jmares / obsidian_backup

Script to backup my Obsidian vault(s) on a regularly basis

Obsidian Backup

Script to backup my Obsidian vault(s) on a regularly basis

Goal

I put a lot of information in my Obsidian vault on a daily basis, and I recently subscribed to the Obsidian Sync service. However, synchronization is not a backup. I want regularly backups.

Plan

It has been a while since I did any python coding, or even any coding at all.

What do I need? A script that

• Makes a copy of my vault, manually
• Add a timestamp to the name
• Moves it to a location outside of my desktop pc (OneDrive, DropBox, SSD, ...)
• Compresses the vault before moving it
• Encrypts the vault before moving it
• Automate the process (cron)
• Exception handling
• Add logging
• Multiple vaults
• SCP to remote server
• Clean up temporary files

Password Generator

When you create lots of encrypted backups, you can either use a static password or use a formula to give each backup a unique password

• static: 3#GhIjKl$2
• dynamic based on filename: #my_vault_backup!
• dynamic based on date: #!20221223!@
• ...

Problem Solving

How to add a cronjob on a Mac

Compared to cronjob on a Ubuntu server I encountered several problems.

I want backups every hour that my computer is on, at 10 minutes past the hour.

First problem: The Terminal.app and cron need full disk access.

• Go to System Preferences
• Go to Security and Privacy
• Go to the tab Privacy
• Unlock to make changes
• Click on the + underneath the list of apps
• The app you are looking for cron is in the /usr/sbin directory
• Select it and click Open
• Check cron and Terminal.app in the list
• Lock it

Second problem: You need to specify the full path for the python version you are using and for the location of your python script.

Where is your python version located on the hard disk? In the terminal type the following command:

which python

The result I got, was:

/Users/myname/.pyenv/shims/python

If you want to know the full path of the python script ypu want to use, go to the directory using the terminal and type the following command:

pwd

The result I got, was:

/Users/myname/cronjobs/obsidian_backups

Open the crontab editor with the following command (my default editor is vi):

crontab -e

I am not going to explain how to use vi here.

Enter the following line and save the file.

10 * * * *	/Users/myname/.pyenv/shims/python /Users/myname/cronjobs/obsidian_backups/obs_backup.py

This got it working for me.

Log

2022-12-23

• added the password generator

2022-12-22

• Renaming some variables
• Moving code into functions
• Basic exception handling
• Dealing with multiple vaults
• Cronjob on Mac mini

2022-12-19

• copy compressed and encrypted backupt to two locations outside of internal HD, in my case:
  • external SSD
  • OneDrive
• quick and dirty

2022-12-18

• installing py7zr

pip install py7zr

• compressing and encrypting locally

2022-12-15

• Created repository
• Created script to test functionality
  • copy vault to another directory
  • add timestamp to the backup