Oliver
47 lines
1.8 KiB
Markdown
47 lines
1.8 KiB
Markdown
# 001 — Why backing up an agent is so hard
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**Status:** Idea
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**Tags:** Technical, Backups, DevOps
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## Research notes
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### Real filesystem changes after one week of work on a Linux agent
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```
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504.6M ./usr
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43.3M ./var
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448.9M ./root
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54.0K ./etc
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996.8M .
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```
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Most users only back up the home directory (`/root` = 448.9M). But over half the changes live outside it — `/usr` (504.6M) and `/var` (43.3M) contain installed packages, pip/npm global installs, database files, logs, and system configs. A naive home-dir-only backup misses 55% of what changed.
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At restore time, you get your config back but the agent won't run — missing dependencies, missing system packages, missing database files.
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### What this means for the post
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- Agent environments are not just config files — they're full Linux systems with packages, services, and state scattered everywhere
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- "Backup your home directory" is dangerously incomplete advice for AI agents
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- Derez.ai's full-disk snapshot approach is the right solution
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- This is a strong selling point: the agent works after restore, not just the config
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### Next data points
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Oliver will do two more memory analysis snapshots after running the speed-run setups (Odoo + Cold Email). Those will show how much additional state those integrations add.
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### Outline
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1. The sprawl problem — why agents are harder to back up than a standard server
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*Include the filesystem analysis table*
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2. What a real agent backup needs to capture
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3. How Borg/deduplicated snapshots solve it
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4. How Derez.ai does it automatically (one-click restore)
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5. Best practices for users
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6. Better save than sorry — the selling point
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### References
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- Borg backup docs
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- Hermes Agent directory structure (~/.hermes/)
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- Filesystem analysis: `du -sch /usr /var /root /etc` after one week |