import shutil from datetime import datetime import os daily_dir = "/media/hd/cloud/Tilman/Computer/selective-backups/daily/" weekly_dir = "" monthly_dir = "" basedir = "/media/hd/cloud/" filelist = "/media/hd/cloud/Tilman/Computer/selective-backups/filelist.txt" now = datetime.now() date_time = now.strftime("%Y-%m-%d_") with open(filelist) as file: lines = [line.rstrip() for line in file] for line in lines: #f_basename = os.path.basename(line) target_filename = date_time + line.replace("/","|") + ".tar.gz" print(target_filename) src_path = basedir + line src_file = os.path.basename(src_path) src_dir = os.path.dirname(src_path) print(src_dir) shutil.make_archive(daily_dir + target_filename, 'gztar', src_dir, src_file) #os.path.basename #shutil.make_archive(output_filename, 'zip', dir_name)