OpenVetSimScripts

A repository for file management scripts made for OpenVetSim

Introduction

These scripts were designed for use with the OpenVetSim project made by Cornell.

Purpose

These scripts perform two simple tasks

1. Delete Old Videos

The videos made by VetSim take up a lot of space. It would be nice to delete them after a specified amount of time. That's what this script does. The time is adjustable from inside the script

2. Copy videos to an external device

Non-technical faculty members wanted a way to easily get the videos onto their computer without having to manually copy them over every time. Since VetSim doesn't allow you to change the video storage location, I wrote a script to periodically copy new files an external flash drive or USB.

Requirements

These scripts are designed to be run as systemd services on linux (the VetSim pc runs Ubuntu)

The Scripts

1. vetsim_delete_old_videos

This script deletes old videos from their default location on the vetsim PC.

    #!/bin/bash

#################################
# vetsim_delete_old_videos      #
# Written by David Rhoads       #
# December 13, 2019             #
#################################

# https://github.com/kd2flz/OpenVetSimScripts 

#Script to delete old video files
#Replace /path/to/directory with actual path to video folder.
#Be sure folder is actually there before running the script
#-mtime checks the time since the last modification of the file
#-type -f tells the program it should look at files
#-delete tells the program to delete the files (surprise :-))

echo "This program deletes files older than a specified date at a specified location."
while true
do
    find '/path/to/directory' -mtime +30 -type f -delete
    sleep 30
done

2. vetsim_copy_video_files

This script copies videos to an external device. This is useful if you want to store the videos on an external hard drive

#!/bin/bash

#################################
# vetsim_copy_video_files       #
# Written by David Rhoads       #
# December 13, 2019             #
#################################

# https://github.com/kd2flz/OpenVetSimScripts 

#This script copies video files from a specified location to another specified location
#It can be set to continuously scan the folder for new files
#I would reccomend installing grsync (sudo apt install grsync), and using it's built in dry run feature to generate the correct script
#However, if you feel confident, you can also modify the below script to reflect the correct paths for your device

echo "This program copies files from a specified folder on your hard drive to an external device."
while true
    do
       rsync -r -t -v --progress --ignore-existing --modify-window=1 -z -s /home/david/Pictures /'media/username/devicename/folder'
        #Change the number after sleep to reflect the number of seconds you want the script to wait before running rsync again
        sleep 10
    done

Using Rsync

This script uses rsync to sync new files to the device. It periodically runs the rsync command. The frequency the command is run can be changed by changing the number after sleep.

I would recomend installing the gui wrapper for rsync - grsync, as it allows you to select the correct folders and files, and a myriad of other options, and then generates the correct rsync command for you (I haven't found a way to automate grsync itself yet, if you know of one, please let me know.)

You can install grsync with

sudo apt install grsync

If you're a command line junkie, and the mere thought of using the gui gives you the heebie jeebies, have no fear, rsync can be installed by

sudo apt install rsync

I take no responsibility for anything that happens if you use plain old rsync. However, the rsync man page may be of some help https://linux.die.net/man/1/rsync.

Setting up the scripts as a service

This section is currently in development. My initial thought was to make the scripts executable and then just set them to run on startup from Ubuntu's graphical "startup applications" utility. Howmsoever (I know that's not a word), this does not seem to be working.

I will continue to test this. However, my plan B is to make a systemd service that automatically runs these scripts.

Currently I've got this working on a flash drive formatted as NTFS. I'm not sure why FAT is not working but NTFS should work fine with Windows, so it should be OK.

Creating the systemd service for deleting old files

Open a terminal using [ctrl][alt][T] (some linux distributions use [Super][T] instead).

Type cd /etc/systemd/system to change into the systemd directory.

To create the actual service, you must first switch to the vet account because vitals is not in the sudoers file

su vet

Next enter the password for vet which is vet.

Next, type the following:

sudo nano vetsim_delete_videos.service

The nano text editor should open in the terminal. Paste the following into the terminal by using right click and paste:

[Unit]
Description=delete old vetsim videos service
After=network.target
StartLimitIntervalSec=0
[Service]
Type=simple
Restart=always
RestartSec=1
User=vet
ExecStart=/home/vitals/Desktop/VetSimScripts/vetsim_delete_old_videos

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Make sure to the service reflect the username and home directory of the correct user (in this case vitals) Turn on the service using

sudo systemctl start vetsim_delete_videos.service

Enable the service to run on boot:

sudo systemctl enable vetsim_delete_videos.service

Creating the systemd service for copying files