Backing up a qube

User Support
#1

Please bear with me, as I know that there is documentation but I have had a run with qubes in the last few days that has me jittery so I want to get this right. I will have a couple of other questions later, but for now, I want to get the backup of my data right. I think that what I am doing is correct but I want to double check, so I thank anybody who can assist.

I want to back up one qube only. So I use qubes tools > backup qubes which takes me to a box with all available qubes in the right hand column which is different to some guides that say that they are listed in the left. So I move all the qubes except the one I want into the left column. From there what I have done is format a usb stick to ext4 and attached it to sys-net and then navigated my way and appear to have things set up for this qube to be backed up to my usb vua sys-net.

Is that all there is too this? I haven’t gone and tried to make it happen yet hoping that I can get someone to confirm that I am on the right track. Am I doing this correctly?

Thanks so much for any help.

#2

Yes, that’s all you need to do to backup your qube.

#3

Why would you use untrusted, sys-net, which has unrestricted access to the network, to backup your qube? The backup is encrypted of course, but connecting your usb stick to it may expose it to unnecessary risk. I suggest to use a dedicated (maybe even disposable) qube for that. Or, if you’re lazy (like me!), you can do it in sys-usb, which is also disposable by default.

#4

Thanks for the replies. I will use another qube for the usb rather than sys-usb. I wasn’t even thinking about that when I was investigating this.

So I can pretty much use any qube and attach the storage device to this by the sounds of it in which case I’ll use a disp vm. I can’t be 100% sure, but I don’t think that sys-usb was listed as an option. My system is set up as default so its nothing unusual.

Thanks for helping.

#5

I guess it would help us more to help you enough if you could describe which qube exactly and why only that one you would want to back up.

#6

Sure, no big deal. My most important qube in terms of what I wouldn’t want to lose is on a vm simply called ‘email’. I have all of my emails plus related browsing. Apart from this I have a separate ‘banking’ qubes with just my two banks that I bank. A loss here is no big deal as its just a couple of memorised passwords. I have another general ‘browsing’ qubes which has some stuff which I suppose would be good to back up such as bookmarks and some configured browsers. Apart from this I have a vault with a keepass file and a couple of other thing but these are already safely backed up.

It is the case that I have qubes configured with some things like LibreOffice, gpa and a couple of other things which would be minor inconveniences only. My main concern are my emails I suppose so that is my motivation. As I go I will most likely back all of my vms up to preserve the environment. I have another ssd which is the subject of another post that I hope to get some stuff off. But I still have my daily driver qubes working which is the subject of this post.

Thanks for your interest.

#7

Thanks for your response. So, if I understand well, you want to backup your emails and your browser profile actually?

#8

In essence that’s probably the case. I also want to get into the previously not practiced habit of backing up the important components of my qubes environment.

I could always just back up the Thunderbird profile folder and my firefox configs etc but I want to continue to learn my way around qubes so learning to backing up my vms I feel is essential.

#9

While technically backing up is pretty trivial, I’m kindly offering you to read the topic with a different perspective on a backup itself, not a process.

#10

Thanks for the link. I’ll follow up.

#11

It’s not listed, because every device, when you connect it, immediately goes to sys-usb by default. There’s no need to choose it in the menu.