1rsnapshot(1)                    rsnapshot-tools                   rsnapshot(1)
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3
4

NAME

6       rsnapshot - remote filesystem snapshot utility
7

SYNOPSIS

9       rsnapshot [-vtxqVD] [-c cfgfile] [command] [args]
10

DESCRIPTION

12       rsnapshot is a filesystem snapshot utility. It can take incremental
13       snapshots of local and remote filesystems for any number of machines.
14
15       Local filesystem snapshots are handled with rsync(1). Secure remote
16       connections are handled with rsync over ssh(1), while anonymous rsync
17       connections simply use an rsync server. Both remote and local transfers
18       depend on rsync.
19
20       rsnapshot saves much more disk space than you might imagine. The amount
21       of space required is roughly the size of one full backup, plus a copy
22       of each additional file that is changed. rsnapshot makes extensive use
23       of hard links, so if the file doesn't change, the next snapshot is
24       simply a hard link to the exact same file.
25
26       rsnapshot will typically be invoked as root by a cron job, or series of
27       cron jobs. It is possible, however, to run as any arbitrary user with
28       an alternate configuration file.
29
30       All important options are specified in a configuration file, which is
31       located by default at /etc/rsnapshot.conf. An alternate file can be
32       specified on the command line. There are also additional options which
33       can be passed on the command line.
34
35       The command line options are as follows:
36
37           -v verbose, show shell commands being executed
38
39           -t test, show shell commands that would be executed
40
41           -c path to alternate config file
42
43           -x one filesystem, don't cross partitions within each backup point
44
45           -q quiet, suppress non-fatal warnings
46
47           -V same as -v, but with more detail
48
49           -D a firehose of diagnostic information
50

