How I configure BorgBackup and borgmatic (2023)

(justus.pw)

39 points | by justusw 5 days ago ago

8 comments

  • IshKebab 2 days ago

    I used Borg for years and it's good, but the fact that you can only backup to SSH is quite limiting. I eventually found Restic & Rustic which are much better and support way more backends:

    https://rustic.cli.rs/docs/comparison-restic.html#supported-...

  • kernc 2 days ago

    The intricacies of Borg are exactly why I switched over to a wrapper around pure git: https://kernc.github.io/myba/

    • TacticalCoder 2 days ago

      Oh that's interesting: it uses two similarly shaped Git repos with one being transparently encrypted.

      I take it that way you can deduplicate backups.

      My own backup procedure uses Git too: but I don't deduplicate. For every Git repo my backup procedure (which runs from an OCI containers and mounts the Git repo volume read-only) does:

          - git clone the entire repo
          - clean any mess
          - run git fsck (you never know you know)
          - tar + compress
          - encrypt
          - add a cryptographic sum to the unique resulting encrypted file
          - deduplicate (but this only works if zero change were made to the Git repo since the last backup)
          - send if not a duplicate
          - on the remote end: verify the cryptographic hash, decrypt, uncompress/untar, re-run git fsck (you never know you know)
      
      This way I'm reasonably sure the backup is not corrupted.

      FWIW the cryptographic hash allowed me to catch a bit flip, once.

      So my files are encrypted too but my main issue is any change to a Git repo means a new full backup has to be made.

      I can see how something automated like myba could help.

  • vjvjvjvjghv 2 days ago

    I know Borg has a good reputation but two years ago I experimented with a Linux laptop. I set up Borg and within 6 months my backups were corrupted twice and not recoverable. Not sure if this common but I personally wouldn’t use it again.

    • throwaway277432 2 days ago

      Lots of people haven't had to actually restore their data. Somehow it has good marketing. I used it for a while and was not impressed. Random Python errors, requires too much scripting, and at least on my data terrible restore speed.

      I followed development on Github and what I saw in terms of fixes and commits gave me pause. Not how I like my critical backup software written.

      I now use restic and sleep much better.

  • imcritic 2 days ago

    This site seems to use netlify and it doesn't serve responses.