# Quickstart This guide gets you started in minutes. You'll create your first backup snapshot, verify it's secure, and learn how to restore your files. **Plakar** makes backups simple and secure by default. Every backup is end-to-end encrypted, deduplicated to save space, and stored as an independent snapshot you can restore at any time without depending on previous backups. If you've used traditional backup tools, here's what's different: instead of incremental archives that chain together, Plakar creates self-contained snapshots. You can delete old snapshots without breaking newer ones, compare any two snapshots directly, and trust that your data is tamper-evident and encrypted before it ever leaves your machine. ## Requirements Make sure **Plakar** is installed on your system. If you haven't done this yet, please refer to the [installation guide](../installation) for detailed instructions. ## Create a Kloset Store Before we can back up any data, we need to define where the backup will go. In **plakar** terms, this storage location is called a **Kloset Store**. This is where Plakar keeps your backups. Think of it like a safe folder for snapshots. You can find out more about the concept and rationale behind Kloset in [this post on our blog](https://www.plakar.io/posts/2025-04-29/kloset-the-immutable-data-store/). For our first backup, we will create a local Kloset Store on the filesystem of the host OS. In a real backup scenario you would want to store backups on a different physical device, so substitute in a better location if you have one. In your terminal, run the following command: ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups create ``` > [!WARNING]+ Don't Lose or Forget your Passphrase Be extra careful when > choosing the passphrase. People with access to the Kloset Store and knowledge > of the passphrase can read your backups. > > By default **Plakar** will enforce rules on your choice of passphrase to make > sure it is complex enough to be secure. To add complexity, use a mixture of > upper and lower case characters, numbers and symbols. > > Your passphrase is not stored anywhere and **cannot** be recovered in case of > loss. A lost passphrase means the data within the repository can no longer be > accessed or recovered. ## Create your first backup Now that we have created the Kloset Store where data will be stored, we can use it to create our first backup. **Plakar** uses the `at` keyword to specify the Kloset Store to use. To create a simple example backup, try running: ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups backup $HOME/Documents ``` This backs up your Documents folder into the `$HOME/backups`. Replace the paths with any folder or storage location you prefer to do plakar operations on. **Plakar** will process the files it finds at that location (in this case the Documents folder) and pass them to the Kloset where they will be chunked and encrypted. The output will indicate the progress: ```bash dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/Obsidian/NOTES.md dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/budget.xlsx dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/notes.txt [...] dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user dd62691d: OK ✓ /home dd62691d: OK ✓ / info: backup: created unsigned snapshot dd62691d of size 6.4 KiB in 125.317267ms (wrote 577 KiB) ``` The output lists the short form of the snapshot ID. This is used to identify a particular snapshot and is also how you identify the snapshot to use for various **Plakar** commands. > [!NOTE]+ The help command Learning new tools can be confusing. To make things > easier, **Plakar** includes built-in help for all commands. Just use > `plakar help` and then the command you need help with for a full list of > options and examples. For example, if you forget what the options are for > restoring files from a snapshot: `plakar help restore` ## List snapshots You can verify that the backup exists with the `ls` command, which returns the backups in that Kloset Store: ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups ls 2026-01-14T06:45:32Z dd62691d 6.4 KiB 0s /home/user/Documents ``` The output lists the date of the last backup, the short UUID, the size of files backed-up, the time it took to create the backup and the source path of the backup. ## Verify integrity It's always a good idea to verify the integrity of your backups. You can do this with the `check` command. This will read back the data from the Kloset Store, decrypt it and verify its integrity by recomputing checksums. ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups check dd62691d info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/Obsidian info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/code_samples [...] info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/Obsidian/NOTES.md info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/recipes/ingredients.csv info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/resume.pdf info: dd62691d: ✓ /home/user/Documents/project_proposal.docx info: check: verification of dd62691d:/home/user/Documents completed successfully ``` In production, you would typically run this command periodically to ensure the integrity of your backups over time. This is necessary to ensure that data has not degraded or become corrupted while stored. ## Restore files from a backup You can restore files from a backup using the `restore` command. In this case, we are restoring the snapshot we just created to another directory called `restored`. ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups restore -to $HOME/restored dd62691d info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/Obsidian info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/budget.xlsx [...] info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/recipes/desserts.txt info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/recipes/dinner.txt info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/resume.pdf info: dd62691d: OK ✓ /home/user/Documents/recipes/ingredients.csv info: restore: restoration of dd62691d:/home/user/Documents at /home/user/restored completed successfully ``` To verify the files have been re-created, list the directory they were restored to. Note that the properties of the restored files, such as timestamps and permissions, will match the original files: ```bash $ ls -l $HOME/restored/Documents/ total 36 -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 30 Jan 14 06:31 budget.xlsx drwxr-xr-x 2 user user 4096 Jan 14 06:31 code_samples -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 28 Jan 14 06:31 notes.txt [...] -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 36 Jan 14 06:31 presentation.pptx -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 40 Jan 14 06:31 project_proposal.docx drwxr-xr-x 2 user user 4096 Jan 14 06:31 recipes -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 29 Jan 14 06:31 resume.pdf ``` ## Access the UI Plakar provides a web interface to view the backups and their content. To start the web interface, run: ```bash $ plakar at $HOME/backups ui ``` Your default browser will open a new tab. You can navigate through the snapshots, search and view the files, and download them. ![Web UI, light mode](../images/ui-light.png) ![Web UI, dark mode](../images/ui-dark.png) A public instance of the web UI is also available at [https://demo.plakar.io](https://demo.plakar.io). You can use it to explore the features of the UI on real backups without installing anything. ## Congratulations! You have successfully: - created a backup - verified it - restored files - used the graphical UI How long did it take? This is how easy **Plakar** is for simple, secure backups. ## Next steps Having a backup on the filesystem is a start, but to improve the durability of your backups, you should consider hosting multiple copies in different locations. Continue to the [Part 2 of the Quickstart](../synchronize-copies) to create multiple copies of your backups.