Backup Strategies

Snapshots (Timeshift) protect the system. Backups protect you. Different jobs, both needed.

The mental model

Tool Protects against

Timeshift snapshots

Bad updates, config mistakes — system-level undo

File backups (rsync/borg/restic)

Dead disks, ransomware, theft, "I deleted my thesis"

Offsite/cloud copy

Fire, flood, house-level disasters

Practical plan: 3-2-1

3 copies of data · 2 different devices · 1 offsite.

For most humans that translates to: internal disk + external USB drive + cloud folder.

Recipe: simple mirror with rsync

rsync -aAXHv --delete \
  --exclude={"/dev/*,/proc/*,/sys/*,/tmp/*,/run/*,/mnt/*,/media/*,/lost+found"} \
  /home/you/ /run/media/you/BACKUP/home-mirror/

Run before coffee every Sunday, or cron it — timers make scheduling clean.

Recipe: versioned + encrypted with borg

sudo pacman -S borg
borg init --encryption=repokey /run/media/you/BACKUP/borg-repo
borg create --progress /run/media/you/BACKUP/borg-repo::{now} ~/Documents ~/Pictures
borg list /run/media/you/BACKUP/borg-repo       # browse history
borg mount ... /mnt/old                          # open an old state as a folder

Deduplicated, so nightly snapshots cost megabytes, not gigabytes.

Recipe: restic to cloud/B2/S3

restic -r rclone:b2:mybucket/docs backup ~/Documents
restic snapshots

Encrypted client-side; the provider sees noise.

Test restores, not just backups

Once a quarter: pull one random file from last month’s backup and open it. Untested backups are hope, not plans.