Backing up my files/system

Ask Fedora
,
1

Getting ready to install a new distro on my computer that will replace Fedora (nothing wrong with Fedora, I just want to experiment), and before I do I wanted to back up my system onto a 64 GB usb drive I have. I was wondering what the process to do that is/what the best way to do that is. I don’t have many files, and I was wondering what I even should back up other than the files I want to keep.

I did see there were a few apps like Pika backup, but I didn’t know if those were the best way to do things or if I should use the terminal for this.

Any help would be appreciated!

2

Hi Clark,

The main thing you would need to backup is the data you created (mostly in your home directory). The rest is OS and the like and can be reinstalled faster than you can restore a backup in most cases. Myself, I do this with a simple rsync (rsync -av /home/one /mnt/{where the USB drive is mounted} ) make certain that when done you do a sync at the command line and wait for it to come back to the prompt BEFORE you unmount/remove the USB drive or you’ll corrupt the USB drive …

IF you would like to avoid a backup due to experimentation, you could always run that other distro in a Virtual Machine.

3

Thank you for the help! I will try out using rsync right now!

That’s true

4

I tried using Rsync, and everything worked, except that it put the file in my /home/ instead of the USB drive. Do you know why this could’ve happened? This command I used was: rsync -av /home/clarkcosentino/ {/run/media/clarkcosentino/SANDISK USB}

5

You weren’t supposed to put the curly braces {} in the command - that was added by the poster to show put your mount details here.

6

Oh I see, sorry

7

Tried it again without the brackets, it did the same thing. It put a file labeled “USB” that is a copy of my /home.

Moving it over would take 23 hours it said lol.

8

I back up $HOME and /etc (on the assumption I tweaked config).
There may also be useful files in /var depending on the services you use, httpd and database come to mind.