Create smaller backup files in Puppet Enterprise

You backed up Puppet Enterprise using the puppet-backup command, which generated a large backup file. Learn how to configure the scope of your backup, so that you can back up only what you need.

Version and installation information

PE version: All supported

Solution

By default, the PE backup and restore commands include your PE configuration, PE certificates, Puppet code, and PuppetDB. You can use the --scope option to customize which data is backed up. Code directories and reports can both get very large. Not including them in your back ups will decrease the size of your backup. Base the scope of your back ups on your organization and deployment.

If you’re keeping your code in version control, you don’t need to back up your code directories. If you want to exclude code directories, specify a scope that doesn’t include code, using steps in our documentation. If you must back up code, you can reduce the size of the backup by decreasing the number of code branches and environments.

Your organization might require you to keep PuppetDB data. If it does not, you can make backups smaller by not including PuppetDB data (which includes reports) in backups. You can also decrease the amount of data by decreasing the length of time that reports are kept. By default, reports are kept for 14 days. To change the length of time that reports are kept, edit the report-ttl parameter in the PuppetDB configuration file. Learn how to update PuppetDB configuration file settings from our article on removing nodes.