We utilize three methods for backups:

• Tape for storage connected to the HPC
• rsync for files not stored on the HPC (other websites, etc)
• BackupPC for files on users' desktops

Example scripts to be used on ILRI servers for automated backup and maintenance of data. Most should be configured to run via cron, usually as root. Make sure that any critical scripts are protected by changing the permissions to 700 so only root can read them.

To add a cron entry, edit root's cron tab:

$ sudo crontab -e

… to contain the following lines:

# Backup the MySQL database at 12:13 every night
13 0 * * * /home/backup/scripts/backup_mysql.sh

Which will run the script every night at 12:13.

This script will dump a given database to a mysql folder in the specified backup directory. Make sure the backup directory and the mysql subdirectory exist.

#!/bin/sh

BACKUP_DIR=/home/backup
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d)

mysqldump --opt -u root -p'yourpassword' databasename | bzip2 -c > ${BACKUP_DIR}/mysql/databasename_${DATE}.sql.bz2

exit 0

This script will dump a given database to a postgres folder in the specified backup directory. Make sure the backup directory and the postgres subdirectory exist.

#!/bin/sh

# set the user's Postgres password in the variable because we are
# not using pg_dump interactively, so we can't type it in!
export PGPASSWORD="database password"

# Grab the current date and save it to the DATE variable.
# February 22, 2010 would look like this: 20100222
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d)

# Backup the PostgreSQL dspace database at 12:15 every night
/usr/bin/pg_dump -b -v -o --format=custom -U user /home/backup/postgres/database_${DATE}.backup database

exit 0

This script will search the specified backup directory for backup files older than 2 weeks and delete them. Make sure you don't delete backup scripts or non-backup files (directories, maybe?).

#!/bin/sh

BACKUP_DIR="/home/backup"

# Find files older than 2 weeks and delete them
find ${BACKUP_DIR} -type f \! -newermt "2 weeks ago" \! -name "*.sh" -exec rm {} \;

exit 0