Backup your home directory with rsync and skip useless folders
The exclude list may only contain filenames, foldernames and lines starting with #
. A comment behind the foldername is not allowed. I created a Git repository with all known files and folders that are superfluous:
Download this ignorelist to /var/tmp/ignorelist
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rubo77/rsync-homedir-excludes/master/rsync-homedir-excludes.txt -O /var/tmp/ignorelist
Then start the rsync with
rsync -aP --exclude-from=/var/tmp/ignorelist /home/$USER/ /media/$USER/linuxbackup/home/
Note:
In the ignorelist there is a commented section at the start with folders, that are probably not worth a backup either. Uncomment those, you don't need.
From man rsync
:
--exclude-from=FILE read exclude patterns from FILE
This option is related to the --exclude option, but it specifies
a FILE that contains exclude patterns (one per line). Blank
lines in the file and lines starting with ’;’ or ’#’ are
ignored. If FILE is -, the list will be read from standard
input.