Ubuntu – Rsync with crontab help

backupcronrsyncserverzfs

I am not a great linux user, and am just attempting to backup my server files in case of a drive failure. I currently have an SSD running docker containers for a media server, and the media is stored on a ZFS pool of 4 drives in a RAIDZ array. I am attempting to figure out how to rsync my crontab directory to the ZFS pool, and possibly also put it onto a usb to make sure my .env files don't get lost if the SSD fails. I don't know if I worded all of what I'm trying to get across correctly, so sorry! I suppose this would make more sense to just do as /home /mnt (name of the zpool). 

rsync -av --delete /home /mnt-

does this command look correct?

Below is what my Docker backup cronjob looks like, as well as the ZFS scrub.

# m h  dom mon dow   command
0 2 * * * /home/<USER>/.docker/main.sh -b max

# zpool scrub every month
0 2 1 * * /sbin/zpool scrub mnt
0 13 1 * * /sbin/zpool status

Thanks in advance!

Best Answer

If you are looking to use rsync to back up files on a regular base you probably want to make some changes. --delete will remove the file you have deleted which means if you accidentally delete all your files and then rsync -av --delete /home /mnt- runs it will remove all of your backups. If all you want to do is to make a copy then this will work, and it will probably save you from a failed disk but you should think about what are you trying to protect your self from. I would suggest taking a look at this post on stack overflow if you are using rsync as your regular backup tool Use rsync for backup without overwrite.

I realize there are many articles out there suggesting to do what you are doing, howtogeek linux.com and while this works great as a one time backup and is even ok if you want to run your backups manually when you know your computer is in a state you are ok with. It is risky to do it automatically. I would suggest using the built-in tool for backups (just search for backup) as it handles the case of deleting or overwriting files by mistake and you can set it up to run weekly/monthly etc and can set how long you want to keep backups for. but if you are just trying to protect from a disk failure what you have is probably ok.

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