r/voidlinux • u/StrangeAstronomer • 12d ago

Backing up /etc

At the moment I'm backing up the entire /etc *1 mainly in case I ever have to re-install after disc replacement but also to protect myself from fat-fingered freddy (me).

But it seems a bit of an overkill to cover the entire directory .

When I used to run fedora/redhat there was a way to discover what configuration files in /etc had been changed from the packaged version. Is there a way to do that on void?

*1 I exclude the 10-Mb /etc/udev/hwdb.bin - what's it doing there instead of /usr/share/...?

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2

u/BinkReddit 12d ago

Don't drive yourself crazy. I run bup and back it all up. It'll do deltas so any changes will only take a tiny amount of storage. In addition, it can leverage par which will handle possible corruption as well.

1

u/hopingforabetterpast 12d ago

man xbps-pkgdb

1

u/Simple_Hamster_4096 11d ago

The way to combat Fat Finger Freddy is to religiously make a back of the file you intend to edit BEFORE you open it and edit.

1

u/Then-Explanation-778 11d ago

I back up the whole directory and use ZFS snapshots. It doesn't take much space.