Use "utf8" encoding in takesnapshot.log (was: UnicodeEncodeError)

[geoff-goldman]

Hi, new install on an RPI3B running Debian Trixie.

When running backintime backup the following error occurs:

root@raspberrypi3-01:~# backintime backup

Back In Time
Version: 1.5.5

Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.
This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it
under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details.

INFO: Lock
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/backintime.py", line 1335, in <module>
    startApp()
    ~~~~~~~~^^
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/backintime.py", line 585, in startApp
    args.func(args)
    ~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/backintime.py", line 852, in backup
    ret = takeSnapshot(cfg, force)
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/backintime.py", line 100, in takeSnapshot
    ret = snapshots.Snapshots(cfg).backup(force)
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/snapshots.py", line 827, in backup
    self.setTakeSnapshotMessage(0, '\u2026')
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/snapshots.py", line 182, in setTakeSnapshotMessage
    self.snapshotLog.append('[I] ' + message, 3)
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/share/backintime/common/snapshotlog.py", line 241, in append
    self.logFile.write(msg + '\n')
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^
UnicodeEncodeError: 'latin-1' codec can't encode character '\u2026' in position 4: ordinal not in range(256)

If additional info is required please let me know.

Thanks,

Geoff

[buhtz]

Hello geoff,

Thank you for taking the time to report the bug and providing the
details. I appreciate your feedback.

I am closing your issue because it is a duplicate of #2288.
The issue is fixed in version 1.5.6.

In context of Debian you can help a lot if you would report to this Debian ticket. The package maintainer is not very responsive. Maybe it will help if another user refresh that report.

If you have any more details to share, feel free to reach out.

Best regards,
Christian

#2288

[geoff-goldman]

Hi Christian, Thanks for the quick response. I looked at 2288 but I didn't see any mention or reference to a UnicodeEncodeError. I was chasing it as a possible LANG environment issue. Geoff Geoff Goldman ***@***.*** (C) 845.797.5011

…

On Tue, Nov 11, 2025 at 3:52 PM Christian Buhtz ***@***.***> wrote: *buhtz* left a comment (bit-team/backintime#2298) <#2298 (comment)> Hello geoff, Thank you for taking the time to report the bug and providing the details. I appreciate your feedback. I am closing your issue because it is a duplicate of #2288 <#2288>. The issue is fixed in version 1.5.6. In context of Debian you can help a lot if you would report to this Debian ticket <https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1117254>. The package maintainer is not very responsive. Maybe it will help if another user refresh that report. If you have any more details to share, feel free to reach out. Best regards, Christian #2288 <#2288> — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#2298 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AEEAJBRBZV6T3ZIKHHCXFFT34JECPAVCNFSM6AAAAACLZS2A52VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTKMJYGY4DSOJQHA> . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[buhtz]

Hello Geoff,
please take my apologize. I was definitely wrong and shouldn't "triage" issues that late at night. 😪

It seems to me that the standard encoding on your Debian 13 is something like 'lating-1'. Am I right?

• Please post the output of locale or check the environment (via env) for variables LANG and LC_*.
• Which Debian image do you used for your Pi? raspi.debian.net?
• Which language and locale settings do you used via installing Debian?
• Please post the output of backintime --debug.

Thanks
Christian

[geoff-goldman]