CONFIGURATION

52       /etc/rsnapshot.conf is the default configuration file. All parameters
53       in this file must be separated by tabs. /etc/rsnapshot.conf.default can
54       be used as a reference.
55
56       It is recommended that you copy /etc/rsnapshot.conf.default to
57       /etc/rsnapshot.conf, and then modify /etc/rsnapshot.conf to suit your
58       needs.
59
60       Long lines may be split over several lines.  "Continuation" lines must
61       begin with a space or a tab character.  Continuation lines will have
62       all leading and trailing whitespace stripped off, and then be appended
63       with an intervening tab character to the previous line when the
64       configuration file is parsed.
65
66       Here is a list of allowed parameters:
67
68           config_version     Config file version (required). Default is 1.2
69
70           snapshot_root      Local filesystem path to save all snapshots
71
72           include_conf       Include another file in the configuration at
73           this point.
74
75               This is recursive, but you may need to be careful about paths
76               when specifying which file to include.  We check to see if the
77               file you have specified is readable, and will yell an error if
78               it isn't.  We recommend using a full path.  As a special case,
79               include_conf's value may be enclosed in `backticks` in which
80               case it will be executed and whatever it spits to STDOUT will
81               be included in the configuration.  Note that shell meta-
82               characters may be interpreted.
83
84           no_create_root     If set to 1, rsnapshot won't create
85           snapshot_root directory
86
87           cmd_rsync          Full path to rsync (required)
88
89           cmd_ssh            Full path to ssh (optional)
90
91           cmd_cp             Full path to cp  (optional, but must be GNU
92           version)
93
94               If you are using Linux, you should uncomment cmd_cp. If you are
95               using a platform which does not have GNU cp, you should leave
96               cmd_cp commented out.
97
98               With GNU cp, rsnapshot can take care of both normal files and
99               special files (such as FIFOs, sockets, and block/character
100               devices) in one pass.
101
102               If cmd_cp is disabled, rsnapshot will use its own built-in
103               function, native_cp_al() to backup up regular files and
104               directories. This will then be followed up by a separate call
105               to rsync, to move the special files over (assuming there are
106               any).
107
108           cmd_rm             Full path to rm (optional)
109
110           cmd_logger         Full path to logger (optional, for syslog
111           support)
112
113           cmd_du             Full path to du (optional, for disk usage
114           reports)
115
116           cmd_rsnapshot_diff Full path to rsnapshot-diff (optional)
117
118           cmd_preexec
119
120               Full path (plus any arguments) to preexec script (optional).
121               This script will run immediately before each backup operation
122               (but not any rotations). If the execution fails, rsnapshot will
123               stop immediately.
124
125           cmd_postexec
126
127               Full path (plus any arguments) to postexec script (optional).
128               This script will run immediately after each backup operation
129               (but not any rotations). If the execution fails, rsnapshot will
130               stop immediately.
131
132           linux_lvm_cmd_lvcreate
133
134           linux_lvm_cmd_lvremove
135
136           linux_lvm_cmd_mount
137
138           linux_lvm_cmd_umount
139
140               Paths to lvcreate, lvremove, mount and umount commands, for use
141               with Linux LVMs.  You may include options to the commands also.
142               The lvcreate, lvremove, mount and umount commands are required
143               for managing snapshots of LVM volumes and are otherwise
144               optional.
145
146           retain             [name]   [number]
147
148               "name" refers to the name of this backup level (e.g., alpha,
149               beta, so also called the 'interval'). "number" is the number of
150               snapshots for this type of interval that will be retained.  The
151               value of "name" will be the command passed to rsnapshot to
152               perform this type of backup.
153
154               A deprecated alias for 'retain' is 'interval'.
155
156               Example: retain alpha 6
157
158               [root@localhost]# rsnapshot alpha
159
160               For this example, every time this is run, the following will
161               happen:
162
163               <snapshot_root>/alpha.5/ will be deleted, if it exists.
164
165               <snapshot_root>/alpha.{1,2,3,4} will all be rotated +1, if they
166               exist.
167
168               <snapshot_root>/alpha.0/ will be copied to
169               <snapshot_root>/alpha.1/ using hard links.
170
171               Each backup point (explained below) will then be rsynced to the
172               corresponding directories in <snapshot_root>/alpha.0/
173
174               Backup levels must be specified in the config file in order,
175               from most frequent to least frequent. The first entry is the
176               one which will be synced with the backup points. The subsequent
177               backup levels (e.g., beta, gamma, etc) simply rotate, with each
178               higher backup level pulling from the one below it for its .0
179               directory.
180
181               Example:
182
