How To Back Up a Web Server
Q. I'm using Red Hat Enterprise Linux based Apache web server. How do I backup my Apache webserver, MySQL and PostgreSQL database to another disk called /backup and then copy it to other offsite backup ssh server called backup.example.com?
A. There are many tools under Linux / UNIX to backup a webserver. You can create a simple shell script to backup everything to /backup directory. You can also copy /backup directory content offsite using ssh and scp tool.
Step # 1: Create /root/backup.sh script
Use the following shell script (download link):
#!/bin/bash # A Simple Shell Script to Backup Red Hat / CentOS / Fedora / Debian / Ubuntu Apache Webserver and SQL Database # Path to backup directories DIRS="/home/vivek/ /var/www/html/ /etc" # Store todays date NOW=$(date +"%F") # Store backup path BACKUP="/backup/$NOW" # Backup file name hostname.time.tar.gz BFILE="$(hostname).$(date +'%T').tar.gz" PFILE="$(hostname).$(date +'%T').pg.sql.gz" MFILE="$(hostname).$(date +'%T').mysql.sq.gz" # Set Pgsql username PGSQLUSER="vivek" # Set MySQL username and password MYSQLUSER="vivek" MYSQLPASSWORD="myPassword" # Remote SSH server setup SSHSERVER="backup.example.com" # your remote ssh server SSHUSER="vivek" # username SSHDUMPDIR="/backup/remote" # remote ssh server directory to store dumps # Paths for binary files TAR="/bin/tar" PGDUMP="/usr/bin/pg_dump" MYSQLDUMP="/usr/bin/mysqldump" GZIP="/bin/gzip" SCP="/usr/bin/scp" SSH="/usr/bin/ssh" LOGGER="/usr/bin/logger" # make sure backup directory exists [ ! -d $BACKUP ] && mkdir -p ${BACKUP} # Log backup start time in /var/log/messages $LOGGER "$0: *** Backup started @ $(date) ***" # Backup websever dirs $TAR -zcvf ${BACKUP}/${BFILE} "${DIRS}" # Backup PgSQL $PGDUMP -x -D -U${PGSQLUSER} | $GZIP -c > ${BACKUP}/${PFILE} # Backup MySQL $MYSQLDUMP -u ${MYSQLUSER} -h localhost -p${MYSQLPASSWORD} --all-databases | $GZIP -9 > ${BACKUP}/${MFILE} # Dump all local files to failsafe remote UNIX ssh server / home server $SSH ${SSHUSER}@${SSHSERVER} mkdir -p ${SSHDUMPDIR}/${NOW} $SCP -r ${BACKUP}/* ${SSHUSER}@${SSHSERVER}:${SSHDUMPDIR}/${NOW} # Log backup end time in /var/log/messages $LOGGER "$0: *** Backup Ended @ $(date) ***"
Customize it according to your needs, set username, password, ssh settings and other stuff.
Step # 2: Create ssh keys
Create ssh keys for password less login from your server to another offsite server hosted at your own home or another datacenter. See following faqs for more information:
- Howto Linux / UNIX setup SSH with DSA public key authentication (password less login)
- SSH Public key based authentication - Howto
Step #3: Create Cron job
Setup a cronjob to backup server everyday, enter:
# crontab -e
Append following code to backup server everyday at midnight:
@midnight /root/backup.sh
Further readings:
Subscribe to our free e-mail newsletter or RSS feed to get all updates.
You can Email this page to a friend.
Related Other Helpful FAQs:
- What you need to back up on Linux to recover
- Hide the Apache Web Server Version number with ServerSignature and ServerTokens directives
- Howto Display text files in a shell script
- How to: Linux display remote X application over telnet session
- How to Linux re apply or restore SELinux security labels context
Discussion on This FAQ
Leave a Reply
We encourage your comments, and suggestions. But please stay on topic, be polite, and avoid spam. Thank you very much for stopping by our site!
Tags: Apache, apache web, backup directory, backup file, backup log, backup mysql, backup red hat, backup server, Linux, UNIX, web server
August 2nd, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 12:55 pm
Excellent and simple to the point.
August 2nd, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 4:15 pm
superb man… a marvellous script.
August 2nd, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 6:43 pm
Nice script. Are you concerned about pwd in plaintext? Falisafe should be Failsafe in comment
We use a combo for daily and monthly, system and user. And use tape and disk. We looked at DVD UDF packet writing format, but decided against it.
Depending on your needs ZAmanda is very nice. Like any product the configuration took a little to understand, but it wasn’t bad, and I believe they also have a GUI now. We liked it over Baccula because it uses tar or dump.
http://www.zmanda.com/
I didn’t find the O’Reilly book, “Backup and Recovery” very helpful. It’s too high level, and the good stuff is all on their website or available online elsewhere.
August 2nd, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 6:50 pm
Are you concerned about pwd in plaintext?
Not much.. if attacker can read my script password, he/she has full access to system. There is no simple solution for password. Usually, I lockdown httpd, named, other service is jail. Continues monitoring and patching prevents lots of bad stuff.
HTH
August 3rd, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 4:24 pm
Excelent Notes.. Vivek
resync command will be best if you have limited bandwidth on backup server.
Also lftp is also support to incremental backup in between the linux servers which support only ftp access in to it.
August 4th, 2008 (4 weeks ago) at 2:59 pm
Concise and useful, a well written script.
Thanks for the effort.