Is there anything like Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) for Linux?

Question

I'm running Ubuntu and I'd like to create an image of my OS. Is this possible?

I used CCC on my mac, it was great it even copies everything in a logical order so it technically defrags for you.

Solution 1

CCC is just a fancy front-end gui for rsync. I'm not sure if there is an equivalent for linux, but if you don't mind the command line, you can do what you want there:

rsync -a -x / /media/backupdisk/

Replace /media/backupdisk/ with whatever mount point your backup disk is attached to.

If you want the backup disk to be an exact copy, add the --delete flag:

rsync -a -x --delete / /media/backupdisk/

Solution 2

It's true that CCC is just rsync on the inside, but there is a lot more going on inside. I tried using rsync and it's not easy to make a fully functional and bootable copy every time.

Solution 3

If you want to make an image (byte for byte) you can always use dd.

dd (Unix) - Wikipedia

Solution 4

Use Clonezilla and make a 100% bootable copy of your drive! It works and can even handle OSX HFS+ volumes, ext4, NTFS etc. Also, it will handle Grub wery well even if the PC is dual boot (e.g. Windows and Linux).

Solution 5

You might wanna check out Clonezilla.
It's the one that comes close to all the other apps that I've come across online.

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Comments

[GiH]

thanks I didn't know he used rsync as the engine for CCC!

[Dentrasi]

Might want to add --exclude="/media/" to that, so you don't try and backup a folder to itself..

[churnd]

CCC does not only use rsync, it will also use asr or other methods depending on the volume being cloned: afp548.com/netboot/mactips/image.html

[XtraSimplicity]

Carbon Copy Cloner is able to be run as a daemon and periodically synchronise your changes to an external drive, when connected. As far as I'm aware, CloneZilla is not capable of doing this?

[DeveloperACE]

dont you have to boot to clonezilla before using it?

[DeveloperACE]

web.archive.org/web/20120427042437/http://www.afp548.com/…

[DeveloperACE]

do you have a tutorial for making bootable backups with rsync?

[user962247]

as a matter of fact, the copy is made bootable at file system level, not a sector level, so you know who ccc works

[user962247]

ccc is a live, incremental, file system based backup system, able to create bootable os instances. it is not based on 40 years old technology like dd, nor rsync. clonezilla is not even correctly spelled in english, completely unmaintained and, since it was mentioned, imagine this. i have 1TB ssd, with total used space of 100GB. i use a 256GB SSD for backup and I can always boot from it from a different machine, having 128GB SSD and transfer the entire system there. so it is not a sector level but file level (just like norton ghost used to be

[user962247]

it is based on rsync adapted. it gives you live, incremental, bootable clone of your system, and it file based not sector based

[user962247]

really?!? try cloning a 1tb ssd, with 200gb active data to another system having a 256gb ssd. let us know what they reach that level of sophistication (is clonezilla even actively maintained)

[user962247]

ccc uses 2 child rsync processes and mdworker, etc (many refinements on top of rsync)