183                   retain  alpha 6
184
185                   retain  beta  7
186
187                   retain  gamma 4
188
189               beta.0/ will be moved from alpha.5/, and gamma.0/ will be moved
190               from beta.6/
191
192               alpha.0/ will be rsynced directly from the filesystem.
193
194           link_dest           1
195
196               If your version of rsync supports --link-dest (2.5.7 or newer),
197               you can enable this to let rsync handle some things that GNU cp
198               or the built-in subroutines would otherwise do. Enabling this
199               makes rsnapshot take a slightly more complicated code branch,
200               but it's the best way to support special files on non-Linux
201               systems.
202
203           sync_first          1
204
205               sync_first changes the behaviour of rsnapshot. When this is
206               enabled, all calls to rsnapshot with various backup levels
207               simply rotate files. All backups are handled by calling
208               rsnapshot with the "sync" argument. The synced files are stored
209               in a ".sync" directory under the snapshot_root.
210
211               This allows better recovery in the event that rsnapshot is
212               interrupted in the middle of a sync operation, since the sync
213               step and rotation steps are separated. This also means that you
214               can easily run "rsnapshot sync" on the command line without
215               fear of forcing all the other directories to rotate up.  This
216               benefit comes at the cost of one more snapshot worth of disk
217               space.  The default is 0 (off).
218
219           verbose             2
220
221               The amount of information to print out when the program is run.
222               Allowed values are 1 through 5. The default is 2.
223
224                   1        Quiet            Show fatal errors only
225                   2        Default          Show warnings and errors
226                   3        Verbose          Show equivalent shell commands being executed
227                   4        Extra Verbose    Same as verbose, but with more detail
228                   5        Debug            All kinds of information
229
230           loglevel            3
231
232               This number means the same thing as verbose above, but it
233               determines how much data is written to the logfile, if one is
234               being written.
235
236           logfile             /var/log/rsnapshot
237
238               Full filesystem path to the rsnapshot log file. If this is
239               defined, a log file will be written, with the amount of data
240               being controlled by loglevel. If this is commented out, no log
241               file will be written.
242
243           include             [file-name-pattern]
244
245               This gets passed directly to rsync using the --include
246               directive. This parameter can be specified as many times as
247               needed, with one pattern defined per line. See the rsync(1) man
248               page for the syntax.
249
250           exclude             [file-name-pattern]
251
252               This gets passed directly to rsync using the --exclude
253               directive. This parameter can be specified as many times as
254               needed, with one pattern defined per line. See the rsync(1) man
255               page for the syntax.
256
257           include_file        /path/to/include/file
258
259               This gets passed directly to rsync using the --include-from
260               directive. See the rsync(1) man page for the syntax.
261
262           exclude_file        /path/to/exclude/file
263
264               This gets passed directly to rsync using the --exclude-from
265               directive. See the rsync(1) man page for the syntax.
266
267           rsync_short_args    -a
268
269               List of short arguments to pass to rsync. If not specified,
270               "-a" is the default. Please note that these must be all next to
271               each other.  For example, "-az" is valid, while "-a -z" is not.
272
273               "-a" is rsync's "archive mode" which tells it to copy as much
274               of the filesystem metadata as it can for each file.  This
275               specifically does *not* include information about hard links,
276               as that would greatly increase rsync's memory usage and slow it
277               down.  If you need to preserve hard links in your backups, then
278               add "H" to this.
279
280           rsync_long_args     --delete --numeric-ids --relative
281           --delete-excluded
282
283               List of long arguments to pass to rsync.  The default values
284               are
285                   --delete --numeric-ids --relative --delete-excluded This
286               means that the directory structure in each backup point
287               destination will match that in the backup point source.
288
289               Quotes are permitted in rsync_long_args, eg --rsync-path="sudo
290               /usr/bin/rsync".  You may use either single (') or double (")
291               quotes, but nested quotes (including mixed nested quotes) are
292               not permitted.  Similar quoting is also allowed in per-backup-
293               point rsync_long_args.
294
295           ssh_args    -p 22
296
297               Arguments to be passed to ssh. If not specified, the default is
298               none.
299
300           du_args     -csh
301
302               Arguments to be passed to du. If not specified, the default is
303               -csh.  GNU du supports -csh, BSD du supports -csk, Solaris du
