PLAKAR(1) General Commands Manual PLAKAR(1)

plakar — effortless backups

plakar [-concurrency number] [-configdir dir] [-cachedir dir] [-datadir dir] [-cpu number] [-json] [-keyfile path] [-quiet] [-silent] [-stdio] [-time] [-trace subsystems] [at kloset] subcommand ...

plakar is a tool to create distributed, versioned backups with compression, encryption, and data deduplication.

By default, plakar operates on the Kloset store at ~/.plakar. This can be changed either by using the at option.

The following options are available:

number
Set the maximum number of parallel tasks for faster processing. Defaults to the CPU count.
dir
Specify an alternate configuration directory. Defaults to ~/.config/plakar.
dir
Specify an alternate cache directory. Defaults to ~/.cache/plakar.
dir
Specify an alternate data directory. Defaults to ~/.local/share/plakar.
number
Limit the number of parallel workers plakar uses to number. By default it's the number of online CPUs.
Use newline-delimited JSON as output format for some subcommands.
path
Read the passphrase from the key file at path instead of prompting. Overrides the PLAKAR_PASSPHRASE environment variable.
Disable all output except for errors.
Disable all output.
Use text lines as output format for some subcommands instead of the default ncurses frontend. Enabled by default when the standard output is not a terminal.
Report the time the subcommand took to run.
subsystems
Display trace logs. subsystems is a comma-separated series of keywords to enable the trace logs for different subsystems: all, trace, repository, snapshot and server.
kloset
Operates on the given kloset store. It could be a path, an URI, or a label in the form “@name” to reference a configuration created with plakar-store(1).

Show this manpage and the ones for the subcommands.
Authenticate to Plakar services, refer to plakar-login(1).
Log out from Plakar services, refer to plakar-logout(1).
Manage additional Plakar services that require you to be logged in, refer to plakar-service(1).
Generate a token to interact with Plakar services, refer to plakar-token-create(1).
Display the current Plakar version, refer to plakar-version(1).

Manage configurations for the destination connectors, refer to plakar-destination(1).
Manage configurations for the source connectors, refer to plakar-source(1).
Manage configurations for storage connectors, refer to plakar-store(1).

Check data integrity in a Kloset store, refer to plakar-check(1).
Create a new Kloset store, refer to plakar-create(1).
Display detailed information about internal structures, refer to plakar-info(1).
Remove unused data from a Kloset store, refer to plakar-maintenance(1).
Prune snapshots according to a policy, refer to plakar-prune(1).
Create a .ptar archive, refer to plakar-ptar(1).
Start a Plakar server, refer to plakar-server(1).
Synchronize snapshots between Kloset stores, refer to plakar-sync(1).
Serve the Plakar web user interface, refer to plakar-ui(1).

Create an archive from a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-archive(1).
Create a new Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-backup(1).
Display file contents from a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-cat(1).
Show differences between files in a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-diff(1).
Compute digests for files in a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-digest(1).
Duplicate an existing snapshot with a different ID, refer to plakar-dup(1).
Find filenames in a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-locate(1).
List snapshots and their contents in a Kloset store, refer to plakar-ls(1).
Mount Kloset snapshots as a read-only filesystem, refer to plakar-mount(1).
Restore files from a Kloset snapshot, refer to plakar-restore(1).
Remove snapshots from a Kloset store, refer to plakar-rm(1).

Install a plugin, refer to plakar-pkg-add(1).
Build a plugin from source, refer to plakar-pkg-build(1).
Package a plugin, refer to plakar-pkg-create(1).
Uninstall a plugin, refer to plakar-pkg-rm(1).
List installed plugins, refer to plakar-pkg-show(1).

Passphrase to unlock the Kloset store; overrides the one from the configuration. If set, plakar won't prompt to unlock. The option keyfile overrides this environment variable.
Reference to the Kloset store.
Token to authenticate for Plakar services.

~/.cache/plakar
Plakar cache directories.
~/.config/plakar/destinations.yml
Restore destinations configuration.
~/.config/plakar/sources.yml
Backup sources configuration.
~/.config/plakar/stores.yml
Kloset stores configuration.
~/.plakar
Default Kloset store location.

The following exit codes are aligned with sysexits(3) where applicable:

0
Command completed successfully.
1
A general error occurred.
64 (EX_USAGE)
Invalid command-line arguments or flags.
65 (EX_DATAERR)
Data integrity check failed (corrupted chunks, verification mismatch).
66 (EX_NOINPUT)
The repository could not be opened or located.
77 (EX_NOPERM)
Authentication or decryption failure (wrong passphrase, missing keyfile).
78 (EX_CONFIG)
Incompatible repository version.

Create an encrypted Kloset store at the default location:

$ plakar create

Create an encrypted Kloset store on AWS S3:

$ plakar store add mys3bucket \
    location=s3://s3.eu-west-3.amazonaws.com/backups \
    access_key="access_key" \
    secret_access_key="secret_key"
$ plakar at @mys3bucket create

Create a snapshot of the current directory on the @mys3bucket Kloset store:

$ plakar at @mys3bucket backup

List the snapshots of the default Kloset store:

$ plakar ls

Restore the file “notes.md” in the current directory from the snapshot with id “abcd”:

$ plakar restore -to . abcd:notes.md

Remove snapshots older than 30 days:

$ plakar rm -before 30d
Plakar May 5, 2026 PLAKAR(1)