I do this too, and am surprised not to see more recommendations for it. It's simpler than a traditional full system backup, lessens security risks like copying

I do this too, and am surprised not to see more recommendations for it. It's simpler than a traditional full system backup, lessens security risks like copying credentials into a backup, and IMO keeps things better organized as well. I know Dropbox or git repos are just syncing the files I care about, in a way that I want them organized and can browse on a web interface, on mobile, sync to another device even if it doesn't have all the same software installed, etc. Whereas with a full system backup, there's not always a clear line between system configuration and data files, so depending what apps you're using the data that you're backing up might only be able to be accessed again on an exact copy of the machine running all the same versions of the same apps, which is often not what I actually want.