borg-automated-backups

Automated backup solution using Borg Backup for critical system directories.

Description

This project provides scripts to automatically backup important system directories using Borg Backup. It includes automatic log rotation and scheduled backups via cron jobs. While similar functionality can be achieved using borgmatic, this project offers a lightweight, customizable solution focused on basic backup needs.

Dependencies

Required packages:

• borgbackup: For creating and managing backups
• logrotate: For managing log file rotation
• cron: For scheduling backup jobs

You can install them on Arch Linux with:

sudo pacman -S borg cronie logrotate

Note: On Arch Linux, the package is named 'borg' instead of 'borgbackup', and 'cronie' provides the cron functionality.

Installation

1. Clone this repository
2. Ensure you have all required dependencies installed
3. Make sure you have sufficient permissions to access the backup locations

Configuration

Environment Variables

• DEPLOY_BORG_BINARY: (Optional) Set to "true" if you want the script to deploy its own Borg binary instead of using the system package. Defaults to false. When set, it downloads the binary from Borg Backup release page.
• BORG_PASSPHRASE: (Required) The passphrase used to encrypt your backups
• BACKUP_FOLDER: (Optional) The destination folder where backups will be stored
• CRON_SCHEDULE: (Optional) The schedule for automatic backups (in cron format)

Default Backup Directories

The following directories are backed up by default:

• /home
• /etc
• /srv
• /boot
• /opt
• /usr

You can change the directories for backup by copying env.dist into env and modifying it.

Usage

1. Set up the encryption passphrase:

sudo echo "BORG_PASSPHRASE={your_long_passphrase}" >> /etc/environment

2. Deploy the backup system:

sudo sh -c 'CRON_SCHEDULE="0 13 * * *" BACKUP_FOLDER=/media/remote-server/backups bash deploy.sh'
# To use custom Borg binary deployment, set DEPLOY_BORG_BINARY="true"

The default schedule (0 13 * * *) runs backups daily at 13:00.

Backup Strategy

• Daily backups are kept for 7 days
• Logs are rotated weekly and kept for 2 rotations
• Backups are compressed using LZ4 compression
• Each directory is backed up to its own Borg repository

Troubleshooting

Common issues:

• If backups fail, check the logs in /var/log/borg_backups/
• Ensure BORG_PASSPHRASE is correctly set in /etc/environment
• Verify that the backup destination has sufficient space
• Check that the backup user has appropriate permissions