vincios/rsync_script

Simple utility to automate rsync backup tasks

RSYNC backup script

This is a simple script to help to define multiple backup task to be executed with RSYNC.

Tasks are defined in a tasks.txt file, with a well defined syntax.

Once the script is executed, it simply reads tasks defined in the tasks.txt file and execute them.

Tasks syntax

Backup tasks are defined in a tasks.txt file. To summarize, a backup task is a block of lines with the following syntax.

-> source/path/
@ dest/path/
+included/path/
+included/file.txt
-exluded/path/
-excluded/file.txt
<-

In details, a task block:

1. MUST start with a start line

   -> /source/path/
   

2. MUST end with a end line

   <-
   

3. Between the start line and the end line there are the configuration lines

4. All other lines will be ignored

Configuration lines

Starting Character	Type	Required	Quantity	Description	Note
@	Path	REQUIRED	Exactly one	Path of the backup destination folder	See Note 1
+	Path	OPTIONAL	Zero or more	Path to be included into the backup	Path is relative to the source folder
-	Path	OPTIONAL	Zero or more	Path to be excluded from the backup	Path is relative to the source folder

Notes:

1. Rsync just copy the source folder content into the destination folder. So make sure that your destination is an empty folder that match with the source.
2. Include/Exclude Paths could be also Patterns. See the rsync man page, section PATTERN MATCHING RULES

Tip: include only some file/folders in your backup

If you want to backup only some files or folder of the source directory, use this pattern for your task

-> /path/to/backup
@ /destination/directory/
+ included_file.ext
+ included_folder/***
- *
<-

In this way we exclude all the file and folders, except for the ones we have included.

Note about the triple asterisk notation (included_folder/***)

From the rsync man page: trailing dir_name/*** will match both the directory (as if dir_name/ had been specified) and everything in the directory (as if dir_name/** had been specified).

So included_folder/*** means in one line: include both the included_folder folder and all its content

See below for why wee need this.

Note that for the way rsync works, if the folder you want include is deeper in the source directory structure, you must define an include line for each ancestor of the required folder.

For example if your source directory is /home/homeassistant/.homeassistant/ and the folder you want to backup is /home/homeassistant/.homeassistant/custom_components/sonoff/, your task will be

-> /home/homeassistant/.homeassistant/
@ /dest/path/
+custom_components/
+custom_components/sonoff/***
- *
<-

Note the use of the triple asterisk pattern!

As noted above, with the triple asterisk pattern we were able to save an include line in the task definition.

In fact, without this notation, the task would be

-> /home/homeassistant/.homeassistant/
@ /dest/path/
+custom_components/
+custom_components/sonoff/
+custom_components/sonoff/**
- *
<-

Cron

Use cron to schedule the script execution

$ crontab -e

You can use this site to generate the cron line.

For example, this line will execute the script each day at 6AM

0 6 * * * $HOME/.backup/rscript.sh >/dev/null 2>&1