Tink vs Deja Dup
Deja Dup copies duplicity archives, schedules, and a GTK window. That is not a mechanic. Tink installs in one command, watches the Linux host, explains what is wrong, and helps you fix it.
Deja Dup takes the archive. Tink answers “why is this VPS sick?”
Accidental sysadmins land on Deja Dup because a desktop backup window looks cheaper than an outage. Then the host volume fills, nginx dies, and deja-dup --backup still looks Success — no archive match for host fill. A filling /var is a Tink warning; it is not a Deja Dup job unless you scraped desktop mail and watched it.
Tink is the other job: detect the issue on the machine, say why it happened in plain English, propose the command, and run it only after you approve. Keep using Deja Dup if you already run desktop backups. Use Tink if you run Linux servers and want a mechanic.
| Feature | Tink | Deja Dup |
|---|---|---|
| Setup time | 30 seconds (one curl | sh command) | Hours — deja-dup-preferences, a remote or folder, encryption, then a host that still has no mechanic after the last deja-dup --backup exits 0 |
| What you get | Working monitoring, diagnosis, and approved fixes | Periodic duplicity archives and a GTK window. Disk fill, nginx, Postgres, and certs stay your problem until you SSH past deja-dup --backup |
| Pricing | Free (Scout) / $9 / $29 per machine per month | GPL and free. You still pay the person who owns the VPS after the last backup still shows Success |
| Hidden costs | None — fully managed | A quiet deja-dup-monitor, a healthy archive that is not host fill, and a second tool to tell you the box is sick while deja-dup --backup still looks Success |
| Monitoring approach | Agent on the server — CPU, disk, services, logs, certs, ports | Folders, schedules, and duplicity chains. Deja Dup does not watch a quiet cert or host auth.log after the last archive landed |
| Configuration | None after install — heuristics and AI | gsettings org.gnome.DejaDup, include/exclude folders, encryption, and which desktop session actually pages you |
| Plain-English diagnosis | Yes — AI explains root cause, impact, and fix | You read deja-dup --backup, then SSH into the host to change the Linux box Deja Dup already sits on |
| Fix execution | Proposes and executes approved commands with an audit trail | Retry deja-dup --backup — Deja Dup cannot free host disk, rotate a cert, or stop SSH brute-force unless you restore the whole tree |
| Alerting | Built-in across 8 channels | Not a Deja Dup job — desktop notifications plus a separate monitoring tool have to fire |
| Predictive alerts | Yes — disk fills in ~6 days, memory and CPU trends | Not a Deja Dup job — a backup comment does not forecast a quiet host filling up |
| SSH brute-force detection | Built-in — parses auth.log every scan | Never — Deja Dup does not read host auth.log, journald, or firewall state after the last archive landed |
| Machine offline detection | Agent presence monitoring with multi-channel alerts | Silence if the guest dies after the last Success backup — unless you built a separate uptime check |
| Public status page | Shareable URL with 90-day history | None — Deja Dup has no customer-facing status page for the Linux host |
| Weekly fleet digest | Automated Monday digest + daily brief when issues are open | None — a deja-dup --backup recap is not a plain-English fleet narrative |
| On-call tracking | Built-in /oncall command + incident acknowledgment | Not included — wire failed deja-dup --backup into PagerDuty or another incident tool |
| Conversation interface | Telegram, WhatsApp, web dashboard, CLI | deja-dup-preferences and SSH. No mechanic you text when /var filled and the last backup still showed Success |
| Learning curve | None — works after install | Steep — duplicity chains, gsettings, deja-dup-monitor, and which failure is Deja Dup vs the running host |
| Best for | Freelancers, small teams, accidental sysadmins (1-50 Linux servers) | Teams that already run Deja Dup for desktop backups, not a sick-VPS mechanic |
When Deja Dup is the right choice
Keep using Deja Dup when you already want that exact job:
- Desktop duplicity archives — you need deja-dup-preferences, encrypted chains, and deja-dup --backup, not a mechanic.
- An existing GNOME backup schedule — include folders and deja-dup-monitor matter more than guest nginx, certs, and SSH on a quiet VPS.
- An existing lab or nested setup — Deja Dup already runs, the archive already ships, and someone owns the destination disk.
- Hosts that only page on backup death — you already run Deja Dup notifications, not a sick-box SSH loop.
The real cost of “just watch deja-dup --backup”
Deja Dup takes duplicity archives and restore points. A working ops loop for five Linux boxes is not:
- A healthy Success backup still means you SSH into the host and change the box by hand when it gets sick later
- Host fill, nginx, certs, and SSH brute-force never appear unless a separate tool scraped those signals and a rule fired
- A filling /var is a Tink disk warning on every scan — Deja Dup will stay quiet until the next backup fails
- A single VPS with a dead agent still needs a mechanic, not another archive comment
For a 5-server team, Tink Mechanic at $45/month is cheaper than the engineer who keeps failed-backup notifications alive after a Deja Dup install, and every scan includes a diagnosis a quiet deja-dup --backup Success will not type.
No deja-dup-preferences homework. No silent host. One command install.
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