3 B A C K U P N I N J A /()/
6 a silent flower blossom death strike to lost data.
8 Backupninja allows you to coordinate system backup by dropping a few
9 simple configuration files into /etc/backup.d/. Most programs you
10 might use for making backups don't have their own configuration file
11 format. Backupninja provides a centralized way to configure and
12 coordinate many different backup utilities.
15 - easy to read ini style configuration files.
16 - you can drop in scripts to handle new types of backups.
17 - backup actions can be scheduled
18 - you can choose when status report emails are mailed to you
19 (always, on warning, on error, never).
20 - console-based wizard (ninjahelper) makes it easy to create
21 backup action configuration files.
22 - passwords are never sent via the command line to helper programs.
23 - works with Linux-Vservers (http://linux-vserver.org/)
26 - secure, remote, incremental filesytem backup (via rdiff-backup).
27 incremental data is compressed. permissions are retained even
28 with an unpriviledged backup user.
29 - backup of mysql databases (via mysqlhotcopy and mysqldump).
30 - backup of ldap databases (via slapcat and ldapsearch).
31 - basic system and hardware info
32 - encrypted remote backups (via duplicity).
33 - backup of subversion repositories.
35 The following options are available:
36 -h, --help This usage message
37 -d, --debug Run in debug mode, where all log messages are
38 output to the current shell.
39 -f, --conffile FILE Use FILE for the main configuration instead
40 of /etc/backupninja.conf
41 -t, --test Test run mode. This will test if the backup could run, without actually
42 preforming any backups. For example, it will attempt to authenticate
43 or test that ssh keys are set correctly.
44 -n, --now Perform actions now, instead of when they might be scheduled.
45 No output will be created unless also run with -d.
46 --run FILE Runs the specified action FILE (e.g. one of the /etc/backup.d/ files).
47 Also puts backupninja in debug mode.
52 The general configuration file is /etc/backupninja.conf. In this file
53 you can set the log level and change the default directory locations.
54 You can force a different general configuration file with "backupninja
57 To preform the actual backup, backupninja processes each configuration
58 file in /etc/backup.d according to the file's suffix:
60 .sh -- run this file as a shell script.
61 .rdiff -- filesystem backup (using rdiff-backup)
62 .dup -- filesystem backup (using duplicity)
63 .mysql -- backup mysql databases
64 .ldap -- backup ldap databases
65 .sys -- general hardware, partition, and system reports.
66 .svn -- backup subversion repositories
67 .maildir -- incrementally backup maildirs (very specialized)
69 Support for additional configuration types can be added by dropping
70 bash scripts with the name of the suffix into /usr/share/backupninja.
72 The configuration files are processed in alphabetical order. However,
73 it is suggested that you name the config files in "sysvinit style."
81 Typically, you will put a '.rdiff' config file last, so that any
82 database dumps you make are included in the filesystem backup.
83 Configurations files which begin with 0 (zero) are skipped.
85 Unless otherwise specified, the config file format is "ini style."
98 i will not have a pear.
104 By default, each configuration file is processed everyday at 01:00 (1
105 AM). This can be changed by specifying the 'when' option in a config
110 when = sundays at 02:00
113 when = everyday at 01 <-- the default
114 when = Tuesday at 05:00
116 A configuration file will be processed at the time(s) specified by the
117 "when" option. If multiple "when" options are present, then they all
118 apply. If two configurations files are scheduled to run in the same
119 hour, then we fall back on the alphabetical ordering specified above.
120 If two configurations files are scheduled close to one another in
121 time, it is possible to have multiple copies of backupninja running if
122 the first instance is not finished before the next one starts.
124 Make sure that you put the "when" option before any sections in your
127 These values for 'when' are equivalent:
129 when = tuesday at 05:30
130 when = TUESDAYS at 05
132 These values for 'when' are invalid:
134 when = tuesday at 2am
142 Backupninja can be used to implement whatever backup strategy you
143 choose. It is intended, however, to be used like so:
145 (1) First, databases are safely copied or exported to /var/backups.
146 Typically, you cannot make a file backup of a database while it
147 is in use, hence the need to use special tools to make a safe copy
148 or export into /var/backups.
150 (2) Then, vital parts of the file system, including /var/backups, are
151 nightly pushed to a remote, off-site, hard disk (using
152 rdiff-backup). The local user is root, but the remote user is not
153 priviledged. Hopefully, the remote filesystem is encrypted.
155 There are many different backup strategies out there, including "pull
156 style", magnetic tape, rsync + hard links, etc. We believe that the
157 strategy outlined above is the way to go because: (1) hard disks are
158 very cheap these days, (2) pull style backups are no good, because then
159 the backup server must have root on the production server, and (3)
160 rdiff-backup is more space efficient and featureful than using rsync +
167 In order for rdiff-backup to sync files over ssh unattended, you must
168 create ssh keys on the source server and copy the public key to the
169 remote user's authorized keys file. For example:
171 root@srchost# ssh-keygen -t dsa
172 root@srchost# ssh-copy-id -i /root/.ssh/id_dsa.pub backup@desthost
174 Now, you should be able to ssh from user 'root' on srchost to
175 user 'backup' on desthost without specifying a password.
177 Note: when prompted for a password by ssh-keygen, just leave it
178 blank by hitting return.
180 The included helper program "ninjahelper" will walk you through creating
181 an rdiff-backup configuration, and will set up the ssh keys for you.
187 apt-get install bash gawk
190 apt-get install rdiff-backup gzip hwinfo
193 /usr/sbin/backupninja -- main script
194 /etc/cron.d/backupninja -- runs main script nightly
195 /etc/logrotate.d/backupninja -- rotates backupninja.log
196 /etc/backup.d/ -- directory for configuration files
197 /etc/backupninja.conf -- general options
198 /usr/share/backupninja -- handler scripts which do the actual work
201 There is no install script, but you just need to move files to the
202 correct locations. All files should be owned by root.
204 # tar xvzf backupninja.tar.gz
206 # mv backupninja /usr/sbin/backupninja
207 # mv etc/logrotate.d/backupninja /etc/logrotate.d/backupninja
208 # mv etc/cron.d/backupninja /etc/cron.d/backupninja
209 # mkdir /etc/backup.d/
210 # mv etc/backupninja.conf /etc/backupninja.conf
211 # mv handlers /usr/share/backupninja
217 If you are using Linux-Vservers (http://linux-vserver.org/) there are some
218 special capabilities that different handlers have to make vserver backups easier.
219 Set the variable "vservers" to be "yes" in /etc/backupninja.conf and see the
220 example configuration files for each handler to configure the vserver specific
223 Additional vserver variables that can be configured in /etc/backupninja.conf. but
224 probably don't need to be changed:
226 VSERVERINFO (default: /usr/sbin/vserver-info)
227 VSERVER (default: /usr/sbin/vserver)
228 VROOTDIR (default: `$VSERVERINFO info SYSINFO |grep vserver-Rootdir | awk '{print $2}'; fi`)
233 Ninjahelper is an additional script which will walk you through the process of
234 configuring backupninja. Ninjahelper has a menu driven curses based interface
237 To add an additional 'wizard' to ninjahelper, follow these steps:
239 (1) to add a helper for the handler "blue", create the file
240 blue.helper in the directory where the handlers live.
241 (ie /usr/share/backupninja).
243 (2) next, you need to add your helper to the global HELPERS variable
244 and define the main function for your helper (the function name
245 is always <helper>_wizard). for example, blue.helper:
246 HELPERS="$HELPERS blue:description_of_this_helper"
251 (3) check the examples of the included helpers to see how they are
252 written. The dialog functions are defined in easydialog.sh.