Add README.md

[time-slider.git] / README.md

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644 (file)
index 0000000..81bf4cb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,73 @@
+time-slider for Linux
+=====================
+
+This is a port (if one can call it that) of the Opensolaris/Illimos
+time-slider package to Linux. The porting effort so far was concentrated
+mainly on removing Solaris-isms and fixing minor annoyances. More work
+might be done in the future
+
+
+Installation
+============
+
+The Makefile provides an install target that can be used to install
+the package. For RPM based distributions a .spec file is included in
+the rpm/ subdirectory.
+
+"rpm" and "srpm" Makefile targets exist that will attempt to build
+a noarch RPM and/or a SRPM based on that spec file. This might fail
+if the user running the command has messed with their RPM environment
+(by using ~/.rpmmacros, for example). Moving that file out of the way
+temporarily should fix the issues.
+
+The .spec file has been tested on Fedora 20 (as the whole package has),
+running ZFS on Linux version 0.6.2 and later.
+
+
+Running
+=======
+
+Python 2 is needed to run this package. Python 3 is not supported.
+
+A systemd time-sliderd.service file is included in the installation.
+It is not enabled by default.
+
+No SysV init file is provided, but should not be too complicated to
+create.
+
+The main binary is /usr/lib/time-sliderd. By default this will daemonize
+itself, but a --foreground parameter has been added that will keep the
+program attached to the starting terminal.
+
+
+Configuration
+=============
+
+Like under Solaris the main way of specifying datasets to be snapshotted
+is using the "com.sun:auto-snapshot" property. This will enable the
+default "frequent", "hourly", "daily", "weekly" and "monthly" snapshots.
+The respective "com.sun:auto-snapshot:<frequency>" properties are
+understood as well.
+
+
+SMF
+===
+
+Further configuration of the time-sliderd service and the snapshots could
+be done unter Solaris by using SMF properties of the respective services.
+
+As Linux does not share this concept a config file located at
+/etc/time-slider/time-sliderd.conf can be used to set configuration options.
+
+To see a config file dump of the default options run "/usr/lib/time-sliderd
+--configdump" which will print the config to stdout.
+
+No restart is necessary after changes to the config file, the new values
+will be picked up immediately.
+
+
+Known issues
+============
+
+Plugins are currently not working and are completely disabled. Also no
+integration with Gnome or other Desktop Environments exists.