<page xmlns="http://projectmallard.org/1.0/"
      xmlns:its="http://www.w3.org/2005/11/its"
      type="topic" style="tip"
      id="backup-thinkabout">

  <info>
    <link type="guide" xref="files#backup"/>

    <revision pkgversion="3.4.0" date="2012-02-19" status="review"/>
    <revision pkgversion="3.13.92" date="2014-09-20" status="review"/>
    <revision pkgversion="3.37.1" date="2020-07-30" status="review"/>

    <credit type="author">
      <name>Tiffany Antopolski</name>
      <email>tiffany.antopolski@gmail.com</email>
    </credit>
    <credit type="author">
      <name>GNOME Documentation Project</name>
      <email>gnome-doc-list@gnome.org</email>
    </credit>
    <credit type="editor">
      <name>Michael Hill</name>
      <email>mdhillca@gmail.com</email>
    </credit>

    <include href="legal.xml" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude"/>

    <desc>A list of folders where you can find documents, files and settings
    that you may want to back up.</desc>
  </info>

  <title>Where can I find the files I want to back up?</title>

  <p>Deciding which files to back up, and locating them, is the most difficult
 step when attempting to perform a backup. Listed below are the most common
 locations of important files and settings that you may want to back up.</p>

<list>
 <item>
  <p>Personal files (documents, music, photos and videos)</p>
  <p its:locNote="translators: xdg dirs are localised by package xdg-user-dirs
  and need to be translated.  You can find the correct translations for your
  language here: http://translationproject.org/domain/xdg-user-dirs.html">These
  are usually stored in your home folder (<file>/home/your_name</file>).
  They could be in subfolders such as <file>Desktop</file>,
  <file>Documents</file>, <file>Pictures</file>, <file>Music</file> and
  <file>Videos</file>.</p>
  <p>If your backup medium has sufficient space (if it is an external hard
  disk, for example), consider backing up the entire Home folder. You can find
  out how much disk space your Home folder takes up by using the
  <app>Disk Usage Analyzer</app>.</p>
 </item>

 <item>
  <p>Hidden files</p>
  <p>Any file or folder name that starts with a period (.) is hidden by
  default. To view hidden files, press the menu button in the sidebar
  of the window of <app>Files</app> and press <gui>Show Hidden Files</gui>, or
  press <keyseq><key>Ctrl</key><key>H</key></keyseq>. You can copy these to a
  backup location like any other file.</p>
 </item>

 <item>
  <p>Personal settings (desktop preferences, themes, and software settings)</p>
  <p>Most applications store their settings in hidden folders inside your Home
 folder (see above for information on hidden files).</p>
  <p>Most of your application settings will be stored in the hidden folders
 <file>.config</file> and <file>.local</file> in your Home folder.</p>
 </item>

 <item>
  <p>System-wide settings</p>
  <p>Settings for important parts of the system are not stored in your Home
  folder. There are a number of locations that they could be stored, but most
  are stored in the <file>/etc</file> folder. In general, you will not need to
  back up these files on a home computer. If you are running a server, however,
  you should back up the files for the services that it is running.</p>
 </item>
</list>

</page>
