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Full Discussion: Cron jobs
Operating Systems Linux Cron jobs Post 302383214 by gjkrpan on Monday 28th of December 2009 09:59:39 PM
Old 12-28-2009
Unless there's real urgent need to change it, you should leave /etc/crontab as is. The primary use of /etc/crontab is to allow the system to manage its own log files and environments. If there are tasks that you would like to include in the system housekeeping to be maintained at the times listed within /etc/crontab, they can be included in the appropriate /etc/cron.<time> file.

For purposes of a database backup, 'crontab -e' is the best option. Create your crontab entry and reference a script. This way you will not need to modify your crontab entry unless you need to change the time of your backup. All other aspects of the backup will be controlled from the script.

Deleting the old backup files will depend on how you perform your backups. If you perform a full database backup every night, then you can use something along the lines of this at the top of your script to remove the oldest file prior to performing the nightly backup:

find /backup-dir -atime +7 -exec rm ()\;

This will remove any files older than 7 days from the directory. Since this executes every night, there will only ever be one file deleted per night.

If you're performing a full backup the first night, and incrementals on subsequent nights, then you'd want to only perform the removal operation prior to your full backup with something similar to the following prior to performing the backup (assuming you perform your full backup on Monday):

Code:
if [ "`date +%a`" == "Mon" ]
then
    cd /backup-dir
    /bin/rm backup-files
fi

That will preserve your incremental backups until the night of your next full backup.

Hope this helps.

Last edited by Scott; 12-28-2009 at 11:06 PM.. Reason: Added code tags
 

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nisbackup(1M)						  System Administration Commands					     nisbackup(1M)

NAME
nisbackup - backup NIS+ directories SYNOPSIS
nisbackup [-v] backup-dir directory... nisbackup [-v] -a backup-dir DESCRIPTION
nisbackup backs up a NIS+ directory object on a NIS+ master server. Updates to the NIS+ database will be temporarily disabled while nis- backup is running. The backup-dir is a UNIX directory that must exist prior to running nisbackup. The nisbackup command can be used to backup an individual NIS+ directory object or all ( -a) of the NIS+ directory objects served by a master server. The NIS+ directory objects being backed up will be placed into subdirectories under the backup-dir directory. These subdirectories are named according to the NIS+ directory object they contain. nisbackup operates on individual NIS+ directory objects (for example, org_dir.wiz.com). This allows an administrator to selectively backup specific directories. The rpc.nisd(1M) process must be running on the master server with a stable NIS+ database for nisbackup to complete. nisbackup will not attempt to correct any corruption in the NIS+ database, so it is important that backups be done regularly as part of the NIS+ administra- tion. The first synopsis is used to backup a single NIS+ directory object or a list of NIS+ directory objects. The objects can be partially qual- ified or fully qualified. The machine on which the command is executing must be the master for the NIS+ directory objects specified. The second synopsis will backup all of the NIS+ directory objects that are served by this master. The -a option is the recommended method of backing up a master server, since it will backup all NIS+ directory objects that are served by this master. If this server is a master server for more than one domain, the backup will include NIS+ directories that belong to all of the domains served. Individual NIS+ direc- tory objects can be selected for restoring from a backup-dir created with the -a option. See nisrestore(1M). The -a option only includes directory objects for which this server is the master. It is possible, but not recommended, to configure a master server as a replica for other domains. The objects belonging to those replicated domains will not be backed up with the -a option. The backup of replicated objects must be run on the master server for those objects. Do not use the same backup-dir to backup different master servers. Each master server must have its own backup-dir. nisbackup will set the rpc.nisd(1M) to read only mode, which will disable updates to the NIS+ database. This is neccessary to ensure the consistency of the backup. For this reason, nisbackup should not be run while large numbers of updates are being applied to the NIS+ data- base. Update utilities such as nisaddent(1M) should not be run simultaneously with nisbackup. OPTIONS
-a Creates a backup of all NIS+ directory objects for which this server is a master. -v Verbose option. Additional output will be produced and sent to syslog(3C) upon execution of the command (see syslog.conf(4)). OPERANDS
backup-dir The directory into which the subdirectories containing the backed up objects are placed. This must be created prior to running nisbackup. directory The NIS+ directory object(s) being backed up. EXAMPLES
Example 1: Backup of the org_dir NIS+ directory object of the domain foo.com on a master server to a directory named /backup To backup the org_dir NIS+ directory object of the domain foo.com on a master server to a directory named /backup: master_server# nisbackup /backup org_dir.foo.com. Example 2: Backup of the entire NIS+ domain foo.com to a directory named /backup To backup the entire NIS+ domain foo.com to a directory named /backup: master_server# nisbackup /backup foo.com. org_dir.foo.com. groups_dir.foo.com. ctx_dir.foo.com. Example 3: Backup of an entire NIS+ database to a backup directory named /backup To backup an entire NIS+ database to a backup directory named /backup: master_server# nisbackup -a /backup EXIT STATUS
0 Successful completion. 1 An error occurred. FILES
/backup-dir/backup_list This ascii file contains a list of all the objects contained in this backup-dir directory. /backup-dir/directory-object A subdirectory that is created in the backup-dir that contains the NIS+ directory-object backup. /backup-dir/directory-object/data A subdirectory that contains the data files that are part of the NIS+ directory-object backup. /backup-dir/directory-object/last.upd This data file contains timestamp information about the directory-object. /backup-dir/directory-object/data.dict A NIS+ data dictionary for all of the objects contained in the NIS+ directory-object backup. ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes: +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+ | ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE | +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+ |Availability |SUNWnisu | +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+ SEE ALSO
nis+(1), nisdefaults(1), nisrm(1), nisrestore(1M), rpc.nisd(1M), syslog(3C), nisfiles(4), syslog.conf(4), attributes(5) NOTES
NIS+ might not be supported in future releases of the SolarisTM Operating Environment. Tools to aid the migration from NIS+ to LDAP are available in the Solaris 9 operating environment. For more information, visit http://www.sun.com/directory/nisplus/transition.html. SunOS 5.10 12 Dec 2001 nisbackup(1M)
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