[dba-Tech] The Swiss army knife of backup systems

[Jim Lawrence]

In the computer world, it seems one old command line program has been the ultimate data transfer application...that is "rsync". Unfortunately, the only platform that it does not run on easily is Windows. (A windows client can be created but a real Linux server has to be at the backend.):

Here is just one example of features. (There are so many more but this is a good start):

http://www.tecmint.com/rsync-local-remote-file-synchronization-commands/  

RSYNC can copy files, backup files (full/incremental)/synchronize/full-image), on a single computer, network, across the web, can fully encrypt data, within any VPN and is designed to run in unstable environments as it can recover when a communication signal is dropped. 

Below is a simple example of what it can do. (I take no credit for figuring out all the parameters as a far smart developer than I assembled the code.)

Given that you have SSH installed on all your computers...I believe it is by default on Windows10 and definitely on Apple and Linux boxes by default...and if it isn't it is very easy to do so. Assuming the the following code works:

ssh username at mydomainname -p 3333 or ssh username at 192.167.111.200 -p 3333
  
### 3333 is just the port through your router/firewall/ssh listening port. It ca  n be accessed from anywhere.

This is how to transfer a file from a server/network to a remote station/server via a secure SSH tunnel.

rsync -avz --progress ~/music/thechoir.mp3 -e "ssh -p 3333" username at mydomain:~/desktop/

Where:
 "~" just says start at the home directory...i.e. ~/music/thechoir.mp3 (get the following file from the following location.)...use a SSH tunnel: "ssh -p 3333" using credentials and data directed towards specific remote computer location: username at mydomain:~/desktop/ 
 
Hope this helps someone. This of course is just a small sample of what can be done.  

Jim