bak

Create and restore simple file/directory backups

Installation

bak is a simple bash script. Put it anywhere on your path and ensure it has executable permissions.

Usage

bak will copy a local file/directory with a timestamped suffix:

% ls -l
ls -l
total 0
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 bc
% bak a
% ls -l
total 0
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a.240217-225351.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 bc

Running bak on a bak-generated backup file will restore that backup to the original filename. If the original filename already exists, it will first be baked up.

% bak a.240217-225351.bak
% ls -l
total 0
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a.240217-225521.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 bc

Because bak uses timestamp suffixes, you can create several local backups. bak is simple and only timestamps to the second, which should be more than sufficient for its intended usage.

% bak a
% bak a
total 0
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 a.240217-225521.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:58 a.240217-225813.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:58 a.240217-225815.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 drootang  staff     0B Feb 17 22:53 bc

Advantages of bak over cp

bak will never overwrite anything. Unless you have cp aliased to cp -i, you run the risk of accidentally overwriting something important while using cp to manage local file versions.

When restoring a previously backed-up file, bak only requires one command where cp would require two.

Notes

The existence of this script should not be taken as an endorsement of haphazard backup strategies nor inefficient workflows. Sometimes you just need to be sure a copy of a file is around, or need quick old-school local versioning.