I’ve written a simple Python script to backup and restore installed rpm packages.

On Ubuntu, I used APTonCD for this matter, but in this case, for Fedora I decided to use my own script.

The usage is quite simple, only two parameters:

Backup:

python rpm-backup.py --backup

Restore:

python rpm-backup.py --restore

This is source code, although you can download it from my github (link to the gh-page of the entire repository)

#!/usr/bin/python

''' Backup script for installed packages.
Only RPM.
Tested under Fedora
Error list:
Code 1: Missing modules
Code 2: Not root
Code 3: Tried to restore without backup file'''

print "     ____  ____  __  ___"
print "    / __ \/ __ \/  |/  /"
print "   / /_/ / /_/ / /|_/ / "
print "  / _, _/ ____/ /  / /  "
print " /_/ |_/_/   /_/  /_/   "


print "        ____  ___   ________ ____  ______ "
print "       / __ )/   | / ____/ //_/ / / / __ \ "
print "      / __  / /| |/ /   / ,< / / / / /_/ /"
print "     / /_/ / ___ / /___/ /| / /_/ / ____/ "
print "    /_____/_/  |_\____/_/ |_\____/_/      "

#Import modules
try:
    import os
    import argparse
except ImportError:
    print "Could not find required modules. Exiting..."
    exit(1)

# Create parser
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description='Backup your installed packages.', epilog="Written by Adrian Espinosa (aesptux).")


# if user types --backup it will be stored as true in variable backup
#if user types --restore it will be stored as true in variable backup
parser.add_argument('--backup', action='store_true', dest='backup', help='Backup your packages.')
parser.add_argument('--restore',  action='store_true', dest='restore', help='Restore your packages.')


args = parser.parse_args()
#print args
#print(args.option(args.integers))

#variables
userlogged = os.environ['LOGNAME']
directory = '/%s' % (userlogged)
filename = 'packages-installed.bak'
path = directory + '/' + filename
rpm_list = []
print " "
print "Hello %s!" % (userlogged)
print "If you are having troubles using the script, use the argument '--help'"


def dobackup():

    ''' Create backup '''
    print "Starting copy..."
    command = 'rpm -qa > ' + path
    #os.system('touch '+path)
    os.system(command)
    os.system('echo Total packages: ; cat ' + path + ' | wc -l ')
    print "Done."


def dorestore():

    ''' Restore packages'''
    print "Starting restore..."
    global rpm_list
    # try, except, to see if the backup file exists
    try:
        for line in open(path, 'r'):
            rpm_list.append(line)
    except IOError:
        print "The backup file does not exist. Please, create a backup first. "
        exit(3)
    # take the list and join it
    rpm_list = ''.join(rpm_list)
    # remove \n
    rpm_list = rpm_list.replace('\n', ' ')
    os.system('yum install ' + rpm_list)


#This script must be run as root
if userlogged != 'root':
    print "You have to run the script as root"
    exit(2)


# if backup is true, dobackup. Else if restore is true, dorestore
if args.backup == True:
    dobackup()
elif args.restore == True:
    dorestore()

Then, you can set up a cron job like this:

0 22 * * * /usr/bin/python /root/rpm-backup.py --backup