Re: Understanding the rdiff-backup restore syntax

[Eric Lavarde]

Hi,

On 25/02/2025 02:29, Eric Beversluis via Any discussion of rdiff-backup 
wrote:
> I think I got it--the back slashes indicate that the command continues 
> on the next line....?

Exactly, usual Linux notation, which you can use in scripts to avoid too 
long lines.

> So if I want to restore '/home/eric/Desktop/FoodLog_2019-22.ods' as of 
> 2023-09-02T7:58::09-04:00, is this the correct command?
>
>   rdiff-backup restore --increment \
> /run/media/eric/Backup_Disk/XPS-2023-03/ 
> eric.2023-08-02T07:58:09-04:00.dir/home/eric/Desktop/FoodLog_2019-22.ods \
>      /home/eric/Desktop/Restored.ods
That doesn't sound right. First, the increment you're referring to must 
physically exist. The date stamp is on the file itself, not on a 
directory in the hierarchy. And finally increments are under 
rdiff-backup-data/increments in your repository. And then the 2nd 
argument ought to be an empty directory.

KR, Eric

> Thanks.
>
> Eric Beversluis
> www.ericbeversluis.com
> 2x Honorable Mention--Writer's Digest Contest
>
>
> On 2/24/25 8:13 PM, Eric Beversluis via Any discussion of rdiff-backup 
> wrote:
> > I'm trying to learn my way around restoring from rdiff-backup. I'm 
> > looking at
> > https://rdiff-backup.net/rdiff-backup.1.html#_restoring
> >
> > I see this sample:
> >
> > rdiff-backup restore --increment \
> >     /backup/rdiff-backup-data/increments/usr/local.{time}.dir \
> >     /usr/local.old
> >
> > What do the back slashes indicate--why are they there?