On Tue, 31 Jul 2018 at 16:53, Bill Harris <[email protected]> wrote:
> I've used rdiff-backup for years, and I'm mostly very happy with it. There > is one problem that crops up occasionally; and I haven't found a way around > it yet. > > AFAICT, rdiff-backup likes running as root. On rare occasion, I forget and > start it as myself. rdiff-backup complains, and, as I recall, offers to > sudo itself (I'm running Debian Stable, which is not normally set up as a > sudo system). > > If I enter a password (and perhaps even if I don't) and then hit Ctrl-c > because I realize I messed up, I get the "it appears the last backup > failed" message, and then I'm in for a long (about a day), full backup > instead of the usual 15-45 minute incremental backup. > > Is there a way to recover in such a situation so that I don't have to wait > for such a long backup to complete? I presume rdiff-backup won't react > well to my changing files during the backup. > > Is there a secure way to keep this from happening? I could learn how > setuid works, but I think that's an insecure approach. > Unless you are backing up system files, rdiff-backup doesn't have to run as root, but in my experience it is wise always to run it as the same user for a given repository. For instance I think if you run a backup as root once, then any subsequent run as another user to or from the same repository may hit problems - because the user may be denied the necessary access to certain rdiff-backup control files (in the rdiff-backup-data subdirectory). The delay must be because after you break a backup run, rdiff-backup has to regress the backup to a consistent state. For it to take a day to do so suggests you have a very large backup dataset and/or a very slow computer. If possible, can you break down the dataset into smaller components, then if you make the same mistake again, the regression will be much quicker? I realise this means starting a load of new backup repositories (which TBH is why I haven't done it in one case where I have an unwieldy repository). _______________________________________________ rdiff-backup-users mailing list at [email protected] https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/rdiff-backup-users Wiki URL: http://rdiff-backup.solutionsfirst.com.au/index.php/RdiffBackupWiki
