.. Normally, there are no heading levels assigned to certain characters as the structure is determined from the succession of headings. However, this convention is used in Python’s Style Guide for documenting which you may follow: # with overline, for parts * for chapters = for sections - for subsections ^ for subsubsections " for paragraphs ######################### Removing backup snapshots ######################### All backup space is finite, so restic allows removing old snapshots. This can be done either manually (by specifying a snapshot ID to remove) or by using a policy that describes which snapshots to forget. For all remove operations, two commands need to be called in sequence: ``forget`` to remove a snapshot and ``prune`` to actually remove the data that was referenced by the snapshot from the repository. This can be automated with the ``--prune`` option of the ``forget`` command, which runs ``prune`` automatically if snapshots have been removed. It is advisable to run ``restic check`` after pruning, to make sure you are alerted, should the internal data structures of the repository be damaged. Remove a single snapshot ************************ The command ``snapshots`` can be used to list all snapshots in a repository like this: .. code-block:: console $ restic -r /srv/restic-repo snapshots enter password for repository: ID Date Host Tags Directory ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 40dc1520 2015-05-08 21:38:30 kasimir /home/user/work 79766175 2015-05-08 21:40:19 kasimir /home/user/work bdbd3439 2015-05-08 21:45:17 luigi /home/art 590c8fc8 2015-05-08 21:47:38 kazik /srv 9f0bc19e 2015-05-08 21:46:11 luigi /srv In order to remove the snapshot of ``/home/art``, use the ``forget`` command and specify the snapshot ID on the command line: .. code-block:: console $ restic -r /srv/restic-repo forget bdbd3439 enter password for repository: removed snapshot d3f01f63 Afterwards this snapshot is removed: .. code-block:: console $ restic -r /srv/restic-repo snapshots enter password for repository: ID Date Host Tags Directory ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 40dc1520 2015-05-08 21:38:30 kasimir /home/user/work 79766175 2015-05-08 21:40:19 kasimir /home/user/work 590c8fc8 2015-05-08 21:47:38 kazik /srv 9f0bc19e 2015-05-08 21:46:11 luigi /srv But the data that was referenced by files in this snapshot is still stored in the repository. To cleanup unreferenced data, the ``prune`` command must be run: .. code-block:: console $ restic -r /srv/restic-repo prune enter password for repository: counting files in repo building new index for repo [0:00] 100.00% 22 / 22 files repository contains 22 packs (8512 blobs) with 100.092 MiB bytes processed 8512 blobs: 0 duplicate blobs, 0B duplicate load all snapshots find data that is still in use for 1 snapshots [0:00] 100.00% 1 / 1 snapshots found 8433 of 8512 data blobs still in use will rewrite 3 packs creating new index [0:00] 86.36% 19 / 22 files saved new index as 544a5084 done Afterwards the repository is smaller. You can automate this two-step process by using the ``--prune`` switch to ``forget``: .. code-block:: console $ restic forget --keep-last 1 --prune snapshots for host mopped, directories /home/user/work: keep 1 snapshots: ID Date Host Tags Directory ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 4bba301e 2017-02-21 10:49:18 mopped /home/user/work remove 1 snapshots: ID Date Host Tags Directory ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 8c02b94b 2017-02-21 10:48:33 mopped /home/user/work 1 snapshots have been removed, running prune counting files in repo building new index for repo [0:00] 100.00% 37 / 37 packs repository contains 37 packs (5521 blobs) with 151.012 MiB bytes processed 5521 blobs: 0 duplicate blobs, 0B duplicate load all snapshots find data that is still in use for 1 snapshots [0:00] 100.00% 1 / 1 snapshots found 5323 of 5521 data blobs still in use, removing 198 blobs will delete 0 packs and rewrite 27 packs, this frees 22.106 MiB creating new index [0:00] 100.00% 30 / 30 packs saved new index as b49f3e68 done Removing snapshots according to a policy **************************************** Removing snapshots manually is tedious and error-prone, therefore restic allows specifying which