304               doesn't support -c at all. The GNU version is recommended,
305               since it offers the most features.
306
307           lockfile    /var/run/rsnapshot.pid
308
309           stop_on_stale_lockfile   0
310
311               Lockfile to use when rsnapshot is run. This prevents a second
312               invocation from clobbering the first one. If not specified, no
313               lock file is used.  Make sure to use a directory that is not
314               world writeable for security reasons.  Use of a lock file is
315               strongly recommended.
316
317               If a lockfile exists when rsnapshot starts, it will try to read
318               the file and stop with an error if it can't.  If it *can* read
319               the file, it sees if a process exists with the PID noted in the
320               file.  If it does, rsnapshot stops with an error message.  If
321               there is no process with that PID, then we assume that the
322               lockfile is stale and ignore it *unless* stop_on_stale_lockfile
323               is set to 1 in which case we stop.
324
325               stop_on_stale_lockfile defaults to 0.
326
327           one_fs    1
328
329               Prevents rsync from crossing filesystem partitions. Setting
330               this to a value of 1 enables this feature. 0 turns it off. This
331               parameter is optional.  The default is 0 (off).
332
333           use_lazy_deletes    1
334
335               Changes default behavior of rsnapshot and does not initially
336               remove the oldest snapshot. Instead it moves that directory to
337               _delete.[processid] and continues as normal. Once the backup
338               has been completed, the lockfile will be removed before
339               rsnapshot starts deleting the directory.
340
341               Enabling this means that snapshots get taken sooner (since the
342               delete doesn't come first), and any other rsnapshot processes
343               are allowed to start while the final delete is happening. This
344               benefit comes at the cost of using more disk space. The default
345               is 0 (off).
346
347               The details of how this works have changed in rsnapshot version
348               1.3.1.  Originally you could only ever have one .delete
349               directory per backup level.  Now you can have many, so if your
350               next (eg) alpha backup kicks off while the previous one is
351               still doing a lazy delete you may temporarily have extra
352               _delete directories hanging around.
353
354           linux_lvm_snapshotsize    2G
355
356               LVM snapshot(s) size (lvcreate --size option).
357
358           linux_lvm_snapshotname  rsnapshot
359
360               Name to be used when creating the LVM logical volume
361               snapshot(s) (lvcreate --name option).
362
363           linux_lvm_vgpath         /dev
364
365               Path to the LVM Volume Groups.
366
367           linux_lvm_mountpath      /mnt/lvm-snapshot
368
369               Mount point to use to temporarily mount the snapshot(s).
370
371           backup  /etc/                       localhost/
372
373           backup  root@example.com:/etc/      example.com/
374
375           backup  rsync://example.com/path2/  example.com/
376
377           backup  /var/                       localhost/      one_fs=1
378
379           backup  lvm://vg0/home/path2/       lvm-vg0/
380
381           backup_script   /usr/local/bin/backup_pgsql.sh    pgsql_backup/
382
383               Examples:
384
385               backup   /etc/        localhost/
386
387                   Backs up /etc/ to <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/localhost/etc/
388                   using rsync on the local filesystem
389
390               backup   /usr/local/  localhost/
391
392                   Backs up /usr/local/ to
393                   <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/localhost/usr/local/ using rsync
394                   on the local filesystem
395
396               backup   root@example.com:/etc/       example.com/
397
398                   Backs up root@example.com:/etc/ to
399                   <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/example.com/etc/ using rsync
400                   over ssh
401
402               backup   example.com:/etc/       example.com/
403
404                   Same thing but let ssh choose the remote username (as
405                   specified in ~/.ssh/config, otherwise the same as the local
406                   username)
407
408               backup   root@example.com:/usr/local/ example.com/
409
410                   Backs up root@example.com:/usr/local/ to
411                   <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/example.com/usr/local/ using
412                   rsync over ssh
413
414               backup   rsync://example.com/pub/      example.com/pub/
415
416                   Backs up rsync://example.com/pub/ to
417                   <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/example.com/pub/ using an
418                   anonymous rsync server. Please note that unlike backing up
419                   local paths and using rsync over ssh, rsync servers have
420                   "modules", which are top level directories that are
421                   exported. Therefore, the module should also be specified in
422                   the destination path, as shown in the example above (the
423                   pub/ directory at the end).
424
425               backup   /var/     localhost/   one_fs=1
426
427                   This is the same as the other examples, but notice the
428                   fourth column.  This is how you specify per-backup-point
