system: snapshot default names and other ideas

[fichtner]

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Now that snapshots are in 24.7.3 and received a last minute change as ebf2b587c63 the debate about the "best" default naming are open.

The ISO date is probably great, but we don't really need the time unless we want to make it unique but the chances are if someone has two snapshots in the same second the second one doesn't need to be created, which naturally fails. However, when that second has passed the value of the next snapshot is equally debatable.

Daily backups are nice and people doing multiple backups per day probably want to annotate their changes more than just timestamps for visibility reasons. The nice thing is that during boot we know what we booted on the console:

Something like this should probably be in the dashboard as well. Now back to the topic: The second half of the default snapshot name is probably best used from the currently installed opnsense package so e.g.:

2024-08-29-24.7.1_2

The leading ISO date mostly caters to a sane ability to sort the list. The version gives enough clues about what to expect from the snapshot away from the date (and you can see the creation date for the snapshot anyway).

Other thoughts? @sheridans @AdSchellevis @swhite2 @Monviech @pmhausen and everyone else

TODO:

• [ ] Change default snapshot name
• [ ] Remove automatic snapshot naming from bectl.py
• [ ] Look at how the boot menu works vs. how it could work
• [ ] Sane way for automation in the future
• [ ] Consider cron-based snapshots and what their names would be then....
• [ ] Auto-cleanup?!
• [ ] Upgrade (major) and update (minor) hooks usefulness and scriptability
• [ ] Discuss "N" and "R" nomenclature and why we are now showing a real text instead, maybe as separate columns

[Monviech]

I like date+version

[ronin3510]

I was wondering if having an indication of whether the system is applying updates from Regular/Generaly Available vs Snapshots/Development would be helpful, especially when testing things and moving back and forth between BEs

2024-08-29-R-24.7.1_2 vs 2024-08-S-29-24.7.1_2 or 2024-08-29-D-24.7.1_2

[AdSchellevis]

I prefer simplicity and uniqueness to be honest, in which case the timestamp prevents multiple snapshots on the same day overlapping each other. When the version stays the same and someone want to test different types of settings or packages, it's convenient that defaults don't automatically overlap.

Remember, it's just a default, people can change the name any way they like manually...