/giis-ext4

Recycle bin for 'rm' command and unlink() call on ext4FS

Primary LanguageCOtherNOASSERTION

gET iT i sAY. giis for ext4 (giis-ext4) build status

+About giis

+How to install

+User Guide and Documents

About giis:

Linux Desktop comes with Trash Bin for GUI. But when you delete a file from commandline or delete a file via programs. They will be deleted forever! giis-ext4 acts as a recycle bin in such cases.

gET iT i sAY.giis-ext4 is a text based file recovery tool.Once you install giis-ext4,files on your disk can be recovered using giis-ext4. But Those files which deleted before the installation of giis-ext4 can't be recovered using giis-ext4.User has the option to choose directories too. Add only those directories where you will store important data.(adding directories like /tmp gives giis-ext4 overhead and installation will take long time).It can recovers a deleted file and restores in it's original directory,if path exists.It recoversdropped database tables.

Screencast:

Tip,to save 6 minutes of your life, During screen-cast after 1:08 you can skip to 7:38. If you interested in boring recovery messages,feel free to watch the whole screen-cast :)

asciicast

How it works?

During installation, giis-ext4 stores file attributes in a sqlite-db. These attribute include output from stat command along with critical data block address. You can view this database content from /usr/local/giis/db/giis-db

At specific time interval, giis-ext4 takes snapshot of pre-configured directories and updates the database. It also searches for deleted files and restores them back into /usr/local/giis/trash location.

How reliable is giis-ext4?

As long as the freed data blocks are not re-used by kernel, giis-ext4 will work. Since giis-ext4 doesn't rely on journal entries, even when the system is rebooted, giis-ext4 can recover the file.

giis-ext4 can't recover any file ,(a) if its data blocks are re-used (b) if the file attributes doesn't present in its database. So itsnot 100% fool-proof. At the moment, it works only with ext4 file system.

Future plans:

  • Provide per user trash location.
  • Include ext3 support in giis-ext4 ( rename the tool as giis)
  • Support for Btrfs!

How to install:

see INSTALL file

User Guide and Documents

For more screencasting/manuals,checkout www.giis.co.in

Magazine references:

You can get me at lakshmipathi.g@giis.co.in

+Lakshmipathi.G www.giis.co.in +Mar 29,2016.