used on top of the first:
+ - Look at how little extra space your second backup used on top of
+ the first:
du -s ~/.bup
- - Restore your old backup again (the ~1 is git notation for "one older than
- the most recent"):
+ - Restore the first tar backup again (the ~1 is git notation for "one
+ older than the most recent"):
bup join local-etc~1 | tar -tf -
- - Get a list of your previous backups:
+ - Get a list of your previous split-based backups:
GIT_DIR=~/.bup git log local-etc
- - Make a backup on a remote server (which must already have the 'bup' command
- somewhere in the server's PATH (see /etc/profile, etc/environment,
- ~/.profile, or ~/.bashrc), and be accessible via ssh.
- Make sure to replace SERVERNAME with the actual hostname of your server):
+ - Make a backup on a remote server:
tar -cvf - /etc | bup split -r SERVERNAME: -n local-etc -vv
bup join -r SERVERNAME: local-etc | tar -tf -
- - Try using the new (slightly experimental) 'bup index' and 'bup save'
- style backups, which bypass 'tar' but have some missing features (see
- "Things that are stupid" below):
-
- bup index -uv /etc
- bup save -n local-etc /etc
-
- - Do it again and see how fast an incremental backup can be:
-
- bup index -uv /etc
- bup save -n local-etc /etc
-
- (You can also use the "-r SERVERNAME:" option to 'bup save', just like
- with 'bup split' and 'bup join'. The index itself is always local,
- so you don't need -r there.)
-
That's all there is to it!
traversal code ("fts") in NetBSD's libc will interpret this as a
cycle and error out, so "ls -R" and "find" will not work.
- - It is not clear if extended attribute and POSIX acl support does
- anything useful.
+ - There is no support for ACLs. If/when some entrprising person
+ fixes this, adjust t/compare-trees.
Notes on Cygwin
---------------
- - There is no support for ACLs. If/when some entrprising person
+ - There is no support for ACLs. If/when some enterprising person
fixes this, adjust t/compare-trees.
- In t/test.sh, two tests have been disabled. These tests check to
Notes on OS X
-------------
- - There is no support for ACLs. If/when some entrprising person
+ - There is no support for ACLs. If/when some enterprising person
fixes this, adjust t/compare-trees.
============
Basic storage:
+--------------
bup stores its data in a git-formatted repository. Unfortunately, git
itself doesn't actually behave very well for bup's use case (huge numbers of
Basically, 'bup split' reads the data on stdin (or from files specified on
the command line), breaks it into chunks using a rolling checksum (similar to
-rsync), and saves those chunks into a new git packfile. There is one git
-packfile per backup.
+rsync), and saves those chunks into a new git packfile. There is at least one
+git packfile per backup.
When deciding whether to write a particular chunk into the new packfile, bup
first checks all the other packfiles that exist to see if they already have that
scripts that do something with those values.
The bup index:
+--------------
'bup index' walks through your filesystem and updates a file (whose name is,
by default, ~/.bup/bupindex) to contain the name, attributes, and an
Things that are stupid for now but which we'll fix later
---------------------------------------------------------
+========================================================
Help with any of these problems, or others, is very welcome. Join the
mailing list (see below) if you'd like to help.
+ - 'bup restore' can't pull directly from a remote server.
+
+ So in one sense "save -r" is a dead-end right now. Obviously you
+ can use "ssh SERVER bup restore -C ./dest..." to create a tree you
+ can transfer elsewhere via rsync/tar/whatever, but that's *lame*.
+
+ Until we fix it, you may be able to mount the remote BUP_DIR via
+ sshfs and then restore "normally", though that hasn't been
+ officially tested.
+
- 'bup save' and 'bup restore' have immature metadata support.
On the plus side, they actually do have support now, but it's new,
- and not remotely as well tested as tar/rsync/whatever's. If you'd
- like to help test, please do (see t/compare-trees for one
- comparison method).
+ and not remotely as well tested as tar/rsync/whatever's. However,
+ you have to start somewhere, and as of 0.25, we think it's ready
+ for more general use. Please let us know if you have any trouble.
- In addition, at the moment, if any strip or graft-style options
- are specified to 'bup save', then no metadata will be written for
- the root directory. That's obviously less than ideal.
+ Also, if any strip or graft-style options are specified to 'bup
+ save', then no metadata will be written for the root directory.
+ That's obviously less than ideal.
- bup is overly optimistic about mmap. Right now bup just assumes
that it can mmap as large a block as it likes, and that mmap will
give the continuous-backup process a really low CPU and I/O priority so
you wouldn't even know it was running.
- - bup currently has no features that prune away *old* backups.
+ - bup currently has no way to prune *old* backups.
Because of the way the packfile system works, backups become "entangled"
in weird ways and it's not actually possible to delete one pack
We'll have to do it in a totally different way. There are lots of
options. For now: make sure you've got lots of disk space :)
+ Until we fix this, one possible workaround is to just start a new
+ BUP_DIR occasionally, i.e. bup-2013-10, bup-2013-11...
+
- bup has never been tested on anything but Linux, MacOS, and Windows+Cygwin.
There's nothing that makes it *inherently* non-portable, though, so
- bup needs better documentation.
- According to a recent article about git in Linux Weekly News
+ According to a recent article about bup in Linux Weekly News
(https://lwn.net/Articles/380983/), "it's a bit short on examples and
a user guide would be nice." Documentation is the sort of thing that
will never be great unless someone from outside contributes it (since
More Documentation
-------------------
+==================
bup has an extensive set of man pages. Try using 'bup help' to get
started, or use 'bup help SUBCOMMAND' for any bup subcommand (like split,
projects / bup.git / blobdiff