If you’re running openHAB on a Raspberry Pi 24/7, losing your SD card means losing everything — configs, rules, persistence data. I built a small self-hosted web tool to automate SD card backups via SSH.
How it works:
You insert a backup SD card into the Pi (via USB adapter), and the tool SSHs in, runs rpi-clone, and automatically fixes cmdline.txt and fstab with the correct PARTUUID — so the backup card boots directly without any manual steps.
Features:
Web UI to manage multiple Raspberry Pis
Weekly automated schedules (cron-based)
Live progress display during backup
Boot partition auto-fix after every clone
SSH keepalive — works reliably even for large backups (2+ hours)
Well it’s openHAB on Docker on Raspberry Pi and I wonder why one should stack stacks like that - you don’t need or benefit from Docker in that case, it’s even harmful and just adding overhead.
No good idea on a lowmem hardware in fact.
The openHABian SD mirroring feature also creates a bootable image of the whole box, i.e. it’s also applicable if you install additional stuff beyond openHAB (no matter if you use containers).
And it’s fully automated and minimizes downtime: in case of SD failure, you just need someone to swap cards and restart your box. No need to have PC access to restore the backup right the moment you’re in trouble.
And really anyone like your mom or neighbour can handle that - very handy in remote locations.
Yes, but openHAB requires a separate Raspberry Pi. Many applications run very stably on my Docker container. With my tool, you don’t need a PC to perform the backup, as it uses the Raspberry Pi’s USB port. Just swap the SD cards.
