[sf-lug] What files are required to back up my "configuration"?

[Rick Moen]

I wrote:

> The list (of directories plus one individual file, menu.lst, is on my
> 'How to do a full backup and restore of linuxmafia.com' page,
> http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Admin/linuxmafia.com-backup.html , and is:
> 
> /root                        Root user's home directory (includes above files)

The phrase 'includes above files' doesn't make much sense when deprived
of context present on the cited Web page.  So, to help:

Just above that bit on my backup-recipe page, I detail one way of
snapshotting installed packages, hard drive partitions, and /etc
contents:

fdisk -l /dev/sda > /root/partitions-sda-$(date +%F)  Partition map of SCSI HD a
fdisk -l /dev/sdb > /root/partitions-sdb-$(date +%F)  Partition map of SCSI HD b
dpkg --get-selections "*" > /root/selections-$(date +%F)  Installed packages
tar cvzf /root/etc-$(date +%F).tar.gz /etc

Notice that the cited commands plunk down those snapshots in /etc with a
timestamping suffix of the day's date in ISO format, e.g., etc-2013-04-29.tar.gz .

In all likelihood, you don't normally store anything in /root, but the
recipe takes into account the possibility of such use.