429                   options to over-ride global settings.  This extra parameter
430                   can take several options, separated by commas.
431
432                   It is most useful when specifying per-backup rsync excludes
433                   thus:
434
435                   backup  root@somehost:/  somehost
436                   +rsync_long_args=--exclude=/var/spool/
437
438                   Note the + sign.  That tells rsnapshot to add to the list
439                   of arguments to pass to rsync instead of replacing the
440                   list.
441
442               backup  lvm://vg0/home/path2/       lvm-vg0/
443
444                   Backs up the LVM logical volume called home, of volume
445                   group vg0, to <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/lvm-vg0/. Will
446                   create, mount, backup, unmount and remove an LVM snapshot
447                   for each lvm:// entry.
448
449               backup_script      /usr/local/bin/backup_database.sh
450               db_backup/
451
452                   In this example, we specify a script or program to run.
453                   This script should simply create files and/or directories
454                   in its current working directory. rsnapshot will then take
455                   that output and move it into the directory specified in the
456                   third column.
457
458                   Please note that whatever is in the destination directory
459                   will be completely deleted and recreated. For this reason,
460                   rsnapshot prevents you from specifying a destination
461                   directory for a backup_script that will clobber other
462                   backups.
463
464                   So in this example, say the backup_database.sh script
465                   simply runs a command like:
466
467                       #!/bin/sh
468
469                       mysqldump -uusername mydatabase > mydatabase.sql
470
471                       chmod u=r,go= mydatabase.sql  # r-------- (0400)
472
473                   rsnapshot will take the generated "mydatabase.sql" file and
474                   move it into the <snapshot_root>/<retain>.0/db_backup/
475                   directory. On subsequent runs, rsnapshot checks the
476                   differences between the files created against the previous
477                   files. If the backup script generates the same output on
478                   the next run, the files will be hard linked against the
479                   previous ones, and no additional disk space will be taken
480                   up.
481
482               backup_exec      ssh root@1.2.3.4 "du -sh /.offsite_backup"
483               optional/
484
485               backup_exec      rsync -az /.snapshots/daily.0
486               root@1.2.3.4:/.offsite_backup/   required/
487
488               backup_exec      /bin/true/
489
490                   backup_exec simply runs the command listed. The second
491                   argument is not required and defaults to a value of
492                   'optional'. It specifies the importance that the command
493                   return 0. Valid values are 'optional' and 'required'. If
494                   the command is specified as optional, a non-zero exit
495                   status from the command will result in a warning message
496                   being output. If the command is specified as 'required', a
497                   non-zero exit status from the command will result in an
498                   error message being output and rsnapshot itself will exit
499                   with a non-zero exit status.
500
501           Remember that tabs must separate all elements, and that there must
502           be a trailing slash on the end of every directory.
503
504           A hash mark (#) on the beginning of a line is treated as a comment.
505
506           Putting it all together (an example file):
507
508               # THIS IS A COMMENT, REMEMBER TABS MUST SEPARATE ALL ELEMENTS
509
510               config_version  1.2
511
512               snapshot_root   /.snapshots/
513
514               cmd_rsync           /usr/bin/rsync
515               cmd_ssh             /usr/bin/ssh
516               #cmd_cp             /bin/cp
517               cmd_rm              /bin/rm
518               cmd_logger          /usr/bin/logger
519               cmd_du              /usr/bin/du
520
521               linux_lvm_cmd_lvcreate        /sbin/lvcreate
522               linux_lvm_cmd_lvremove        /sbin/lvremove
523               linux_lvm_cmd_mount           /bin/mount
524               linux_lvm_cmd_umount          /bin/umount
525
526               linux_lvm_snapshotsize    2G
527               linux_lvm_snapshotname    rsnapshot
528               linux_lvm_vgpath          /dev
529               linux_lvm_mountpath       /mnt/lvm-snapshot
530
531               retain              alpha  6
532               retain              beta   7
533               retain              gamma  7
534               retain              delta 3
535
536               backup              /etc/                     localhost/
537               backup              /home/                    localhost/
538               backup_script       /usr/local/bin/backup_mysql.sh  mysql_backup/
539
540               backup              root@foo.com:/etc/        foo.com/
541               backup              root@foo.com:/home/       foo.com/
542               backup              root@mail.foo.com:/home/  mail.foo.com/
543               backup              rsync://example.com/pub/  example.com/pub/
544               backup              lvm://vg0/xen-home/       lvm-vg0/xen-home/
545               backup_exec         echo "backup finished!"
546

