sluice 0.2.0

Tools for managing zfs snapshots

Sluice is a set of tools for managing ZFS snapshots inspired by Time Machine.

A goal of Sluice is to follow the Unix philosophy of simple, composable tools. To this end, the core functionality is broken into three independent operations on snapshots: creation, synchronisation and culling.

Snapshots essential to synchronisation are locked with zfs holds to prevent their accidental removal. This allows these operations to run independently but cooperatively, and facilitates interoperation with other tools.

Each of the tools is simple enough that it can be fully configured with command-line options - no configuration file is required. Some options, however, can be looked up from zfs user properties.

Complex schemes can be effected by combining multiple cron jobs.

Sluice is implemented on top of Weir, which will provide support for remote operation from v0.3.0.

Installation

Requires Python 2.7.

To install Sluice, simply:

$ pip install sluice

zfs-autosnapshot

Creates snapshots with names generated from a strftime()-compatible date format string:

$ zfs-autosnapshot zroot/test@%Y-%m-%d
$ zfs list -t snapshot -d 1 zroot/test | tail -1
zroot/test@2015-02-10                   0       -   136Ki  -

If no format string is specified, it will be looked up from the user property sluice.autosnapshot:format or the default ISO 8601-compatible format %Y-%m-%dT%H%M will be used:

$ zfs set sluice.autosnapshot:format=auto-%Y-%m-%dT%H%M%S zroot/test
$ zfs-autosnapshot zroot/test
$ zfs list -t snapshot -d 1 zroot/test | tail -1
zroot/test@auto-2015-02-10T114854       0       -   136Ki  -

zfs-copy

Combines zfs send and zfs receive:

$ zfs-copy zroot/test@2015-02-10 zroot/test-copy
$ zfs list -t all -r zroot/test-copy
NAME                          USED   AVAIL   REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot/test-copy              556Ki  97.0Gi   444Ki  /Volumes/zroot/test-copy
zroot/test-copy@2015-02-10   112Ki       -   136Ki  -

zfs-sync

Performs one-way synchronisation of snapshots between two datasets:

$ zfs-sync zroot/test zroot/test-sync
$ zfs list -t all -r zroot/test-sync
NAME                                      USED   AVAIL   REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot/test-sync                          136Ki  97.0Gi   136Ki  /Volumes/zroot/test-sync
zroot/test-sync@auto-2015-02-10T114854       0       -   136Ki  -

$ zfs-autosnapshot zroot/test
$ zfs-sync zroot/test zroot/test-sync
$ zfs list -t all -r zroot/test-sync
NAME                                      USED   AVAIL   REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot/test-sync                          144Ki  97.0Gi   136Ki  /Volumes/zroot/test-sync
zroot/test-sync@auto-2015-02-10T114854     8Ki       -   136Ki  -
zroot/test-sync@auto-2015-02-10T121006       0       -   136Ki  -

A hold is placed on the source snapshot to prevent inadvertently deleting it and thereby breaking incremental synchronisation:

$ zfs holds zroot/test@auto-2015-02-10T121006
NAME                               TAG                          TIMESTAMP
zroot/test@auto-2015-02-10T121006  sluice.sync:zroot/test-sync  Tue Feb 10 12:10 2015

zfs-cull

Destroys old snapshots.

Snapshots can be removed by specifying a maximum age in ISO 8601 duration format. The most recent snapshot and any held snapshots are preserved:

$ zfs-autosnapshot zroot/test
$ zfs-cull --max-age=t1m zroot/test
$ zfs list -t all -r zroot/test
NAME                                 USED   AVAIL   REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot/test                          136Ki  95.6Gi   136Ki  /Volumes/zroot/test
zroot/test@auto-2015-02-10T121006       0       -   136Ki  -
zroot/test@auto-2015-02-10T122648       0       -   136Ki  -

Snapshots can also be removed by density, defined as a / ∆a, where a is snapshot age and ∆a is the age difference between adjacent snapshots. Snapshot density is thus defined in log-time rather than in linear-time. The oldest snapshot is also preserved in this mode:

$ zfs-sync zroot/test zroot/test-sync
$ zfs-cull --max-density=1 zroot/test-sync
$ zfs list -t all -r zroot/test-sync
NAME                                      USED   AVAIL   REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot/test-sync                          144Ki  95.6Gi   136Ki  /Volumes/zroot/test-sync
zroot/test-sync@auto-2015-02-10T114854     8Ki       -   136Ki  -
zroot/test-sync@auto-2015-02-10T122648       0       -   136Ki  -

zfs-import

Proposed addition for v1.x - copy files from a non-zfs filesystem and create a snapshot.

zfs-export

Proposed addition for v1.x - create a clone of a zfs snapshot and copy files to a non-zfs filesystem.

License

Licensed under the Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL).