vbackup

VBACKUP(8) System Manager's Manual VBACKUP(8)

NAME

   vbackup - A modular backup program

SYNOPSIS

      vbackup [OPTIONS] [ --check ] [strategy] level
      vbackup [OPTIONS] { --list | --help [module] | --version | --init }
      vbackup [OPTIONS] --rc --list [strategy] [level]
      vbackup [OPTIONS] --rc --init strategy
      vbackup [OPTIONS] --rc { --add | --delete } [strategy] config
      vbackup [OPTIONS] --rc { --enable | --disable } [strategy] config

DESCRIPTION

   vbackup  is  a  program that performs system backups.  The backup strategy is specified with a set of minimal configuration files that exist in directories under /etc/vbackup. See the
   quickstart section for quick first-time setup.

   The full documentation of vbackup is available online at http://vbackup.readthedocs.org

OPTIONS

   -d <level>
          Set the message level to <level> (default level is 8): 1: Fatal, 2: Error, 3: Warning, 4: Note, 5-7: Information (5: Rare messages, 6: Useful message, 7: Not so useful), 10-14:
          Debug messages that don't flood, 15-19: Debug messages that flood

    --dir <directory>
          Set the configuration directory. This is only useful in case you want to implement (e.g.) user backups, so each user may have her own configuration directory.

COMMANDS

   In all commands below: <strategy> refers to the name of a backup strategy (e.g. test, remote, etc). <level> refers to the backup level that is to be performed. <config>  refers  to  a
   configuration  file  name  and it is in the form XX-NAME.TYPE or XX-NAME-LEVEL.TYPE, where XX is a number indicating a priority, NAME is an arbitrary name, LEVEL is an optional backup
   level (0-9) and TYPE is the corresponding module name (e.g. xfsdump) (example: 50-home.xfsdump, 20-mbr-0.mbr, 10-remote.nfsmount, etc). <module> refers to a module name (e.g. xfsdump)

   --check [<strategy>] [<level>]
          Check configuration files for a specific backup strategy. Each module checks its own configuration file. If strategy is omitted then the default strategy will  be  checked.  If
          level is provided then only config files that apply to that level will be checked.

   --list List all available modules, their version and a brief description.

   --help [<module>]
          Show some help. If a module is passed as argument then it will display some help about that module. This is where the module configuration parameters are shown.

   --version
          Guess what...

   --init Shortcut for --rc --init.

   --rc --list [<stategy>] [<level>]
          List  the configuration of a certain backup strategy. If level is specified then only list configuration that applies to that level. If strategy is omitted the look for the de‐
          fault strategy. This similar to looking at the directories with ls.

   --rc --init <strategy>
          Create/initialize a new backup strategy. It will ask a couple of questions and then it will create the directory and populate it with a vbackup.conf file based on the answers.

   --rc --add [<strategy>] <config>
          Add a new configuration file to a certain backup strategy (or to the default). config is the file name and must be in the form XX-NAME.TYPE or XX-NAME-LEVEL.TYPE, as  described
          above.

   --rc --delete [<strategy>] <config>
          Delete an existing configuration file from a strategy.

   --rc --enable [<strategy>] <config>
          Enable a previously disabled configuration file by removing the .off extension.

   --rc --disable [<strategy>] <config>
          Disable a configuration file for a backup strategy by appending the .off extension.

QUICKSTART

   Use the vbackup-wizard(8) for quickstarting. Most probably that's what you will do the first time.

CONFIGURATION

   The  backup strategy is specified with a set of minimal configuration files that exist in directories under /etc/vbackup. Each directory is named rc.XXXXX.d where XXXXX is the name of
   the backup strategy. There's also the default strategy that's using the directory rc.d.

   For most setups the default strategy should suffice.

   Each strategy must contain a vbackup.conf file that specifies some global configuration options (like a destination directory).  Next, it must contain one or more module configuration
   files.  The available modules can be seen using the --list parameter.  The files in there are in the form XX-NAME.TYPE or XX-NAME-LEVEL.TYPE, where XX is a  number  indicating  order,
   NAME  is  an  arbitrary  name, LEVEL is an optional level and TYPE is the name of the module that will be invoked.  If LEVEL is specified then this config file will only apply to that
   LEVEL.

