How to properly in and exclude folders from Timeshift

[O-rion]

Hello all,

I've setup timeshift to include my hidden folders, but I do not want the .mozilla, .stellarium and .wine to be included.
This is how I tried to set it up ... but the above folders are still in the backup. What am I doing wrong?

(First item is the second user on this PC, then my hidden folders, followed by the ones i wish to exclude).

Thanks for an suggestions.

[Pjotr]

Practical solution: turn it around.

Don't generally include the hidden settings files by default. Only include the hidden settings files you do want.

Then you won't have to deal with exclude rules for specific hidden files you don't want. It's a bit more work, but not much. Wenn's nicht kann so wie es muss, dan muss es mal so wie es kann.

[O-rion]

Thank you for the idea ... I'll think it over.

Just stumbled over this bug-report: https://github.com/teejee2008/timeshift/issues/495
so I guess I can do what I want ... it'll just not work.
A pity.

[pbear]

I've setup timeshift to include my hidden folders, but I do not want the .mozilla, .stellarium and .wine to be included.

I'm curious, why? I include hidden folders, in part, precisely so I capture Wine (which, after all, has apps in it).
The other two are too small to worry about either way.

[dfiler]

Might be too late to the party, but since I did stumble to this thread via search engine, on a quest for answers for this very topic..
It would not be unreasonable to assume others would as well, hence the resurrection;

So, what ended up helping me the most was the link for a rsync -manual, Over M'hjyah»> https://download.samba.org/pub/rsync/rsync.html

And overall some snippets of info here and there about the significance of the order you put these exclude / include -rules..
The rules are read top>>down, and first rule establishes precedence.. so: if you want to include all hidden from $HOME .. but exclude couple directories in particular; Let's say: ~/.wine/*** & ~/.steam/*** ... If that is the case, you'll need to set those exclusions first in order.

"exclude" : [
"/home/user/.steam/***",
"/home/user/.wine/***",
"+ /home/user/.**",
"/home/trustno1/**"
],

And then, there is the bug which was documented at least up till 2021.. (Using not the newest distro, they said) Where the order of in-/exclusions end up not being saved..
Bug report https://github.com/teejee2008/timeshift/issues/626
Which also mentioned, if encountering said bug; to just change the order straight from /etc/timeshift.json .. Which, at least in my case solved any remaining pendulum effect on my test-ticlés.

Addendum; After msg speculation of diminishing significance:
Then there is the opinion of not including the hidden files&folders from home directory.. But I can only speculate for it to be for security conserns, like perhaps in the case of ~/.mozilla/ -if you use the logins&passwords function on the browser.. And, mayhaps also, if just mass- copy-pasting from old home dir to new.. could end up messing up some applications which employ a different way to handle config files..
Tho' recognizing that, I suppose you could make an informed decision after the risk assessment..
Well, as long as you will not blame me for backhole boppin' your shit up.. I know I wont. Peace.

[O-rion]

Thanks @dfiler.
Not too late to the party. I'm still interested in a solution and I'll try that out as soon as I have some spare time.