USAGE

548       rsnapshot can be used by any user, but for system-wide backups you will
549       probably want to run it as root.
550
551       Since backups usually get neglected if human intervention is required,
552       the preferred way is to run it from cron.
553
554       When you are first setting up your backups, you will probably also want
555       to run it from the command line once or twice to get a feel for what
556       it's doing.
557
558       Here is an example crontab entry, assuming that backup levels alpha,
559       beta, gamma and delta have been defined in /etc/rsnapshot.conf
560
561           0 */4 * * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot alpha
562
563           50 23 * * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot beta
564
565           40 23 * * 6         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot gamma
566
567           30 23 1 * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot delta
568
569       This example will do the following:
570
571           6 alpha backups a day (once every 4 hours, at 0,4,8,12,16,20)
572
573           1 beta backup every day, at 11:50PM
574
575           1 gamma backup every week, at 11:40PM, on Saturdays (6th day of
576           week)
577
578           1 delta backup every month, at 11:30PM on the 1st day of the month
579
580       It is usually a good idea to schedule the larger backup levels to run a
581       bit before the lower ones. For example, in the crontab above, notice
582       that "beta" runs 10 minutes before "alpha".  The main reason for this
583       is that the beta rotate will pull out the oldest alpha and make that
584       the youngest beta (which means that the next alpha rotate will not need
585       to delete the oldest alpha), which is more efficient.  A secondary
586       reason is that it is harder to predict how long the lowest backup level
587       will take, since it needs to actually do an rsync of the source as well
588       as the rotate that all backups do.
589
590       If rsnapshot takes longer than 10 minutes to do the "beta" rotate
591       (which usually includes deleting the oldest beta snapshot), then you
592       should increase the time between the backup levels.  Otherwise
593       (assuming you have set the lockfile parameter, as is recommended) your
594       alpha snapshot will fail sometimes because the beta still has the lock.
595
596       Remember that these are just the times that the program runs.  To set
597       the number of backups stored, set the retain numbers in
598       /etc/rsnapshot.conf
599
600       To check the disk space used by rsnapshot, you can call it with the
601       "du" argument.
602
603       For example:
604
605           rsnapshot du
606
607       This will show you exactly how much disk space is taken up in the
608       snapshot root. This feature requires the UNIX du command to be
609       installed on your system, for it to support the "-csh" command line
610       arguments, and to be in your path. You can also override your path
611       settings and the flags passed to du using the cmd_du and du_args
612       parameters.
613
614       It is also possible to pass a relative file path as a second argument,
615       to get a report on a particular file or subdirectory.
616
617           rsnapshot du localhost/home/
618
619       The GNU version of "du" is preferred. The BSD version works well also,
620       but does not support the -h flag (use -k instead, to see the totals in
621       kilobytes). Other versions of "du", such as Solaris, may not work at
622       all.
623
624       To check the differences between two directories, call rsnapshot with
625       the "diff" argument, followed by two backup levels or directory paths.
626
627       For example:
628
629           rsnapshot diff beta.0 beta.1
630
631           rsnapshot diff beta.0/localhost/etc beta.1/localhost/etc
632
633           rsnapshot diff /.snapshots/beta.0 /.snapshots/beta.1
634
635       This will call the rsnapshot-diff program, which will scan both
636       directories looking for differences (based on hard links).
637
638       rsnapshot sync
639
640           When sync_first is enabled, rsnapshot must first be called with the
641           sync argument, followed by the other usual cron entries. The sync
642           should happen as the lowest, most frequent backup level, and right
643           before. For example:
644
645               0 */4 * * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot sync &&
646               /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot alpha
647
648               50 23 * * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot beta
649
650               40 23 1,8,15,22 * * /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot gamma
651
652               30 23 1 * *         /usr/local/bin/rsnapshot delta
653
654           The sync operation simply runs rsync and all backup scripts. In
655           this scenario, all calls simply rotate directories, even the lowest
656           backup level.
657
658       rsnapshot sync [dest]
659
660           When sync_first is enabled, all sync behaviour happens during an
661           additional sync step (see above). When using the sync argument, it
662           is also possible to specify a backup point destination as an
663           optional parameter. If this is done, only backup points sharing
664           that destination path will be synced.
665
666           For example, let's say that example.com is a destination path
667           shared by one or more of your backup points.
668
669               rsnapshot sync example.com
670
671           This command will only sync the files that normally get backed up
672           into example.com.  It will NOT get any other backup points with
673           slightly different values (like example.com/etc/, for example). In
674           order to sync example.com/etc, you would need to run rsnapshot
675           again, using example.com/etc as the optional parameter.
676
677       rsnapshot configtest
678
679           Do a quick sanity check to make sure everything is ready to go.
680

EXIT VALUES

682           0  All operations completed successfully
683
684           1  A fatal error occurred
685
686           2  Some warnings occurred, but the backup still finished
687

FILES

689       /etc/rsnapshot.conf
690

SEE ALSO

692       rsync(1), ssh(1), logger(1), sshd(1), ssh-keygen(1), perl(1), cp(1),
693       du(1), crontab(1)
694

DIAGNOSTICS

696       Use the -t flag to see what commands would have been executed. This
697       will show you the commands rsnapshot would try to run. There are a few
698       minor differences (for example, not showing an attempt to remove the
699       lockfile because it wasn't really created in the test), but should give
700       you a very good idea what will happen.
701
702       Using the -v, -V, and -D flags will print increasingly more information
703       to STDOUT.
704
705       Make sure you don't have spaces in the config file that you think are
706       actually tabs.
707
708       Much other weird behavior can probably be attributed to plain old file
709       system permissions and ssh authentication issues.
710

