[Borgbackup] default list of exclusions

[Bzzzz]

On Sun, 26 Sep 2021 12:34:35 -0400
Default User <hunguponcontent at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello!

Hi,

> I want to try using borgbackup to do backups of my (only) user
> directory: /home/debian-user
> 
> I just want to do so using Vorta, a GUI for borgbackup.
> 
> But I just need a good, general list of directory and file type
> exclusions that I can just cut and paste into the Exclude Patterns
> window in Vorta.  Something like the  that
> appears by default in the Backintime backup program, or a similar one
> that is used by default in deja-dup.

I use simple rules, but some needs to be doubled (to avoid matching
hidden files or dirs), backup is made like this :

borg create \
--verbose \
--exclude-caches \
--show-rc \
--warning \
--filter AME \
--list \
--stats \
--checkpoint-interval 600 \
--comment " ${1}" \
--chunker-params 16,23,16,4095 \
--compression auto,zlib,6 \
--exclude-from /usr/local/sbin/BORG_EXCLUSIONS.list \
::$ARCH /

and here's a sample of /usr/local/sbin/BORG_EXCLUSIONS.list :

/lost+found/*
/lost+found/.?*
/BORG/*
/BORG/.?*
/dev/*
/dev/.?*
/home/*/.gvfs/*
/home/*/.gvfs/.?*
/root/.gvfs/*
/root/.gvfs/.?*
/home/*/.cache/chromium/*
/home/*/.cache/mozilla/firefox/*
/home/*/.claws-mail/tmp/*
/home/*/.googleearth/Cache/*
/home/*/Videos/*
/home/*/Videos/.?*
[…]

Even if you just have one user, this may change in the future, so using
the * wildcard is a good way to fire and forget about that.

> Note 2: I am not intending to use borgbackup to back up the whole
> system; just /home/debian-user and its subdirectories.  I am using
> timeshift to back up the rest of the system.

It doesn't take much time, except for the first backup of course and the
advantage of backing up the whole system in one palce is to be able to
recover from a full failure (like rm -r * from the system root or a disk
failure).

I've tested it with the systemrescue live CD that includes borgbackup in
it's programs, works like a charm and quite fast - so, think twice
before dismissing this possibility.

Jean-Yves