I've been wondering about using git-annex and bup together - but not with bup as the backend, but rather backing up bup repos using git-annex.

Let me try to explain...

  • bup is a a great deduplicating backup tool, but it does not have encryption
  • git-annex is a awesome in so many ways. Including 1) multiple copies, 2) encryption

(I know the following reads like the motivation for git-annex, but let me add the word backup)

  • Recovering large backups over the internet can be costly and time consuming
  • Local copies are fast, but are risky

So I was wondering about having my bup repos in git-annex, with multiple copies, including, say, an encrypted S3 bucket and some local copies.

Then, if I had a problem and needed to restore I could use my local copies for as much as I could and then only pull part of the backup from the complete remote backup.

If that all works, I then have:

  1. A more complicated process than a simple backup tool :-(
  2. Multiple complete backups available :-D
  3. Encrypted, offsite backups :-D
  4. Small transfers (bup uses the awesomness of git to dedup the hell out of your data) :-D

I've not done this yet, but was thinking it through.

Can anyone share some opinions, thoughts, concerns or high-5s for the awesomeness of my idea? ;-)