Re: [rdiff-backup-users] How to back up /var/log with a different incremental retention?

[Patrick Nagel]

Hi Daniel,

On 2009-10-10 01:03 UTC Daniel Einspanjer wrote:
> 1. I'd like an almost complete backup of my entire server from /
> 2. I know I have to exclude a few things to prevent bad problems (no
> /proc, and --exclude-sockets also seemed to be necessary)
> 3. There are a couple of directories that I don't want at all (some
> website mirrors I host), so those go into --exclude as well.

That sounds right :)

> Now here is the fun part and my question: I think it would be
>  convenient to have my /var/log directory backed up, but I really
>  don't see the value in recording every incremental change of all
>  those files, so I was hoping to implement the following rule:
> 
> 4. Copy /var/log, but don't keep more than 1 incremental of it (or
>  none if doing just one is difficult).
> 
> I've thought of a couple of ways to do this:
> a. exclude the directory from rdiff-backup, and then just rsync that
>  one directory afterward (but would subsequent rdiff-backups delete
>  those files? 
> b. run rdiff-backup twice, once excluding /var/log and
>  once including only it and using the --remove-older-than 1B option
> c. run rdiff-backup twice, but store the the /var/log in a completely
> separate target tree (seems safest, but also the most work to
>  maintain and restore from)
> d. Some magic bullet I've overlooked

I'd go for d ;) This could be very close to a:
Run rdiff-backup and exclude /var/log, then run rsync to a destination 
*outside the rdiff-backup repository* (and document this fact well).

c is also good, but then you have your increments (which you don't 
want), and would have to delete them, which would be a waste of 
resources. Also, since Log files tend to change during backup, and 
rdiff-backup (currently) doesn't backup files that have changed during 
the backup at all, you could end up having no backup of some logs at 
all.

b will probably not work on the same repository.

Patrick.

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