Re: [rdiff-backup-users] Cron and Rdiff-backup

[chuck odonnell]

On Wed, May 25, 2011 at 06:32:40PM -0500, Dan Nugent wrote:
> I am trying to use rdiff-backup from cron on an Ubuntu 10.04 server.  I have a
> script with this
> 
>   
> rdiff-backup /home/dan/data /media/sdb1/data
> rdiff-backup /home/dan/data2 /media/sda1/data
> 
> 
> crontab looks like this:
> 
> * 21 * * * sh /home/dan/backupscript.sh
> 

Specify a value in the minute slot, e.g.,

0 21 * * * sh /home/dan/backupscript.sh

Otherwise your script will run every time cron is invoked during the
hour of 9:00 PM.

On a side note, I use lockf to prevent overlap on long running backups
(sometimes our backups go into gigabytes over a network line, so it is
possible for them to occasionally run for more than 24 hours).

e.g.,

0 3 * * * lockf -s -t 0 /var/run/rdiff-backup.lock /path/to/rdiff.sh

Best,

Chuck