BUGS

712       Please report bugs (and other comments) to the rsnapshot-discuss
713       mailing list:
714
715       http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/rsnapshot-discuss
716

NOTES

718       Make sure your /etc/rsnapshot.conf file has all elements separated by
719       tabs.  See /etc/rsnapshot.conf.default for a working example file.
720
721       Make sure you put a trailing slash on the end of all directory
722       references.  If you don't, you may have extra directories created in
723       your snapshots.  For more information on how the trailing slash is
724       handled, see the rsync(1) manpage.
725
726       Make sure to make the snapshot directory chmod 700 and owned by root
727       (assuming backups are made by the root user). If the snapshot directory
728       is readable by other users, they will be able to modify the snapshots
729       containing their files, thus destroying the integrity of the snapshots.
730
731       If you would like regular users to be able to restore their own
732       backups, there are a number of ways this can be accomplished. One such
733       scenario would be:
734
735       Set snapshot_root to /.private/.snapshots in /etc/rsnapshot.conf
736
737       Set the file permissions on these directories as follows:
738
739           drwx------    /.private
740
741           drwxr-xr-x    /.private/.snapshots
742
743       Export the /.private/.snapshots directory over read-only NFS, a read-
744       only Samba share, etc.
745
746       See the rsnapshot HOWTO for more information on making backups
747       accessible to non-privileged users.
748
749       For ssh to work unattended through cron, you will probably want to use
750       public key logins. Create an ssh key with no passphrase for root, and
751       install the public key on each machine you want to backup. If you are
752       backing up system files from remote machines, this probably means
753       unattended root logins. Another possibility is to create a second user
754       on the machine just for backups. Give the user a different name such as
755       "rsnapshot", but keep the UID and GID set to 0, to give root
756       privileges. However, make logins more restrictive, either through ssh
757       configuration, or using an alternate shell.
758
759       BE CAREFUL! If the private key is obtained by an attacker, they will
760       have free run of all the systems involved. If you are unclear on how to
761       do this, see ssh(1), sshd(1), and ssh-keygen(1).
762
763       Backup scripts are run as the same user that rsnapshot is running as.
764       Typically this is root. Make sure that all of your backup scripts are
765       only writable by root, and that they don't call any other programs that
766       aren't owned by root. If you fail to do this, anyone who can write to
767       the backup script or any program it calls can fully take over the
768       machine. Of course, this is not a situation unique to rsnapshot.
769
770       By default, rsync transfers are done using the --numeric-ids option.
771       This means that user names and group names are ignored during
772       transfers, but the UID/GID information is kept intact. The assumption
773       is that the backups will be restored in the same environment they came
774       from. Without this option, restoring backups for multiple heterogeneous
775       servers would be unmanageable. If you are archiving snapshots with GNU
776       tar, you may want to use the --numeric-owner parameter. Also, keep a
777       copy of the archived system's /etc/passwd and /etc/group files handy
778       for the UID/GID to name mapping.
779
780       If you remove backup points in the config file, the previously archived
781       files under those points will permanently stay in the snapshots
782       directory unless you remove the files yourself. If you want to conserve
783       disk space, you will need to go into the <snapshot_root> directory and
784       manually remove the files from the smallest backup level's ".0"
785       directory.
786
787       For example, if you were previously backing up /home/ with a
788       destination of localhost/, and alpha is your smallest backup level, you
789       would need to do the following to reclaim that disk space:
790
791           rm -rf <snapshot_root>/alpha.0/localhost/home/
792
793       Please note that the other snapshots previously made of /home/ will
794       still be using that disk space, but since the files are flushed out of
795       alpha.0/, they will no longer be copied to the subsequent directories,
796       and will thus be removed in due time as the rotations happen.
797

