Provided by: fsarchiver_0.8.4-1_amd64 
NAME
fsarchiver - filesystem archiver
DESCRIPTION
fsarchiver is a system tool that allows you to save the contents of a filesystem to a compressed archive
file. The filesystem contents can be restored on a device which has a different size and it can be
restored on a different filesystem. Unlike tar/dar, fsarchiver also creates the filesystem when it
extracts the data to devices. Everything is checksummed in the archive in order to protect the data. If
the archive is corrupt, you just lose the current file, not the whole archive.
LINKS
Official project homepage:
http://www.fsarchiver.org
Quick Start guide:
http://www.fsarchiver.org/quickstart/
Forums where to ask questions:
http://www.fsarchiver.org/forums/
Git repository:
https://github.com/fdupoux/fsarchiver
Report a bug:
https://github.com/fdupoux/fsarchiver/issues
SYNOPSIS
fsarchiver [ options ] savefs archive device ...
fsarchiver [ options ] restfs archive
id=n,dest=device[,mkfs=fstype,mkfsopt=options,label=newlabel,uuid=newuuid] ...
fsarchiver [ options ] savedir archive directory ...
fsarchiver [ options ] restdir archive destination
fsarchiver [ options ] archinfo archive
fsarchiver [ options ] probe [detailed]
COMMANDS
savefs Save device filesystem to archive.
restfs Restore filesystems from archive. This overwrites the existing data on device. Zero-based index
n indicates the part of the archive to restore. Optionally, a filesystem may be converted to
fstype and extra mkfs options specified. newlabel and newuuid override values stored in the
archive.
savedir
Save directories to archive (similar to a compressed tarball).
restdir
Restore data from archive which is not based on a filesystem to destination.
archinfo
Show information about an existing archive file and its contents.
probe Show list of filesystems detected on the disks.
OPTIONS
-h, --help
Show help and information about how to use fsarchiver with examples.
-V, --version
Show program version and exit.
-v, --verbose
Verbose mode (can be used several times to increase the level of details). The details will be
printed to the console.
-o, --overwrite
Overwrite the archive if it already exists instead of failing.
-d, --debug
Debug mode (can be used several times to increase the level of details). The details will be
written in /var/log/fsarchiver.log.
-x, --experimental
Allow to save filesystems which support is considered experimental in fsarchiver.
-A, --allow-rw-mounted
Allow to save a filesystem which is mounted in read-write (live backup). By default fsarchiver
fails with an error if the device is mounted in read-write mode which allows modifications to be
done on the filesystem during the backup. Modifications can drive to inconsistencies in the
backup. Using LVM snapshots is the recommended way to make backups since it will provide
consistency, but it is only available for filesystems which are on LVM logical volumes.
-a, --allow-no-acl-xattr
Allow to save a filesystem when ACLs and extended attributes are not supported (or are disabled)
by the kernel. By default fsarchiver fails with an error if it cannot access ACLs and extended
attributes, since they would not be saved. If you do not need ACLs and extended attributes
preserved then it is safe to use this option.
-e pattern, --exclude=pattern
Exclude files and directories that match specified pattern. The pattern can contain shell
wildcards such as * and ? or may be either a simple file/dir name or an absolute file/dir path.
You must use quotes around the pattern each time you use wildcards, else it would be interpreted
by the shell. The wildcards must be interpreted by fsarchiver. See examples below for more details
about this option.
-L label, --label=label
Set the label of the archive: it is just a comment about its contents. It can be used to remember
a particular thing about the archive or the state of the filesystem for instance.