snapshots should be removed automatically according to a policy. You can specify how many hourly, daily, weekly, monthly and yearly snapshots to keep, any other snapshots are removed. The most important command-line parameter here is ``--dry-run`` which instructs restic to not remove anything but print which snapshots would be removed. When ``forget`` is run with a policy, restic loads the list of all snapshots, then groups these by host name and list of directories. The grouping options can be set with ``--group-by``, to only group snapshots by paths and tags use ``--group-by paths,tags``. The policy is then applied to each group of snapshots separately. This is a safety feature. The ``forget`` command accepts the following parameters: - ``--keep-last n`` never delete the ``n`` last (most recent) snapshots - ``--keep-hourly n`` for the last ``n`` hours in which a snapshot was made, keep only the last snapshot for each hour. - ``--keep-daily n`` for the last ``n`` days which have one or more snapshots, only keep the last one for that day. - ``--keep-weekly n`` for the last ``n`` weeks which have one or more snapshots, only keep the last one for that week. - ``--keep-monthly n`` for the last ``n`` months which have one or more snapshots, only keep the last one for that month. - ``--keep-yearly n`` for the last ``n`` years which have one or more snapshots, only keep the last one for that year. - ``--keep-tag`` keep all snapshots which have all tags specified by this option (can be specified multiple times). - ``--keep-within duration`` keep all snapshots which have been made within the duration of the latest snapshot. ``duration`` needs to be a number of years, months, and days, e.g. ``2y5m7d`` will keep all snapshots made in the two years, five months, and seven days before the latest snapshot. Multiple policies will be ORed together so as to be as inclusive as possible for keeping snapshots. Additionally, you can restrict removing snapshots to those which have a particular hostname with the ``--hostname`` parameter, or tags with the ``--tag`` option. When multiple tags are specified, only the snapshots which have all the tags are considered. For example, the following command removes all but the latest snapshot of all snapshots that have the tag ``foo``: .. code-block:: console $ restic forget --tag foo --keep-last 1 This command removes all but the last snapshot of all snapshots that have either the ``foo`` or ``bar`` tag set: .. code-block:: console $ restic forget --tag foo --tag bar --keep-last 1 To only keep the last snapshot of all snapshots with both the tag ``foo`` and ``bar`` set use: .. code-block:: console $ restic forget --tag foo,tag bar --keep-last 1 All the ``--keep-*`` options above only count hours/days/weeks/months/years which have a snapshot, so those without a snapshot are ignored. For safety reasons, restic refuses to act on an "empty" policy. For example, if one were to specify ``--keep-last 0`` to forget *all* snapshots in the repository, restic will respond that no snapshots will be removed. To delete all snapshots, use ``--keep-last 1`` and then finally remove the last snapshot ID manually (by passing the ID to ``forget``). All snapshots are evaluated against all matching ``--keep-*`` counts. A single snapshot on 2017-09-30 (Sun) will count as a daily, weekly and monthly. Let's explain this with an example: Suppose you have only made a backup on each Sunday for 12 weeks. Then ``forget --keep-daily 4`` will keep the last four snapshots for the last four Sundays, but remove the rest. Only counting the days which have a backup and ignore the ones without is a safety feature: it prevents restic from removing many snapshots when no new ones are created. If it was implemented otherwise, running ``forget --keep-daily 4`` on a Friday would remove all snapshots! Another example: Suppose you make daily backups for 100 years. Then ``forget --keep-daily 7 --keep-weekly 5 --keep-monthly 12 --keep-yearly 75`` will keep the most recent 7 daily snapshots, then 4 (remember, 7 dailies already include a week!) last-day-of-the-weeks and 11 or 12 last-day-of-the-months (11 or 12 depends if the 5 weeklies cross a month). And finally 75 last-day-of-the-year snapshots. All other snapshots are removed.