Restic Helper Scripts

Helper scripts to use restic more easily on Linux x86, x64 and ARM (such as Truenas Scale or generic Debian/Ubuntu/Arch etc.). Scripts might work on BSD if you try that by setting OS to BSD.

How to use

Simple steps:

1. Install git
2. Run git clone https://github.com/christiaangoossens/restic-backup-scripts.git
3. Go to the restic-backup-scripts directory using cd restic-backup-scripts
4. Copy .env.example to .env and fill in your repository path and password for the repository. Alternatively, you can also set RESTIC_PASSWORD_FILE in the .env file to use password files instead (or RESTIC_PASSWORD_COMMAND). Any restic env vars are supported.
5. Call ./restic with your arguments to use restic directly with the env. For example ./restic version should give you the current version.
6. Profit!

Multiple env files

The scripts also support passing either -e=PATH or --env-file=PATH as commands to set the env var to a different path.

Convenience scripts

./init

Initializes the repository that you configured in .env.

./backup

Automatically runs the backup and cleanup as configured. Use .env file to configure paths to be included and retention policy.

./restore-all

Automatically restores the last snapshot to the configured directories. Use .env file to configure paths to be included/restored.

./cleanup

Automatically runs the backup retention policy as configured. Use .env file to configure paths to be included and retention policy.

./file-tree

Gives a file tree of the latest snapshot, only showing files and their sizes

./update

Update the scripts to the latest version.

Common commands

./restic prune

Manually prune the repository if you have BACKUP_PRUNE set to false. Make this a regular cron task, probably monthly.

./restic snapshots

View existing snapshots on your repository.

./restic self-update

Update restic binary automatically in /tmp/restic.

./restic stats

Show statistics on your repository, such as total size and file count.

Append-only backups

You might have append-only backups running from one machine using these scripts, while having the ./cleanup command run from another machine. For this, configure all backup retentions to 0 on the sending machine and run ./run-backup and configure the correct retentions on the admin machine and run ./cleanup there. Please review the safety considerations documentation for more info.