Hi Christian, no worries - can't rush an artist :-). Well now, your question about the image is a good question. It's the official Raspberry Pi OS - generated with the (Windows) Pi Imager - per /etc/os-release (and lsb_release) it says it's Debian 13.1 - but I'm not totally sure how it might diverge from a pure Debian download. I discovered that initially the LANG locale was just en_US and the en_US.UTF8 locale did not exist , so I ran dpkg-reconfigure locales (the same as going in through raspi-config) and generated the en_US.UTF-8 for the LANG environment variable. None of the other LAN*. LC* variables are set to that though. # cat /etc/locale.conf # File generated by update-locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LC_ALL=en_US LANGUAGE=en_US # env | grep -E 'LANG|LC' LANGUAGE=en_US LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LC_ALL=en_US # locale (truncated) ... LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=en_US LC_CTYPE="en_US" LC_NUMERIC="en_US" LC_TIME="en_US" LC_COLLATE="en_US" LC_MONETARY="en_US" LC_MESSAGES="en_US" LC_PAPER="en_US" LC_NAME="en_US" LC_ADDRESS="en_US" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US" LC_ALL=en_US ... After changing the LANG variable it still failed. I uninstalled and reinstalled backintime(-common, -qt) and it still exhibited the same errors. Not very scientific though. ***@***.***:~# backintime --debug DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:668 argParse] Argument(s) used: {'debug': True, 'quiet': False} DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:565 startApp] backintime: {'name': 'Back In Time', 'version': '1.5.5', 'running-as-root': True}; host-setup: {'OS': {'/etc/os-release': 'Debian GNU/Linux 13 (trixie)', '/etc/debian_version': '13.1\n'}} Back In Time Version: 1.5.5 Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details. DEBUG: [common/configfile.py:585 Config.setCurrentProfile] Change current profile: 1=Main profile DEBUG: [common/tools.py:227 initiate_translation] No language code. Use systems current locale. DEBUG: [common/tools.py:242 initiate_translation] Language code used: "en" DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:754 getConfig] config file: "/root/.config/backintime/config"; share path: "/root/.local/share/backintime"; profiles: "1=Main profile" ==== I just installed backintime on a Debian VM that I'd just finished upgrading from 12 to 13 (anything for the cause). It seems to work fine. ***@***.***:~# backintime backup Back In Time Version: 1.5.5 Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details. INFO: Lock INFO: Take a new snapshot. Profile: 1 Main profile INFO: Call rsync to take the snapshot INFO: Save config file INFO: Save permissions INFO: Unlock ***@***.***:~# locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE= LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8" LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8" LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8" LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8" LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8" LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8" LC_ALL= On that VM the only line in locale.conf is LANG="en_US.UTF-8", however unlike the RPI build every (defined) locale L* variable is set to en_US.UTF-8. An educated guess would seem to be that that is an issue :-). I'm not at all sure a) how to change every one of those (other than define each one in the locale.conf file) and b) what will happen to the running RPI if I do. Geoff

…

On Tue, Nov 11, 2025 at 6:05 PM Christian Buhtz ***@***.***> wrote: *buhtz* left a comment (bit-team/backintime#2298) <#2298 (comment)> Hello Geoff, please take my apologize. I was definitely wrong and shouldn't "triage" issues that late at night. 😪 It seems to me that the standard encoding on your Debian 13 is something like 'lating-1'. Am I right? - Please post the output of locale or check the environment (via env) for variables LANG and LC_*. - Which Debian image do you used for your Pi? raspi.debian.net? - Which language and locale settings do you used via installing Debian? - Please post the output of backintime --debug. Thanks Christian — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#2298 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AEEAJBUG4JZBVFEOVDCUO3L34JTUVAVCNFSM6AAAAACLZS2A52VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTKMJZGA3DGOBZGM> . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[geoff-goldman]

Yeah, that's it. I'm just not sure how to properly make the changes. Many of the variables remained unchanged even after manually defining them - until I set LC_ALL - then they all suddenly reflected en_US.utf8. After that backintime ran ok: Trying to manually define and export the variables - only the first two reflected the change: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ***@***.***:~/scripts# locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=en_US.utf8 LC_CTYPE="en_US" LC_NUMERIC="en_US" LC_TIME="en_US" LC_COLLATE="en_US" LC_MONETARY="en_US" LC_MESSAGES="en_US" LC_PAPER="en_US" LC_NAME="en_US" LC_ADDRESS="en_US" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US" LC_ALL=en_US After exporting LC_ALL they all changed: ------------------------------------------------------ ***@***.***:~/scripts# export LC_ALL=en_US.utf8 ***@***.***:~/scripts# locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=en_US.utf8 LC_CTYPE="en_US.utf8" LC_NUMERIC="en_US.utf8" LC_TIME="en_US.utf8" LC_COLLATE="en_US.utf8" LC_MONETARY="en_US.utf8" LC_MESSAGES="en_US.utf8" LC_PAPER="en_US.utf8" LC_NAME="en_US.utf8" LC_ADDRESS="en_US.utf8" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.utf8" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.utf8" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.utf8" LC_ALL=en_US.utf8 And there you go: ***@***.***:~/scripts# backintime backup Back In Time Version: 1.5.5 Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details. INFO: Lock INFO: Take a new snapshot. Profile: 1 Main profile INFO: Call rsync to take the snapshot INFO: Save config file INFO: Save permissions INFO: Unlock ***@***.***:~# du -sBM /backups/backintime/raspberrypi3-01/root/1 82M /backups/backintime/raspberrypi3-01/root/1 ***@***.***:~# find /backups/backintime/raspberrypi3-01/root/1 -type f | wc -l 1847 [image: image.png] Any thoughts on how to properly redefine the required environment variables? Geoff

