Working with Ubuntu desktop is a fun. But don’t turn the fun situation into disaster by losing your valuable files and data because of data loss. Backup is an integral part of an operating system and users should consider backup their files regularly.
Ubuntu 16.04 comes with default handy Backup application. You can use this backup application to backup your files regularly. If you are lazy enough to manually backup your files, you can turn on the automatic backup feature on this application.
How to prepare your first backup on Ubuntu 16.04
Find Backups application from Dash menu. Or, you can also open Backups from Settings. On several cases, there are some additional packages needs to be installed in order to enable the scheduled backup and restore backup. Simply press Install button on the Overview window of Backups.
Once installed, you will see the schedule and restore button is enabled.
OK, at this point we are ready to the next step. Click Folders to save to specify the folders we want to backup.
Specify backup sources
You can add multiple folders to the section above. Additionally, you can also add some folders to ignore. For example, you don’t want to include the Downloads folder inside your home directory.
Specify the backup location
Now we need to set the storage location for the backup. It is recommended to store the backup on different disk or on the network location. Backups supports these kind of storage.
On the example above, we save our backup on the network shared folder. You may choose other backup storage such as WebDAV, FTP Server, SSH server or local folder.
Backup Scheduling
Optionally, we can enable the backup schedule. Its a good idea to have routine backup enabled automatically.
Ubuntu 16.04 comes with a handy, free and useful backup program that can save your “life”. Its easy to configure, and also easy to use.