AUTHORS

799       Mike Rubel - http://www.mikerubel.org/computers/rsync_snapshots/
800
801       - Created the original shell scripts on which this project is based
802
803       Nathan Rosenquist (nathan@rsnapshot.org)
804
805       - Primary author and original maintainer of rsnapshot.
806
807       David Cantrell (david@cantrell.org.uk)
808
809       - Previous maintainer of rsnapshot
810       - Wrote the rsnapshot-diff utility
811       - Improved how use_lazy_deletes work so slow deletes don't screw up the
812       next backup at that backup level.
813
814       David Keegel <djk@cybersource.com.au>
815
816       - Previous rsnapshot maintainer
817       - Fixed race condition in lock file creation, improved error reporting
818       - Allowed remote ssh directory paths starting with "~/" as well as "/"
819       - Fixed a number of other bugs and buglets
820
821       Benedikt Heine <benedikt@heine.rocks>
822
823       - Current rsnapshot maintainer
824
825       Carl Wilhelm Soderstrom (chrome@real-time.com)
826
827       - Created the RPM .spec file which allowed the RPM package to be built,
828       among other things.
829
830       Ted Zlatanov (tzz@lifelogs.com)
831
832       - Added the one_fs feature, autoconf support, good advice, and much
833       more.
834
835       Ralf van Dooren (r.vdooren@snow.nl)
836
837       - Added and maintains the rsnapshot entry in the FreeBSD ports tree.
838
839       SlapAyoda
840
841       - Provided access to his computer museum for software testing.
842
843       Carl Boe (boe@demog.berkeley.edu)
844
845       - Found several subtle bugs and provided fixes for them.
846
847       Shane Leibling (shane@cryptio.net)
848
849       - Fixed a compatibility bug in utils/backup_smb_share.sh
850
851       Christoph Wegscheider (christoph.wegscheider@wegi.net)
852
853       - Added (and previously maintained) the Debian rsnapshot package.
854
855       Bharat Mediratta (bharat@menalto.com)
856
857       - Improved the exclusion rules to avoid backing up the snapshot root
858       (among other things).
859
860       Peter Palfrader (weasel@debian.org)
861
862       - Enhanced error reporting to include command line options.
863
864       Nicolas Kaiser (nikai@nikai.net)
865
866       - Fixed typos in program and man page
867
868       Chris Petersen - (http://www.forevermore.net/)
869
870           Added cwrsync permanent-share support
871
872       Robert Jackson (RobertJ@promedicalinc.com)
873
874           Added use_lazy_deletes feature
875
876       Justin Grote (justin@grote.name)
877
878           Improved rsync error reporting code
879
880       Anthony Ettinger (apwebdesign@yahoo.com)
881
882           Wrote the utils/mysqlbackup.pl script
883
884       Sherman Boyd
885
886           Wrote utils/random_file_verify.sh script
887
888       William Bear (bear@umn.edu)
889
890           Wrote the utils/rsnapreport.pl script (pretty summary of rsync
891           stats)
892
893       Eric Anderson (anderson@centtech.com)
894
895           Improvements to utils/rsnapreport.pl.
896
897       Alan Batie (alan@batie.org)
898
899           Bug fixes for include_conf
900
901       Dieter Bloms (dieter@bloms.de)
902
903           Multi-line configuration options
904
905       Henning Moll (newsScott@gmx.de)
906
907           stop_on_stale_lockfile
908
909       Ben Low (ben@bdlow.net)
910
911           Linux LVM snapshot support
912
914       Copyright (C) 2003-2005 Nathan Rosenquist
915
916       Portions Copyright (C) 2002-2007 Mike Rubel, Carl Wilhelm Soderstrom,
917       Ted Zlatanov, Carl Boe, Shane Liebling, Bharat Mediratta, Peter
918       Palfrader, Nicolas Kaiser, David Cantrell, Chris Petersen, Robert
919       Jackson, Justin Grote, David Keegel, Alan Batie, Dieter Bloms, Henning
920       Moll, Ben Low, Anthony Ettinger
921
922       This man page is distributed under the same license as rsnapshot: the
923       GPL (see below).
924
925       This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
926       under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
927       Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your
928       option) any later version.
929
930       This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
931       WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
932       MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
933       General Public License for more details.
934
935       You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along
936       with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
937       51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA  02110-1301 USA
938
939
940
941rsnapshot-tools                   2022-01-21                      rsnapshot(1)
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