Is Duplicacy a suitable backup solution for me?

[plkx00]

I use OSX/macos. For years, I have backed up files to external hard drives either directly attached to my computer or to my home router using rsync. Essentially, I get verified copies (which can be incremental backups). However, restoration is purely manual.

Now, I am looking for an alternative that (1) each family member can use on their own (2 high school kids and wife), (2) may backup to external hard drives at home and maybe in the cloud in the future, (3) may be scheduled to run periodically, and (4) includes restoration capability.

One other user is on macos, and the other 2 are on Windows 10. Each of us will have our own “free-standing” backups, i.e. backups are isolated even if they may contain identical files, such as a family photo.

Having spent the past hour perusing this forum and the Duplicacy guide, it is not clear to me whether or not Duplicacy fits the bill.

How does Duplicacy verify accuracy of backed up files? Do the backed up files retain all of their original properties when restored (e.g. extended attributes or alternate data streams)?

What about incremental backups? It seems that incremental backups are maintained through Duplicacy revisions. How many revisions are maintained, i.e. if I delete a file from the Documents directory, how many backups can I perform before the deleted document is no longer available in any snapshot?

About licensing - under Licensing Exceptions is stated “GUI/CLI licenses are not required under the following situations:” - one of which is running the CLI to back up personal files on an individual home computer. Is a GUI/CLI license required, or not? Apparently, a CLI license is never required for personal non-business use, so is there an exception for the GUI? (I’ve installed Duplicacy on my Mac without any apparent option for license exception).

Thanks,

Paul

[gchen]

@plkx00

One other user is on macos, and the other 2 are on Windows 10. Each of us will have our own “free-standing” backups, i.e. backups are isolated even if they may contain identical files, such as a family photo.

A unique feature of Duplicacy is cross-computer deduplication. Backups from different computers appear to be isolated but under the hood they may share the same chunks if there are identical files.

@plkx00

How does Duplicacy verify accuracy of backed up files? Do the backed up files retain all of their original properties when restored (e.g. extended attributes or alternate data streams)?

Each file in the backup is guarded by a file hash and each chunk is guarded by a chunk hash. We back up all extended attributes on macOS/Linux but not alternate data streams on Windows.

@plkx00

What about incremental backups? It seems that incremental backups are maintained through Duplicacy revisions. How many revisions are maintained, i.e. if I delete a file from the Documents directory, how many backups can I perform before the deleted document is no longer available in any snapshot?

Each revision is a ‘snasphot’ of the source directory when the backup is running. After you delete a file from the source directory, it will still exist in previous revisions until you explicitly remove those reivisions explicitly via prune operations.

@plkx00

one of which is running the CLI to back up personal files on an individual home computer. Is a GUI/CLI license required, or not

This only means you don’t need a CLI license for running the CLI for personal use. If you run the GUI for personal backups then you still need a personal GUI license.

@plkx00

Apparently, a CLI license is never required for personal non-business use, so is there an exception for the GUI?

The last license exception applies to the GUI license: restore, check, copy, or prune doesn’t need a GUI license – you’ll notice that these operations can be performed in the web GUI even if the web GUI says unlicensed.