Lindesk

So far, we covered backing up files locally and over a network. Now let let see how to backup databases(only mysql supported – yet).

The script uses ‘mysqldump’ command to backup the data. That means that the backups are in the SQL dump format. The dumps of all the databases that are backed up are compressed and stored in the destination folder. They will be named in this format – YYYY-MM-DD.tar.gz.

Configuration File

This script reads a configuration file named ‘dbbackup.config’ and backups all the databases specified in that file to another location in the same system. This configuration file must be in the same folder as the perl script. The configuration file format is given below…

Data
Project_Nexty
App_activecollab
# Unwanted_DB - commented - will not be backedup
binco
binnyva

The Perl Script

#!/usr/bin/perl
# Backups all the databases specified in the dbbackup.config file

$backup_folder = '/var/Backup/Special/Databases'; #EDIT THIS LINE

use File::Basename;
my $config_file = dirname($0) . "/dbbackup.config";
my @databases = removeComments(getFileContents($config_file));

chdir($backup_folder) or die("Cannot go to folder '$backup_folder'");

my ($sec,$min,$hour,$mday,$mon,$year,$wday,$yday,$isdst) = localtime(time);
$year += 1900;
$mon++;
#Zero padding
$mday = '0'.$mday if ($mday<10);
$mon = '0'.$mon if ($mon<10);

my $folder = "$year-$mon-$mday";
mkdir($folder) or die("Cannot create a folder called '$folder'");

foreach my $database (@databases) {
	next if ($database eq '');
	chomp($database);
	
	my $table = '';
	if(index($database,' ')+1) { #Get just 1 table in the database - if there is a ' '(space) in the db name
		my @parts = split(' ',$database);
		$database = $parts[0];
		$table = $parts[1];
	}
	
	print "Backing up $database ... ";

 	my $file = $database;
 	$file .= '_' . $table if($table ne '');
 	$file .= ".sql";
 	
 	`mysqldump -u root $database $table > $folder/$file`;

	print "Done\n";
}
print "Compressing the folder ... ";
`tar -czf $folder.tar.gz $folder/`;
print "Done\nRemoving Folder ... ";
`rm -rf $folder`;
print "Done\n\n";


sub getFileContents {
	my $file = shift;
	open (FILE,$file) || die("Can't open '$file': $!");
	my @lines=<FILE>;
	close(FILE);
	
	return @lines;
}

sub removeComments {
	my @lines = @_;

	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*#/, @lines); #Remove Comments
	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*$/, @cleaned); #Remove Empty lines

	return @cleaned;
}

If you need, you can set this script as a cron job – this will make sure that you don’t have to worry about the backup.

This script will backup the specified files to another computer on your network. You can also use this to send your files to a remote server. This script compliments the last Rsync Backup script. Its possible to combine both the script together, I prefer to keep them separate.

The Setup

For this to work, you need to have a password-less login system over ssh. You should configure the remote system to accept your credentials by giving your public key to the remote server. If you are not sure how to do that, just leave a comment and I’ll make a post on how to set it up.

The configuration file is the same format as the one used in the last Rsync script. But in this case, the file name will be ‘rsyncnetworkbackup.config‘.

The Code

#!/usr/bin/perl

#The folder on the remote system that must be used to store the data
$backup_folder = '/home/neo/Backup'; #Final '/' must NOT be there.
# The user for whom we have set up the key based login
$backup_user = 'neo';
# The IP address/domain name of the remote system.
$backup_server = '192.168.0.30';

use File::Basename;
my $config_file = dirname($0) . "/rsyncnetworkbackup.config";
my @all_locations = removeComments(getFileContents($config_file));

foreach my $folder_locations (@all_locations) {
	my($folder,$backup_location) = split(/\s+/,$folder_locations);
	
	print "Backing up $folder to $backup_location ... ";
	`rsync -avze ssh $folder $backup_user\@$backup_server:\"$backup_folder/$backup_location\"`;
	print "Done\n";
}

sub getFileContents {
	my $file = shift;
	my @lines;
	
	open (FILE,$file) || die("Can't open '$file': $!");

	@lines=<FILE>;
	close(FILE);
	return @lines;
}


sub removeComments {
	my @lines = @_;

	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*#/, @lines); #Remove Comments
	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*$/, @cleaned); #Remove Empty lines

	return @cleaned;
}

All programmers have their own customized backup solutions. I have six. Yes, six! Five to backup files and one to backup database tables. And I am not counting version control or other backup systems built into the tools I use. Anyway, in the first post of the shell scripts series, let me introduce you to my Rsync based local backup solution.

Configuration File

This script reads a configuration file named ‘rsyncbackup.config’ and backups all the folders specified in that file to another location in the same system. This configuration file must be in the same folder as the perl script. The configuration file format is given below…

#Notes - do NOT include the last '/' at the end of the source folders
~/Scripts
~/Documents

#################### Web files ####################
# My Sites
#Folder to backup		#Folder to which it should be backuped to
/var/www/html/Sites		Htdocs/
/var/www/html/Projects	Htdocs/

If there is just one column in a line, that folder will be backuped to “<backup folder>/<folder name>“. Let say that my backup destination folder is ‘/var/Backup/Rsync‘. So the first line, ‘~/Scripts‘ will copy the contents of ‘~/Scripts‘ to ‘/var/Backup/Rsync/Scripts‘

If a line in the configuration file has two columns, then an extra folder will be created with the name provided in the second column. For example, the line ‘/var/www/html/Sites     Htdocs/‘ will create a backup of ‘/var/www/html/Sites‘ in ‘/var/Backup/Rsync/Htdocs/Sites‘

And if you have not guessed it already, all lines that begin in a # are comments and will be ignored.

The Script

There is the perl script that automates the rsync calls…

#!/usr/bin/perl

#EDIT THIS LINE
$backup_folder = '/var/Backup/Rsync'; #Final '/' must NOT be there.

use File::Basename;
my $config_file = dirname($0) . "/rsyncbackup.config";
my @all_locations = removeComments(getFileContents($config_file));

chdir($backup_folder) or die("Cannot go to folder '$backup_folder'");

foreach my $folder_locations (@all_locations) {
	my($folder,$backup_location) = split(/\s+/,$folder_locations);

	print "Backing up $folder to $backup_location ... ";
	`rsync -a $folder $backup_folder/$backup_location`;
	print "Done\n";
}

sub getFileContents {
	my $file = shift;
	my @lines;
	if(!open (FILE,$file)) {
		die("Can't open '$file': $!");
	} else {
		@lines=<FILE>;
		close(FILE);
	}
	return @lines;
}

sub removeComments {
	my @lines = @_;

	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*#/, @lines); #Remove Comments
	@cleaned = grep(!/^\s*$/, @cleaned); #Remove Empty lines

	return @cleaned;
}

Execute this script using the command ‘perl RsyncBackup.pl’. In my system I have created an alias ‘bk’ for this script. I recommend that you make a similar alias if you take backups regularly(extremely recommended).

Backing up is done using rsync – so its faster than a simple ‘cp’ as only the modified and new files are copied.