BACKUP

   After having defined at least one strategy you can perform that backup by running "vbackup <level>" or "vbackup <strategy> <level>".  This will first source the  vbackup.conf  and  it
   will then check for existing configuration files.  For each one that is found, it will determine the appropriate backup module and run it.

MODULES

   dpkg   Backup the debian package list. Small space requirement and very useful for restoring a debian system.

   exec   Execute shell commands. Allows custom things to happen between steps (e.g. creating a tar of the whole backup directory or removing old backups).

   exist  Check  whether a file or directory exists. This can be used to determine whether a filesystem is actually mounted or not. It is strongly advised to use this when you're not us‐
          ing mount or nfsmount!

   gpg    Encrypt a file or a directory using with GPG using a symmetric key. It can be used to encrypt the whole backup before uploading the results to a remote system.

   ftar (DEPRECATED)
          Use tar to backup a filesystem but use find to locate the files to backup. This is similar to the tar method but is not that good for incremental backups. If you restore a sys‐
          tem that was incrementally backed up using this method it will have all files that were deleted between intermediate backups too. The advantage of this method is that  you  can
          use regular expressions to filter files that will be backed up.

   mbr    Backup  MBRs  from  all  disks and their Partition Tables. It will also backup MD and LVM information if any of those is detected. Extremely useful with very low space require‐
          ments.

   md5    Calculate the md5sum of certain files. Can be used to store checksums of the backed up files in order to be able to verify that they are not corrupted. If can also be  used  to
          store checksums of system files.

   mount  Mount a local filesystem, in case you have an unmounted filesystem to perform backups (for example a spare or external disk).

   mysql  Backup some or all MySQL databases.

   nfsmount
          Mount a remote filesystem using NFS.

   off    Don't do anything at all. Used for disabling configuration files. For example, if you rename 50-main.pgsql to 50-main.pgsql.off it will remain in the configuration directory by
          will be disabled.

   openldap
          Backup OpenLDAP database and configuration (if it's stored in LDAP).

   pgsql  Backup some or all PostgreSQL databases.

   rm     Remove  a  directory recursively. Useful when storing the backup to a temporary directory before (e.g.) moving it to another system or compressing it. It can be used to cleanup
          the directory tree, both before and after a backup.

   rpm    Backup RPM database.

   scp    Copy files to a remote system using scp. It will copy directories recursively so it can be used to copy a full backup.

   tar    Perform incremental backups using the listed-incremental format of GNU tar.  Make sure to use the --noplugin parameter when editing tar configuration files with vim.

   umount Umount a filesystem that was previously mounted. This can be used for local and remote mounts. The configuration of this module is compatible with the  configuration  of  mount
          and nfsmount modules. This means that you can just create a link to the coresponding mount configuration file to have it unount the filesystem. (For example, link 00-remote.nf‐
          smount to 99-remount.umount)

   x509   Encrypt a file or a directory using an x509 certificate. This way backups can be safely stored in remote systems.

   xfsdump
          Perform  incremental  backups  using  xfsdump. This is by far the very best way to backup an XFS filesystem (as a whole). It works extremely well, it is very reliable and it is
          able to do live backups. It is also very easy to restore all or part of the backed-up data using the interactive xfsrestore utility (xfsrestore -i).

EXTENDING

   You can extend vbackup by writing simple scripts that will be combined with other scripts. See the online documentation for more information.

AUTHOR - COPYRIGHT

   vbackup is written and maintained by Stefanos Harhalakis.  Copyright (c) 2006-2016 Harhalakis Stefanos

CONTACT

   For bugs, requests, ideas, comments and anything else (except spam) contact <v13@v13.gr>

LICENSE

   This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either  version
   3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

   This  program  is  distributed  in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
   See the GNU General Public License for more details.

   If GPLv3 doesn't fit your needs (BSD?) feel free to contact me and I may release it with another license too.