summaryrefslogtreecommitdiffstats
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
authorbreadcat2023-02-28 18:24:31 +0000
committerbreadcat2023-02-28 18:24:31 +0000
commit856399a3707645e06012c48ca446c6727027caf6 (patch)
treed1849128be9f57b9b90e51ecd427e506340559bc
parent424bc5d7983d7b0a138c6c8529bb239305633e0e (diff)
downloadblog.minskio.co.uk-856399a3707645e06012c48ca446c6727027caf6.tar.gz
blog.minskio.co.uk-856399a3707645e06012c48ca446c6727027caf6.tar.bz2
blog.minskio.co.uk-856399a3707645e06012c48ca446c6727027caf6.zip
Update with new instructions
-rw-r--r--content/posts/removing-large-files-borg.md31
1 files changed, 29 insertions, 2 deletions
diff --git a/content/posts/removing-large-files-borg.md b/content/posts/removing-large-files-borg.md
index 33dac4a..ebaa521 100644
--- a/content/posts/removing-large-files-borg.md
+++ b/content/posts/removing-large-files-borg.md
@@ -1,15 +1,18 @@
---
title: "Removing large files from a Borg backup"
date: 2022-10-28T15:30:00
+lastmod: 2023-02-28T18:13:00
tags: ["Linux", "Infrastructure", "Recovery", "Snippets", "Software", "Servers"]
---
I have a couple of 'backup systems'. For important documents that change frequently I use [Borg](https://www.borgbackup.org/), along with the helper script [borgmatic](https://torsion.org/borgmatic/) with my hosting being provided by [BorgBase](https://www.borgbase.com/). The three all tie together incredibly well and if the free tier of BorgBase didn't cover my every need I'd happily pay for it.
-Occasionally however, I'll end up temporarily storing a large file in a directory that will be backed up on schedule which then increases my overall storage usage unnecessarily. The simple fix for this is just to delete the backups which contain the file.
+Occasionally however, I'll end up temporarily storing a large file in a directory that will be backed up on schedule which then increases my overall storage usage unnecessarily. The simple fix for this is just to delete the backups which contain the file, the more complicated option is to selectively remove just those files from a backup. I'll cover both cases in this post.
The guide assumes you already have a working Borgmatic setup.
+# Removing a whole backup
+
Firstly, you can find the details of your repository using:
```
borgmatic info
@@ -33,4 +36,28 @@ borgmatic borg delete host-dateTtime
Once this has been done, you can compact your repository, then you should be done.
```
borgmatic compact
-``` \ No newline at end of file
+```
+
+# Removing single files from multiple backups
+
+If in the above example you've run a few backups and don't want to entirely remove all backups containing these files, you can use Borgs' [recreate command](https://borgbackup.readthedocs.io/en/stable/usage/recreate.html) to rebuild your backups without certain patterns. You can find the details (and browse sizes/contents) using the commands covered above.
+
+To list out backups that can be recreated, you issue:
+```
+borgmatic borg recreate --list
+```
+
+Once you know what you want to remove, you can perform a dry run using:
+```
+borgmatic borg recreate -e /full/path/to/file/you/wish/to.remove -n
+```
+
+If everything looks okay, remove the `-n` and issue the command again to recreate the backups excluding your pattern.
+
+Once done, feel free view information and to compact the repo again.
+```
+borgmatic info
+borgmatic compact
+```
+
+* **Edit 2023-02-28:** Added single file/multiple backups section \ No newline at end of file