-z level, --compress=level
Legacy compression levels are between 0 (very fast) and 9 (very good). The memory requirement
increases a lot with the best compression levels, and it is multiplied by the number of
compression threads (option -j). Level 9 is considered as an extreme compression level and
requires an huge amount of memory to run. For more details please read this page:
http://www.fsarchiver.org/compression/
-Z level, --zstd=level
Zstd compression levels are between 1 (very fast) and 22 (very good). The memory requirement
increases a lot with the best compression levels, and it is multiplied by the number of
compression threads (option -j). Levels above 20 are considered as extreme compression levels and
requires an huge amount of memory to run. For more details please read this page:
http://www.fsarchiver.org/compression/
-s mbsize, --split=mbsize
Split the archive into several files of mbsize megabytes each.
-j count, --jobs=count
Create more than one (de)compression thread. Useful on multi-core CPUs. By default fsarchiver will
only use one (de)compression thread (-j 1) and then only one logical processor will be used for
the task. You should use this option if you have a multi-core CPU or more than one physical CPU on
your computer. The typical way to use it is to specify the number of logical processors available
so that all the processing power is used to (de)compress the archive very quickly. You may also
want to use all logical processors but one so that your system stays responsive for other
applications.
-c password, --cryptpass=password
Encrypt/decrypt data in archive. Password length: 6 to 64 characters. You can either provide a
real password or a dash (-c -). Use the dash if you do not want to provide the password in the
command line. It will be prompted in the terminal instead.
EXAMPLES
save only one filesystem (/dev/sda1) to an archive:
fsarchiver savefs /data/myarchive1.fsa /dev/sda1
save two filesystems (/dev/sda1 and /dev/sdb1) to an archive:
fsarchiver savefs /data/myarchive2.fsa /dev/sda1 /dev/sdb1
restore the first filesystem from an archive (first = number 0):
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive2.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1
restore the second filesystem from an archive (second = number 1):
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive2.fsa id=1,dest=/dev/sdb1
restore two filesystems from an archive (number 0 and 1):
fsarchiver restfs /data/arch2.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1 id=1,dest=/dev/sdb1
restore a filesystem from an archive and convert it to reiserfs:
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive1.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1,mkfs=reiserfs
restore a filesystem from an archive and specify extra mkfs options:
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive1.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1,mkfs=ext4,mkfsopt="-I 256"
restore a filesystem from an archive and specify a new filesystem label:
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive1.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1,label=root
restore a filesystem from an archive and specify a new filesystem UUID:
fsarchiver restfs /data/myarchive1.fsa id=0,dest=/dev/sda1,uuid=5f6e5f4f-dc2a-4dbd-a6ea-9ca997cde75e
save the contents of /usr/src/linux to an archive (similar to tar):
fsarchiver savedir /data/linux-sources.fsa /usr/src/linux
save a filesystem (/dev/sda1) to an archive split into volumes of 680MB:
fsarchiver savefs -s 680 /data/myarchive1.fsa /dev/sda1
save a filesystem and exclude all files/dirs called 'pagefile.*':
fsarchiver savefs /data/myarchive.fsa /dev/sda1 --exclude='pagefile.*'
generic exclude for 'share' such as '/usr/share' and '/usr/local/share':
fsarchiver savefs /data/myarchive.fsa --exclude=share
absolute exclude valid for '/usr/share' but not for '/usr/local/share':
fsarchiver savefs /data/myarchive.fsa --exclude=/usr/share
save a filesystem (/dev/sda1) to an encrypted archive:
fsarchiver savefs -c mypassword /data/myarchive1.fsa /dev/sda1
same as before but prompt for password in the terminal:
fsarchiver savefs -c - /data/myarchive1.fsa /dev/sda1
extract an archive made of simple files to /tmp/extract:
fsarchiver restdir /data/linux-sources.fsa /tmp/extract
show information about an archive and its filesystems:
fsarchiver archinfo /data/myarchive2.fsa
WARNING
fsarchiver is considered stable for Linux filesystems such as EXT4 and XFS but unstable for NTFS.
AUTHOR
fsarchiver was written by Francois Dupoux. It is released under the GPL2 (GNU General Public License
version 2). This manpage was written by Ilya Barygin and Francois Dupoux.
30 December 2009 FSARCHIVER(8)