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MianQi
Asked: 2019-02-14 03:01:57 +0800 CST

How to create system restore point on Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS?

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I have installed Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS on a HP Z228 Microtower Workstation, and I installed Android Studio on it. Since there were so many components needed to be download and installed, I want to create a system restore point on it, just like those could be done on Windows 8.1. How to do it?

restore

4 Answers

  1. The closest thing to a Windows-like restore point is by using Timeshift. I use it to save snapshots to an external USB hard drive. Although it can, it's normally not used for backing up your /home directory, just system-level changes. Use Backups (Déjà Dup) for backing up /home files.

    Timeshift is a system restore utility which takes snapshots of the system at regular intervals. These snapshots can be restored at a later date to undo system changes. Creates incremental snapshots using rsync or BTRFS snapshots using BTRFS tools.

    More information at https://github.com/teejee2008/timeshift

    Add the PPA and install with:

    sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:teejee2008/ppa

    sudo apt update

    sudo apt install timeshift

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  2. Ubuntu (and most Linux systems) don't have a "restore point" concept like Windows does because all components in Linux are simply files. Unless you specifically run a command as root (sudo) all your files are stored in your home directory (~) - in the case of Android Studio they are stored in the directories ~/Android and ~/android-studio and you can back those up files up like you would any other file, such as a creating a compressed archive.

    If you're looking for a way to backup all the packages you have installed using apt you can do:

    dpkg --get-selections > ~/Package.list

    Then you can keep the Packages.list file and later "restore" it using:

    sudo dpkg --set-selections < ~/Package.list
sudo apt-get dselect-upgrade -y

    However, it's likely that the only package you ever installed to use Android Studio was openjdk-11-jdk and such a process is overkill.

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  3. Use the default Backup tool that comes with Ubuntu (Déjà Dup). It will backup your entire home directory, allowing you to rollback etc. It is very easy to use.

    In this article they explain how to set it up: https://www.techjunkie.com/how-to-backup-and-restore-your-linux-distribution-with-deja-dup/

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  4. You can use timeshift

    sudo apt install timeshift

    timeshift

    For creating a system restore point or snapshot just click on the Create button

    For rolling back to the previous state, select the snapshot and click on the Restore button & follow the further procedure

    If you want, you can configure your schedule snapshot too. Just click on Settings -> Schedule

    Despite GUI, you can use the timeshift from the command line too

    Creating a Restore point

    sudo timeshift --create --comments "A new backup" --tags D

    Restoring snapshot

    sudo timeshift --restore
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