Backups

Author: John M. Gabriele | back to index

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Three easy options

Here's three really simple ways to get started making backups:

rsync

Probably the easiest way to backup a directory is to just use rsync. For example, here's a simple one-liner to recursively mirror a local directory to somewhere else: 

rsync -urzv --delete ~/my/stuff someone@bar.com:somedir

tar files over ssh

Steps to follow:

  1. ssh to the machine which has the files you want backed up.
  2. cd to where the files are under.
  3. tar cvzf - dir_to_backup | ssh machine_to_backup_to 'cat - > /path/to/foo.SOME-ID.tar.gz'

tar sends its output to stdout, and ssh takes its input for the cat command from stdin. It works nicely. This method has the added benefit of not taking up space for the tar.gz file on the machine you're backing up from.

A short script

If you like, you can use something as simple as: 

#!/bin/bash
#
# This script will overwrite any existing ~/bkup.tar.gz

cd
pwd

stuff="\
.bashrc \
.mozilla/firefox/whatever.default/bookmarks.html \
bin \
code_templates \
dev \
docs \
perllib \
websites \
work"

echo "Stuff to backup: $stuff"
echo ''

tar cf bkup.tar $stuff
echo
echo "Here's how much room all that stuff takes up on-disk:"
du -hs $stuff
echo ''
ls -lh bkup.tar
echo "gzipping it up..."
gzip bkup.tar
ls -lh bkup.tar.gz
echo ''
echo "Done creating backup file. Now copy it somewhere safe."

A little bit more

For something a little fancier, you might have a look at rsnapshot.