docker-rotate-backups

This repository provides a Docker image that implements rotate-backups.

By using this image, you are enabled to instantiate a container that runs rotate-backups once on a mounted directory. In the mounted directory, irrelevant backups are removed and useful are preserved. Afterwards, the container is stopped and, if desired, removed.

How to use

We support running rotate-backups on both local and remote directories.

Local Directories

Simply adapt the directory to mount at /archive and run the following command on your Docker host:

docker run --rm \
-v /path/to/backups:/archive \
ghcr.io/jan-brinkmann/docker-rotate-backups

Remote Directories

To run rotate-backups on a remote directory, adapt the variables SSH_USER, SSH_HOST, and SSH_ARCHIVE. You also need to mount your public SSH key to the named directory. Make sure, that you already have exchanged keys with the remote host.

docker run --rm \
-e SSH_USER=pi \
-e SSH_HOST=192.168.0.42 \
-e SSH_ARCHIVE=/path/to/backups \
-v ~/.ssh/id_rsa:/root/.ssh/id_rsa:ro \
ghcr.io/jan-brinkmann/docker-rotate-backups

How to customize

The default scheme to preserve and to remove backups is --hourly=0 --daily=7 --weekly=4 --monthly=12 --yearly=always --dry-run. Due to the --dry-run flag, no backups will be removed. But you are allowed to customize the scheme.

Scheme at once

You may overhand a complete scheme at once by means of ROTATION_SCHEME:

docker run --rm \
-e ROTATION_SCHEME="--daily=7 --weekly=4 --monthly=6" \
-v /path/to/backups:/archive \
ghcr.io/jan-brinkmann/docker-rotate-backups

For more information on the syntax and the options, we refer to the official rotate-backups documentation.

Configuration File

It is also possible to overhand a scheme within a configuration file rotate-backups.ini:

docker run --rm \
-v /path/to/backups:/archive \
-v /path/to/rotate-backups.ini:/config/rotate-backups.ini \
ghcr.io/jan-brinkmann/docker-rotate-backups

In order to find out how to create such a file, we again refer to the documentation.

Separate Variables

The scheme can also be customized by a number of environmental variables representing various time spans:

Variable	Default Value	Possible Values	Notes
HOURLY	0	any integer, always	Number of hourly backups to preserve.
DAILY	7	any integer, always	Number of daily backups to preserve.
WEEKLY	4	any integer, always	Number of weekly backups to preserve.
MONTHLY	12	any integer, always	Number of monthly backups to preserve.
YEARLY	always	any integer, always	Number of yearly backups to preserve.
DRY_RUN	true	true, false	The dry-run option must explicitly be deactivated by means of DRY_RUN=false in order to remove backups.

Feel free to customize the variables you like to adapt only. In the following example, DAILY, WEEKLY, MONTHLY, and DRY_RUN are set to the respective values. HOURLY and YEARLY remain on the default values 0 and always, respectively. The resulting scheme is --hourly=0 --daily=3 --weekly=1 --monthly=1 --yearly=always.

docker run --rm \
-e DAILY=3 \
-e WEEKLY=1 \
-e MONTHLY=1 \
-e DRY_RUN=false \
-v /path/to/backups:/archive \
ghcr.io/jan-brinkmann/docker-rotate-backups