How to save configuration
- @cghague
Since there seems to be a lot of questions here where the answer is "I sounds like you have a corrupted OS," is there a way to save the configuration so it can be restored later?
- CCharles Hague @cghague2024-05-25 02:24:58.099Z
Hi @stretch327, thanks for your question about backing up a TinyPilot device!
Our customers use their TinyPilot devices in many different ways, often with third-party software such as Tailscale installed, making offering a comprehensive and reliable backup mechanism impractical. However, there are options available depending on your requirements.
The most straightforward option is to configure your TinyPilot device as required, shut it down, remove the microSD card, and use a tool such as Balena Etcher on a computer to duplicate the microSD card to a spare card. You can then use the spare card if anything goes wrong with the first one.
I hope this is helpful! Please let me know if you have any questions.
- S@stretch327
That's unfortunate. The plan is to put the TP into an office that's 4 hours from here just so I can log in to a machine before its network services come up. It would be much more helpful at a minimum if you could provide a list of files or a directory that I'd need to backup/restore which contained everything I needed to get back to a working state.
How about this... could you guys create a configurable Linux service which supported config files that the user could add themselves? If you modeled it after something like logrotate.d, users could drop new config files in which specified files or directories that needed to be backed up and restored (along with all the TP stuff). You already have an upload mechanism in place, and downloads from a web service are dead simple by comparison.
- CCharles Hague @cghague2024-05-29 22:51:42.689Z
Thanks for those extra details! I can completely understand why a backup and restore system appeals to you, but unfortunately, it's not on our short-term roadmap.
Offering this feature would be complex because TinyPilot runs on top of a fully featured Linux operating system. As a result, the configuration files that determine your TinyPilot device's settings are in multiple locations throughout the filesystem. In addition, users can install extra software, such as cloud-access tools, so keeping an inventory of files that need backing up is a significant challenge.
I appreciate that this isn't the answer you were hoping for, but we consider all feedback and we may revisit this in the future.