I recently wrote this bash script for the purpose of a simple selective backup on one of our linux servers. It tars up a bunch of files and copies them to a windows / SMB server elsewhere on the network (where it is then backed up to tape as per everything else on that server). I know there are many different examples of this type of script on the interweb already, but someone might find this version helpful as well.
There seems to be a few different ways to get the SMB bit done but I ended up using smbfs: you’ll need this on your system for this script to work. If you don’t have it and you’re using a package manager it should be pretty simple to get, a bit of #apt-get install smbfs should do the trick.
Note: I am aware of various security issues with running scripts as root, storing passwords in scripts, and this sort of thing. Since this is a super simple backup script, I’m doing it anyway : Complaints department is /dev/null ;)
Script 1: this is a super simple version. It tars and copies some folders to the remote share and thats it.
#simple backup script
#by Glen Scott, glenscott.net
# set smb server and auth vars
sharename="//ourserver/ourshare"
username="ourdomain\ourbackupuser"
password="passwordgoeshere"
backuplocation="/backups/*"
savepath="/root/"
filename=$(hostname).backup.$(date +%a).tar
mountpoint="/mnt/smb"
#tar up the backup folder
tar -cf $savepath$filename $backuplocation
#connect to the share
mount.smbfs $sharename $mountpoint -o username=$username,password=$password
# move the tar
mv -f $savepath$filename $mountpoint
# disconnect the share
umount $mountpoint
#all done!
Script 2: this is the second version I made for another box. It needed a mysql database backed up as well so I added a few lines in for that. I also took the chance to add a quick working folders checker / creator, tidy it up a bit and comment everything.
# simple backup script
# by Glen Scott, glenscott.net
# this is a simple script to tar.gz certain folder locations and copy them to a SMB share
# this script should be run periodically from crontab
# you will need smbfs installed on your system or modify the samba mount method
# set smb server and auth vars
sharename="//ourserver/ourshare"
username="ourdomain\ourbackupuser"
password="passwordgoeshere"
#set mysql details
mysqlhost="localhost"
mysqlusername="root"
mysqlpasswd="mysqlpasswordhere"
#set which folder locations we want to backup, inc trailing slashes
#add more here and append to the appropriate tar line further down the script if needed
location1="/var/"
location2="/backup/"
#set temp files and folders
backuptemp="/backuptmp/"
savepath="/root/backup/"
filename=$(hostname).backup.$(date +%a).tar.gz
mountpoint="/mnt/smb"
# make sure our working folders are present and accounted for
if [ ! -d "${backuptemp}" ]
then
mkdir $backuptemp
fi
if [ ! -d "${savepath}" ]
then
mkdir $savepath
fi
if [ ! -d "${mountpoint}" ]
then
mkdir $mountpoint
fi
# tar up the files we want into the backup temp
tar -cf ${backuptemp}files.tar $location1 $location2
#dump the local mysql db into the backup temp
mysqldump "-h${mysqlhost}" "-u${mysqluser}" "-p${mysqlpasswd}" --all-databases --lock-tables > ${backuptemp}mysqldump.sql
#tar up the backup temp folder
tar -czf $savepath$filename $backuptemp
#connect the smb share to our mount point
mount.smbfs $sharename $mountpoint -o username=$username,password=$password
# copy the tar (could also move it but whatever you like)
cp -f $savepath$filename $mountpoint
# disconnect the share
umount $mountpoint
#all done
As long as you have smbfs installed, the above should work fine.
A word on smbfs: without it the above script will fail. You can probably install smbfs quite easily on your system with the command apt-get install smbfs (or yum if you’re using redhat/fedora, or whatever your flavor of package manager happens to be). I use debian, so apt-get works just fine for me.
A word on Crontab: You’ll need to add the script to your local cron to get regular backups.
I won’t go into hideous details about how crontab works, theres plenty of that on the net already. To keep it simple, if your distro supports it (most should) you can put a symlink to the script in /etc/cron.daily or /etc/cron.weekly which will give you a simple schedule.
If you want something a bit more complicated, you’ll have to mess with the crontab. I’m aware there are commands to get this done but I’ve always just edited the system crontab directly. Mine runs twice a week, on wednesdays and fridays, so my crontab line looks like this:
# m h dom mon dow user command 0 2 * * 3,5 root /root/backupscript
UPDATE: I notice a mutated version of this script has been posted in this forum thread over at linuxquestions.org – cool! Check it out over there if you want to see what someone else has done with it.
