SSH Backup Script

This script is designed to back up a user's .ssh directory. It compresses the entire .ssh folder into an archive and stores it in a designated backup directory.

Prerequisites

macOS or Linux operating system
tar utility must be installed (present by default on most UNIX systems)
Write permission in the target backup directory

Installation

Copy the ssh-backup.sh script to your preferred script directory, for example, $HOME/ssh-backup. Keep in mind: Use absolute paths: You cannot use environment variables such as $HOME in .plist files for launchd. You must specify absolute paths.
Make the script executable with the command:sh chmod +x ~/ssh-backup/ssh-backup.sh
(Optional) Configure a launchd job or cron job to execute the script regularly.

Configuration

The script uses environment variables and default paths. Ensure that these paths exist and are correct on your system:

Backup directory: /Users/yourUsername/ssh-backup
Log directory: /Users/yourUsername/ssh-backup/logs

Usage

To run the script manually, open a terminal and execute the following command:Replitsh ~/ssh-backup/ssh-backup.shThe script will create an archive of the .ssh folder in the configured backup directory.

Automation

To perform the backup automatically, you can set up a cron job or launchd service. An example .plist file for launchd might look like this

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>com.yourUsername.ssh-backup</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
        <string>/Users/yourUsername/ssh-backup/ssh-backup.sh</string>
    </array>
    <key>StartCalendarInterval</key>
    <dict>
        <key>Hour</key>
        <integer>14</integer>
        <key>Minute</key>
        <integer>0</integer>
    </dict>
    <key>RunAtLoad</key>
    <true/>
    <key>StandardErrorPath</key>
    <string>/Users/yourUsername/ssh-backup/logs/error.log</string>
    <key>StandardOutPath</key>
    <string>/Users/yourUsername/ssh-backup/logs/output.log</string>
</dict>
</plist>

Add the .plist file to ~/Library/LaunchAgents and load it with launchctl to configure automatic execution.

launchctl load ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.yourUsername.ssh-backup.plist

Crobtab

echo "0 14 * * * $HOME/ssh-backup/backup.sh" > /tmp/cron_job #This entry would execute the backup.sh script every day at 02:00 PM.

crontab -l | cat - /tmp/cron_job | crontab -

crontab -l

Author

Matthias Lüttermann

mluettermann / backup_ssh