~/.skel contains only 3 zero sized files:
kdebase4.120
kdebase4firefox.120
kdebase4.wallpapercache.113
Do I need this directory at all?
There are some scripts running on login that create/modify certain user settings like creating shortcut icons on the desktop.
They create (touch) those empty files to know that they have been run already and not do the same thing again (and overwriting user changes).
Do I need this directory at all?
Well, not need as such.
But if you delete it, some things might get done again which you might not want.
TBH, I’m not sure at the moment if those 3 are even used in Leap any more.
At least two of them are from KDE4, which is not available in Leap. The third one is from Firefox’s KDE integration I think.
I would have to look at the startup scripts in detail to give a definitive answer.
But why are they bothering you? They are empty anyway…
Thanks wolfi.
I am reviewing my Bareos FileSet and checking what I should exclude from backup if it is not important. I wish there was an easy way to do that - different applications seem to create all kinds of temp/cache stuff which are sometimes not named in an obvious way. For example ~.confing/chromium is a nightmare.
I’m not seeing ~/.skel on my system. So it probably isn’t needed.
Thanks. I will skip it then.
Need back up is easy you need your home. Any hidden directory that may have confs that you consider important and any data you need. The system my need /etc as a reference or image. You may need any database you use that lives on root. You can install all else from the repos and/or install media. Never saw the point in backing up an OS
The problem is it is difficult to know where that data resides and at the same time it makes no sense to backup files which might not only be useless but even cause problems when restoring and overwriting their newer versions.
It is not hard. ALL personal stuff of all users are in /home. Most of the important system stuff is in /etc. If you use SQL database they may be in root but if serious should be redirected to it’s own partition. Which makes it easy to back up. Anything else is OS and programs which are easy to reinstall. in the home directories any file starting with a period is hidden and is a configs file. Each program that keeps perssonal configs will have an entry or an entry in ~/.conf. Each entry is a directory related to the name of the program. The amount of space the configs them selves take are small so it is not a burden to back them up. Your data is where ever you stick it
I thought so too but it seems not to be true. Example: ~/.config/chromium/ShaderCache/
I don’t think it is a config, so why should I back it up? Also why should one backup ~/.xsession-errors*? There are other dot prefixed directories which contain cache subdirectories, tmp files and so on. One doesn’t need to to backup all the torrent chunks in .kde4/share/apps/ktorrent/tor* directories, right?
Each program that keeps perssonal configs will have an entry or an entry in ~/.conf. Each entry is a directory related to the name of the program.
I wish it was so. But it is not. Example: ~/.purple - one needs to know this is for Pidgin, so it is not related to the name of the program. But one also doesn’t need to backup ~/.purple/icons which contains the cached icon images of contacts.
The amount of space the configs them selves take are small so it is not a burden to back them up. Your data is where ever you stick it
It is not just about space. The more important thing is for have clean and manageable data. After all the whole point of having a backup is to save time and not to redo things, including things such as browsing through thousands of unnecessary files.
A more detailed example to illustrate what I mean:
Imagine last night you backed up a file named ~/.config/some_program/some_cache + also all files in ~/.config/some_program/. But it turns out for some reason you need to restore ~/.config/some_program/data_fileX. In the meantime some_cache has been updated with new content. If you restore and overwrite blindly the whole ~/.config/* you will overwrite the cache file too with an older version and the next time the program tries to use it you might see wrong output. This means you need to backup and restore only files which are actual data and settings, not temporary stuff.
I hope that clarifies why I am looking to find what is really important.
no cache is needed any time it is pure temp storage. But then again how much space does it take and is to really worth it to parse ever one of thousands of directories for small files that you may not explicitly need??
# cd ~/.config/
# du -hs chromium/
246M chromium/
And I am running chromium with option --disk-cache-dir=/dev/null
Considering that the only file which really needs backup is ~/.config/chromium/Default/Preferences which is only 136K I don’t see the point of backing up 250mb of useless data every day. So yes, it is worth parsing only the ones you need. This also makes backup much faster.
[QUOTE=nrickert;2740376]I’m not seeing ~/.skel on my system./QUOTE] I think that it is a KDE4 directory,. I guess you have a clean Plasma5 install.
It looks like it. I moved it inside another directory and rebooted - it was not recreated.
You are right. I checked my opensuse 13.2 home directory, and there is a “.skel” with three files of length zero all having names that suggest KDE4.
So can we make a final conclusion that in Leap 42.1 with Plasma it is safe to remove ~/.skel?
Yes. I had a look and the 3 files are indeed only used by a KDE4 startup script (/usr/share/kde4/env/startkde.suse.sh, part of the package kdebase4-workspace-branding-openSUSE). We don’t have/use such a script in Plasma5.
Thank you!