ZFS Idea for an app: zfs additional utilities / snapshot utilies

A

AlfredoLlaquet

I'm aware that a post like this may attract the accustomed group of toxic forum members that will post things like:
  • Why don't you do it yourself?
  • Why don't you ask ChatGPT to do it for you?
  • There's already and app that does something similar.
  • You can already do all that using awk and grep.
  • You are using certain term wrong.
To them all I say in advance: florp you very much for your insightful contributions.

What a CLI utility like the one I'm proposing could do:

- Create a snapshot of every filesystem adding a description as part of the name (and perhaps the date in YYYMMDD format).
- Let you search your datasets' names using regular expressions or plain strings.
- Delete all snapshots save each filesystem's most recent one.
- Let you define (using some convention) related snapshots (each of a different filesystem).
- Let you rollback a set of related snapshots all at once.

And many more useful things. I've notice that I'm talking mainly about snapshots, so the app could also be specialized in snapshots.
 
I would very much either like to "closely watch" or "help". I'm not as good with ZFS as I would like to be. So, being optimistic first: count me in.

Why What language?
Do the following built-in's examples (#14 and #15) work in at all (or we using the libzfs api -- sort of a re-ask of the language question above): https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=zfs
Would/does the `.zfs/snapshot` directory help in our efforts?

edit: fixed: "why" to "what".
 
There are several utilities in the ports tree for creating/managing snapshots.
 
Quite reasonable expectations. But they are not unique and as said there likely is existing art there.

On the other hand ignoring existing art can greatly enhance one's own scripting abilities.

And I don't think many here recommend asking an LLM chatbot.
 
There was an article about using "saniod" by the foundation. Please note that I looked at sanoid when I read that article and it seemed very..."big" and I don't use it (I am only passing along the article link).

ZFS automatic snapshots with Sanoid on FreeBSD | FreeBSD Foundation

OpenZFS is a first class citizen on FreeBSD for a number of years now. Right from the installer, users can install a complete root-on-ZFS system. FreeBSD will create the necessary datasets for the base operating system, including one for /usr, /var, and /home. If disaster strikes and files get...
freebsdfoundation.org freebsdfoundation.org

sysutils/sanoid
 
Dear friends:
  • I don't need to do any of the mentioned operations. My needs are well met with my scripts.
  • I didn't check what apps already did what: this is true. I was lazy. But I didn't want my laziness to get in the way of sharing something that could give someone else an idea to have some fun.
  • The bit about "ChatGPT" means that there are people who didn't like, apparently, that I did the "vibecoding" experiment and I didn't want someone saying sarcastically that I should vibecode the app, because this type of negative comments affect my mood.
The only important thing, though:
  • I'm not talking about scheduled automation. I'm talking about a tool that let's you do additional high-level things from the terminal manually. But maybe it exists.
 
Sorry, but I'm this close to being out on this one because this sounds like it's going down the path of being shell aliases.

I thought the 'vibe code' thread was "interesting" and "extremely ominous" at the same time.
 
I'm moving my previous edits here so everyone gets a notification about this additions to my "discourse:"

Edit: My rationale was: For the info I have I suspect something like this may not exist. It costs nothing to me to create a thread in "Off-topic" sharing these ideas. Ergo, it's cost-effective to share them even if I'm wrong. So I did. I apologize eternally to those who think this is a bad way of doing things. I don't think I'll change, though.

Edit 2: I'm not liking the internet-forum dynamic very much, though (I'm not talking about this forum, I'm talking in general). It seems that the main game is to demonstrate that the previous poster is wrong. Probably it's a human dynamic.

Edit 3: I created the thread in "Off-topic" (it was moved afterward not by me) precisely because it's a casual thread, not a request or a necessity or a problem.
 
AlfredoLlaquet said:
Thank you, JohnK. I thought something similar. I'm optimistic regarding AI, but I know I'm in the minority.
Click to expand...
:] Yeah, that's probably an accurate (safe) thought (about being in the minority with your optimism). From the 10 minutes, and one aspect (only because it was the point I ended up on after a random scroll), I looked at the scripts it was obvious it was built like an onion (in layers) where each iteration built on top of the previous. At no time did the AI seem to stop and revert tactics. This for "non coders" will be a death knell. The other high-level flag was Roff; roff isn't guaranteed to render properly on BSD (`mandoc` only supports a portion of Roff) and a 'non coder' may rely on this and/or use the basis of this for the next project. ...so, many fun questions and discussions I'd like to have.
 
AlfredoLlaquet said:
Edit 2: I'm not liking the internet-forum dynamic very much, though (I'm not talking about this forum, I'm talking in general). It seems that the main game is to demonstrate that the previous poster is wrong. Probably it's a human dynamic.
Click to expand...
stop! you need separate the "names on a screen" with actually real people. Just because someone says that you "are a horrible person" doesn't mean there are not 10 others that feel the opposite. Conveying a point/intent via written word is extremely difficult (it's hard enough with the spoken word).
 
It seems to me that, as pointed out by JohnK elsewhere, the zfsnap utility is quite close to what I was envisioning. It doesn't seem to cover the specific use case of my scripts, though (which is fine, for I have my scripts; it's just an observation). Said specific case is to delete all snapshots of all filesystems except the most recent of every filesystem. Perhaps it's considered too risky. IDN.

J

Post in thread 'ZFS in Production: Real-World Deployment Patterns and Pitfalls'

Seems to me the `zfsnap` utility could be right up your alley.
For example:
Create an alias in your shell RC file for creating a snapshot that has a lifespan (shown here is 5 days):

Code: 
alias snap='/sbin/zfsnap snapshot -a 5d -r zpool'

Then create a crontab to just delete snapshots after they expire.
Code: 
#
# SNAPSHOT: delete
# At 11:00am on Friday delete expired snapshots.
0       23      *       *       5       root   /usr/local/sbin/zfsnap destroy -r zroot
  • Thanks
 
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