Browsing and restoring

Browse the datastore backups and restore their contents, in full or file by file.

Last updated: May 18, 2026

The Backups screen (key 5) browses the snapshots present in the datastore and restores their contents.

Browsing backups

When it opens, the screen queries the datastore and lists the available snapshots: backup group, date, size, number of archives, and an encryption indicator where relevant. The r key refreshes the list.

Token permissions

Browsing and restoring require the token to hold the Datastore.Read (or Datastore.Audit) privilege on the datastore. A token limited to Datastore.Backup can write backups but not read them back: in that case, the screen says so explicitly. See Connecting to the PBS server.

The restore flow

The restore happens in steps:

  1. Pick the snapshot: select the backup in the list, then confirm with Enter.
  2. Pick the archive: a snapshot holds one or more archives (one per source). Choose the one to restore.
  3. Browse the contents: Cloud-PBS TUI mounts the archive and shows its contents.
  4. Select: tick the files and folders to restore, or none to restore everything.
  5. Pick the destination: choose the directory where the data will be written.
  6. Restore: the selected items are copied to the destination.

Selective restore

Rather than restoring a whole archive, you can extract only what you need.

At the browsing step, the archive is mounted through FUSE and its contents become navigable like an ordinary tree:

  • ↑ ↓ move through the entries;
  • → enters a folder, ← goes up;
  • Space ticks or unticks the entry under the cursor;
  • v confirms the selection and moves on to the destination step.

An empty selection restores the whole archive. A selection of one or more items restores only those, keeping their relative tree under the destination directory.

NOTE

Browsing the contents requires FUSE (the fuse3 package) on the host. If it is missing, the tool says so and invites you to install it. See Troubleshooting.

Choosing the destination

The destination screen shows a directory picker:

  • → opens a sub-folder, ← goes up;
  • n creates a new folder in the current directory;
  • Enter confirms the current directory as the destination and starts the restore.

The restore preserves file modes and modification times as well as symbolic links. Ownership (owner and group) is not restored when the tool runs without privileges: restore as root if you need the original uid/gid back.

Encrypted backups

To browse or restore an encrypted backup, the encryption key must be set in the Target screen. See Encryption.