Disclosure: I maintain the experimental open-source project DiagSift mentioned below. This is a request for pilot feedback, not a product promotion.
I am testing whether a small project-neutral diagnostic manifest could be useful in real restic troubleshooting, and I am looking for 1-2 maintainers or experienced contributors willing to try one short pilot.
The pilot is deliberately narrow. The manifest only:
runs restic version
records OS and architecture
reads one explicitly named diagnostic log file
Before anything is collected, DiagSift shows the exact resolved plan, limits and paths. Collection creates an ordinary ZIP locally. There is no upload or telemetry, and the user can inspect the ZIP locally before deciding whether to share it.
I am not proposing that restic adopt or integrate DiagSift. I am simply trying to learn whether this workflow would make a real support case clearer or safer, or whether it is unnecessary or too restrictive.
A pilot would involve running validate, plan, collect, and inspect against one real troubleshooting scenario and reporting only non-sensitive observations. No diagnostic bundle needs to be sent to me. Redaction reduces risk but is not a guarantee.
Source / pre-release:
Pilot tracking:
If anyone is willing to test it, I have a small three-file restic pilot package and instructions ready. Feedback that the idea is unnecessary or poorly scoped is equally useful. Thanks.
honestly the inspect-before-share zip idea is probably useful for support. ive wasted time pasting half a log and missing the restic version line more than once. bounded to version + os + one named log feels about right to me, not too grabby. if the plan preview is clear i would actually use it on a real broken restore case. not a maintainer though so take that with a grain of salt
Thanks, this is really useful. Keeping it small and predictable is pretty much what I’m aiming for — version + OS + only the log you choose, with a clear preview before anything gets collected.
I’m going to double check the current pilot against this as well. If you hit another broken restic restore case, would be great if you can give it a try once.