How To Install etckeeper on CentOS 8

etckeeper is Store /etc in a SCM system (git, mercurial, bzr or darcs)

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install etckeeper on CentOS 8.

What is etckeeper

The etckeeper program is a tool to let /etc be stored in a git, mercurial, bzr or darcs repository. It hooks into yum to automatically commit changes made to /etc during package upgrades. It tracks file metadata that version control systems do not normally support, but that is important for /etc, such as the permissions of /etc/shadow. It’s quite modular and configurable, while also being simple to use if you understand the basics of working with version control. The default backend is git, if want to use a another backend please install the appropriate tool (mercurial, darcs or bzr). To start using the package please read /usr/share/doc/etckeeper/README.

We can use yum or dnf to install etckeeper on CentOS 8. In this tutorial we discuss both methods but you only need to choose one of method to install etckeeper.

Install etckeeper on CentOS 8 Using dnf

Update yum database with dnf using the following command.

sudo dnf makecache --refresh

The output should look something like this:

CentOS Linux 8 - AppStream                                       43 kB/s | 4.3 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - BaseOS                                          65 kB/s | 3.9 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - ContinuousRelease                               43 kB/s | 3.0 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - Extras                                          23 kB/s | 1.5 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - FastTrack                                       40 kB/s | 3.0 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - HighAvailability                                36 kB/s | 3.9 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - Plus                                            24 kB/s | 1.5 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - PowerTools                                      50 kB/s | 4.3 kB     00:00    
Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux Modular 8 - x86_64           13 kB/s | 9.2 kB     00:00    
Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 8 - x86_64                   24 kB/s | 8.5 kB     00:00    
Metadata cache created.

After updating yum database, We can install etckeeper using dnf by running the following command:

sudo dnf -y install etckeeper

Install etckeeper on CentOS 8 Using yum

Update yum database with yum using the following command.

sudo yum makecache --refresh

The output should look something like this:

CentOS Linux 8 - AppStream                                       43 kB/s | 4.3 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - BaseOS                                          65 kB/s | 3.9 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - ContinuousRelease                               43 kB/s | 3.0 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - Extras                                          23 kB/s | 1.5 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - FastTrack                                       40 kB/s | 3.0 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - HighAvailability                                36 kB/s | 3.9 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - Plus                                            24 kB/s | 1.5 kB     00:00    
CentOS Linux 8 - PowerTools                                      50 kB/s | 4.3 kB     00:00    
Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux Modular 8 - x86_64           13 kB/s | 9.2 kB     00:00    
Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux 8 - x86_64                   24 kB/s | 8.5 kB     00:00    
Metadata cache created.

After updating yum database, We can install etckeeper using yum by running the following command:

sudo yum -y install etckeeper

How To Uninstall etckeeper on CentOS 8

To uninstall only the etckeeper package we can use the following command:

sudo dnf remove etckeeper

etckeeper Package Contents on CentOS 8

/etc/cron.daily/etckeeper
/etc/etckeeper
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/10vcs-test
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/20store-metadata
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/30bzr-add
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/30darcs-add
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/30git-add
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/30hg-addremove
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/50vcs-commit
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/99push
/etc/etckeeper/commit.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/daily
/etc/etckeeper/etckeeper.conf
/etc/etckeeper/init.d
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/10restore-metadata
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/20restore-etckeeper
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/40vcs-init
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/50vcs-ignore
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/50vcs-perm
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/50vcs-pre-commit-hook
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/60darcs-deleted-symlinks
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/70vcs-add
/etc/etckeeper/init.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/list-installed.d
/etc/etckeeper/list-installed.d/50list-installed
/etc/etckeeper/post-install.d
/etc/etckeeper/post-install.d/50vcs-commit
/etc/etckeeper/post-install.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/pre-commit.d
/etc/etckeeper/pre-commit.d/20warn-problem-files
/etc/etckeeper/pre-commit.d/30store-metadata
/etc/etckeeper/pre-commit.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/pre-install.d
/etc/etckeeper/pre-install.d/10packagelist
/etc/etckeeper/pre-install.d/50uncommitted-changes
/etc/etckeeper/pre-install.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/unclean.d
/etc/etckeeper/unclean.d/50test
/etc/etckeeper/unclean.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/uninit.d
/etc/etckeeper/uninit.d/01prompt
/etc/etckeeper/uninit.d/50remove-metadata
/etc/etckeeper/uninit.d/50vcs-uninit
/etc/etckeeper/uninit.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/update-ignore.d
/etc/etckeeper/update-ignore.d/01update-ignore
/etc/etckeeper/update-ignore.d/README
/etc/etckeeper/vcs.d
/etc/etckeeper/vcs.d/50vcs-cmd
/usr/bin/etckeeper
/usr/lib/systemd/system/etckeeper.service
/usr/lib/systemd/system/etckeeper.timer
/usr/share/bash-completion
/usr/share/bash-completion/completions
/usr/share/bash-completion/completions/etckeeper
/usr/share/doc/etckeeper
/usr/share/doc/etckeeper/README.fedora
/usr/share/doc/etckeeper/README.html
/usr/share/licenses/etckeeper
/usr/share/licenses/etckeeper/GPL
/usr/share/man/man8/etckeeper.8.gz
/usr/share/zsh
/usr/share/zsh/vendor-completions
/usr/share/zsh/vendor-completions/_etckeeper
/var/cache/etckeeper

References

Summary

In this tutorial we learn how to install etckeeper on CentOS 8 using yum and dnf.