Homedir backup (was Re: "Stateless Linux" project)

Josiah Royse jroyse at gmail.com
Fri Sep 17 19:50:36 UTC 2004


On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 12:09:28 -0400, Owen Taylor <otaylor at redhat.com> wrote:
> Well, a bigger problem with rsync is that in many cases, the listing
> files part is the biggest time sync. And if that gets interrupted,
> you start from the beginning. (*)

Hey this is totally different approach: What if each user's home
directory was an encrypted file (mounted as a local loopback).  These
are laptops usually- for the need of occasional sync, so why not also
encrypt them also in case of theft, secrets, etc.

Then as an option at login you can answer yes/no if you would like
your profile (encrypted file) sync'ed before login.  Then the rdiff
does a compare against one (albeit large) file remotely.

Bonuses: encrypted, safe from losing laptop/local computer, at time of
login- exactly the same profile/home directory

Drawbacks: slow?, container size of encrypted file, version control
management difficult?

Just a thought!
--Josiah (RHCE)





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