How to backup the remote files in Linux / UNIX

Q. How do I make remote backups under Linux? I’ve CentOS 5 Linux server located in remote data center and I’d like to backup it to local or another server?

A. Both Linux / UNIX come with handy tools to make secure remote backups. You can use tool called rsync for automating remote backups of your Linux, UNIX, Windows server, Mac OS X and BSD systems. rsync is a program with many more options and uses the rsync remote-update protocol to greatly speed up file transfers when the destination file is being updated.

Task: Copy files / backup files from remote Linux server

Let us say you would like to backup files from remote server called server.nixcraft.in and directory called /home/vivek to local directory called /backup, type the command as follows on local system:
$ rsync -avz -e ssh vivek@server.nixcraft.in:/home/vivek/ /backup
You need to supply password for vivek user.

Task: Exclude files from backup

You can also skip few files from backup. Let us say you don't want to backup all C source code file, enter:
$ rsync --exclude '*.cpp' -avz -e ssh vivek@server.nixcraft.in:/home/vivek/ /backup

Task: Automatic backup using a shell script

SSH always prompts for a password. To automate process via a shell script you need to remove password using SSH key i.e. generate passphraseless keys, enter (type at local system):
$ ssh-keygen -t dsa
When asked for to enter passphrase, just press [ENTER] key twice. Now copy public key to remote server:
$ scp ~/.ssh/id_dsa.pub vivek@server.nixcraft.in:.ssh/authorized_keys
Now you can login without a password. For more information see - howto setup SSH with DSA public key authentication and RSA key authentication for password less login.

Now create a simple shell script as follows:
$ vi backup.sh
Append code:
#!/bin/bash rsync --exclude '*.cpp' --exclude '*.log' -avz -e ssh vivek@server.nixcraft.in:/home/vivek/ /backup
Setup executable permission using chmod command:
$ chmod +x backup.sh
Use cron to command to backup remote server:
$ crontab -e
Make a backup everyday:
@daily /path/to/backup.sh
Save and close the file.

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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Margie Ludlam February 2, 2008 at 11:21 pm: Hello,
Does using rsync to back up Linux/Unix allow open files backup?
Margie
2 matt June 9, 2008 at 6:05 am: Thanks so much for this script, I have a serveral web servers whose htdocs are finally safe.
I have a real few real estate sites with hundreds of thousands of images that I don’t need to back up, they come from the MLS depot every night. So, I tried excluding an entire directory, to my surporse, it works great, thought I would share.
--exclude '/unwanted_directory/'
Thanks again,
Matt
http://www.allnightit.com
3 IAmWEC October 24, 2011 at 2:56 am: Is there any way that I can, say, tar the files and save them with a different file name each day, then delete the oldest one after, say, a week or so?