…

On Tue, Nov 11, 2025 at 7:16 PM Geoffrey Goldman ***@***.***> wrote: Hi Christian, no worries - can't rush an artist :-). Well now, your question about the image is a good question. It's the official Raspberry Pi OS - generated with the (Windows) Pi Imager - per /etc/os-release (and lsb_release) it says it's Debian 13.1 - but I'm not totally sure how it might diverge from a pure Debian download. I discovered that initially the LANG locale was just en_US and the en_US.UTF8 locale did not exist , so I ran dpkg-reconfigure locales (the same as going in through raspi-config) and generated the en_US.UTF-8 for the LANG environment variable. None of the other LAN*. LC* variables are set to that though. # cat /etc/locale.conf # File generated by update-locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LC_ALL=en_US LANGUAGE=en_US # env | grep -E 'LANG|LC' LANGUAGE=en_US LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LC_ALL=en_US # locale (truncated) ... LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=en_US LC_CTYPE="en_US" LC_NUMERIC="en_US" LC_TIME="en_US" LC_COLLATE="en_US" LC_MONETARY="en_US" LC_MESSAGES="en_US" LC_PAPER="en_US" LC_NAME="en_US" LC_ADDRESS="en_US" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US" LC_ALL=en_US ... After changing the LANG variable it still failed. I uninstalled and reinstalled backintime(-common, -qt) and it still exhibited the same errors. Not very scientific though. ***@***.***:~# backintime --debug DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:668 argParse] Argument(s) used: {'debug': True, 'quiet': False} DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:565 startApp] backintime: {'name': 'Back In Time', 'version': '1.5.5', 'running-as-root': True}; host-setup: {'OS': {'/etc/os-release': 'Debian GNU/Linux 13 (trixie)', '/etc/debian_version': '13.1\n'}} Back In Time Version: 1.5.5 Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details. DEBUG: [common/configfile.py:585 Config.setCurrentProfile] Change current profile: 1=Main profile DEBUG: [common/tools.py:227 initiate_translation] No language code. Use systems current locale. DEBUG: [common/tools.py:242 initiate_translation] Language code used: "en" DEBUG: [common/backintime.py:754 getConfig] config file: "/root/.config/backintime/config"; share path: "/root/.local/share/backintime"; profiles: "1=Main profile" ==== I just installed backintime on a Debian VM that I'd just finished upgrading from 12 to 13 (anything for the cause). It seems to work fine. ***@***.***:~# backintime backup Back In Time Version: 1.5.5 Back In Time comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; type `backintime --license' for details. INFO: Lock INFO: Take a new snapshot. Profile: 1 Main profile INFO: Call rsync to take the snapshot INFO: Save config file INFO: Save permissions INFO: Unlock ***@***.***:~# locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8 LANGUAGE= LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8" LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8" LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8" LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8" LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8" LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8" LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8" LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8" LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8" LC_ALL= On that VM the only line in locale.conf is LANG="en_US.UTF-8", however unlike the RPI build every (defined) locale L* variable is set to en_US.UTF-8. An educated guess would seem to be that that is an issue :-). I'm not at all sure a) how to change every one of those (other than define each one in the locale.conf file) and b) what will happen to the running RPI if I do. Geoff On Tue, Nov 11, 2025 at 6:05 PM Christian Buhtz ***@***.***> wrote: > *buhtz* left a comment (bit-team/backintime#2298) > <#2298 (comment)> > > Hello Geoff, > please take my apologize. I was definitely wrong and shouldn't "triage" > issues that late at night. 😪 > > It seems to me that the standard encoding on your Debian 13 is something > like 'lating-1'. Am I right? > > - Please post the output of locale or check the environment (via env) > for variables LANG and LC_*. > - Which Debian image do you used for your Pi? raspi.debian.net? > - Which language and locale settings do you used via installing > Debian? > - Please post the output of backintime --debug. > > Thanks > Christian > > — > Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub > <#2298 (comment)>, > or unsubscribe > <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AEEAJBUG4JZBVFEOVDCUO3L34JTUVAVCNFSM6AAAAACLZS2A52VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTKMJZGA3DGOBZGM> > . > You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: > ***@***.***> >

[geoff-goldman]

Ok, so I just edited /etc/locale.conf and changed the variables listed there to UTF-8:

File generated by update-locale

LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8
LANGUAGE=en_US.UTF-8

It survived an update-locale and a reboot and all the variables are correct. Not sure what other system updates might do to it though. I re-tested both the command line and GUI and both seem to work properly.

Not sure if that's the correct way to address it but it seems to work. Now to see if everything else on that system still works.

Geoff

[buhtz]

Hello Geoff,

RasperryPi OS is not Debian, but Debian based. That is an important difference.

I haven't asked to change the variables. I only asked for their values because of diagnosis. Anyway. "LC_ALL" is one of the problems because it kind of overwrites all the other variables. This might the behavior you described.

In context of BIT the problem here is that it can not handle such simple environment problems and crushing itself. I will fix it and force BIT to use utf-8 encoding in all circumstances.

Thanks again for reporting.
Regards,
Christian