gist-backup

Back up a hardcoded local file to a GitHub Gist — create or update with a single command.

Installation

pip install gist-backup

Setup

Create a GitHub Personal Access Token with the gist scope:

1. Go to https://github.com/settings/tokens
2. Generate a new token (classic or fine-grained) with the gist scope
3. Export it in your shell:

export GITHUB_TOKEN="ghp_your_token_here"

Hardcoded file

By default the package backs up ~/.bashrc. To change this, edit the BACKUP_FILE constant at the top of gist_backup/backup.py before installing.

Usage

Command line

# Back up the default file
gist-backup

# Back up a different file
gist-backup --file ~/dotfiles/.vimrc

# Override description or make it public
gist-backup --description "My .bashrc backup" --public

Python API

import os
from gist_backup import backup

os.environ["GITHUB_TOKEN"] = "ghp_..."

url = backup()                              # uses BACKUP_FILE default
url = backup("~/.vimrc", public=False)     # custom path
print(url)

Return value

Both the CLI and the backup() function return the Gist's HTML URL, e.g.:

https://gist.github.com/your-username/abc123def456

If a Gist containing the same filename already exists in your account it is updated rather than duplicated.

Configuration reference

License

MIT