Kopia S3 Backup - Quick Start Guide ¶

This is a condensed guide to get Kopia backups running quickly. See README.md for full documentation.

Prerequisites ¶

• Root access to the system
• An AWS account with S3 access
• AWS CLI configured (or IAM role if on EC2)

1. Install Kopia ¶

curl -s https://kopia.io/signing-key | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/kopia-keyring.gpg
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/kopia-keyring.gpg] http://packages.kopia.io/apt/ stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kopia.list
sudo apt update && sudo apt install kopia

2. Create S3 Bucket ¶

aws s3 mb s3://my-kopia-backups --region us-east-1

3. Run Setup Script ¶

sudo ./kopia-setup.sh

You'll be prompted for:

• S3 bucket name
• AWS region
• S3 endpoint (optional)
• AWS credentials (or choose IAM role)
• Repository encryption password

4. Install Systemd Files ¶

# Backup service
sudo cp kopia-backup.service kopia-backup.timer /etc/systemd/system/
sudo cp kopia-backup.sh /usr/local/bin/

# Verification service (monthly integrity checks)
sudo cp kopia-verify.service kopia-verify.timer /etc/systemd/system/
sudo cp kopia-verify.sh /usr/local/bin/

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now kopia-backup.timer
sudo systemctl enable --now kopia-verify.timer

5. Verify ¶

# Check timer
sudo systemctl list-timers kopia-backup.timer

# Test backup
sudo systemctl start kopia-backup.service
sudo journalctl -u kopia-backup -f

# View snapshots
sudo kopia snapshot list

Optional: Reduce S3 Costs ¶

# Apply lifecycle policy to transition old backups to cheaper storage
aws s3api put-bucket-lifecycle-configuration \
    --bucket my-kopia-backups \
    --lifecycle-configuration file://s3-lifecycle-policy.json

Backup Schedule ¶

• First backup: 40 minutes after boot
• Subsequent backups: Every hour
• Retention: Standard retention (7 daily, 4 weekly, 24 monthly, 3 annual)
• Monthly verification: 1st of each month at 3 AM

Common Commands ¶

# List snapshots
sudo kopia snapshot list

# Repository status
sudo kopia repository status

# Manual backup
sudo systemctl start kopia-backup.service

# Manual verification
sudo systemctl start kopia-verify.service

# View backup logs
sudo journalctl -u kopia-backup -f

# View verification logs
sudo journalctl -u kopia-verify -f

# Restore files
sudo kopia mount all /mnt/kopia &

What Gets Backed Up ¶

• /etc (system configuration)
• /home/jeremy (excluding Documents and Work directories)

Need Help? ¶

See README.md for:

• Detailed troubleshooting
• IAM permissions
• Restore procedures
• S3 cost optimization
• Management commands