[arch-general] Full system backup with rsync

[Merlin Büge]

On Mon, 17 Oct 2016 21:20:53 +0200
Ralf Mardorf <silver.bullet at zoho.com> wrote:

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2016 21:12:51 +0200
> From: Ralf Mardorf <ralf.mardorf at rocketmail.com>
> To: Arch general <arch-general at archlinux.org>
> Subject: Re: [arch-general] Full system backup with rsync
> 
> 
> On Mon, 17 Oct 2016 21:11:23 +0200, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> >I would simply sudo cp -r everything.  
> 
> Oops,           sudo cp -pr

I would definitely go for rsync, because it's easier to resume if the process
gets interrupted, for whatever reason.

Also cp -pr does not preserve links or xattrs for example. Maybe cp -ar would
be more appropriate.

rsync -a is a good start, you might also want to check if you need
-xattrs
-hard-links
-acls
--numeric-ids (if doing edits from a live system)
--sparse
--relative

And yes, you sould review your fstab. If you use UUIDs in it, then they have
to be adapted of course.

If you are willing to spend some time reading, here is a good article which
mentions some pitfalls regarding backups.

Regarding the bootloader: Yes, you would have to install it on the new drive
ofc. Your commands seem okay to me, not sure if you need something more.

If you have a swap file, create it first, so that it gets not scattered on the
new drive.

Regards,

mearon


-- 
Merlin Büge <toni at bluenox07.de>