Re: [Duplicity-talk] Backing up desktop virtual machines?

[edgar . soldin]

Laurence Perkins (OE) wrote on 2014-07-22 09:52:
> Duplicity only backs up changed parts of the file, but must scan the
> entire file to determine which parts have changed.  If your .VDIs for
> your VMs are large, this will take a while.  Try snapshotting the VMs.
> This will cause all changes to the disks to be written to a separate,
> potentially much smaller file.  If you snapshot after each incremental,
> then all the changes for the VM will be in their own, small file that
> duplicity can just pick up and add to the archive without having to scan
> the big, unchanged root VDI.

just realized that this can be simmered down to a very simple rule for vm's in 
general. simply snapshot your machine after it is set up for the first time. 
this base snapshot contains most of the os and other files unlikely to change. 
when changes are written afterwards they end up in the much new overlaying 
snapshot file resulting in a much smaller file to check for changes.

nice catch Laurence! ..ede/duply.net