Monitor rsync Backup Cron Jobs

The Problem

rsync backups run nightly but can fail due to network issues, disk full errors, or SSH key problems. A missed backup might not be noticed until you need to restore.

The Solution

Wrap rsync with error checking and send status to CronRabbit. Track backup duration to spot network degradation early.

Common rsync Failures

rsync can fail silently in many ways: SSH authentication errors, disk quota exceeded on the remote, network timeouts, or partial transfers. Each produces a non-zero exit code that cron ignores.

Monitoring Pattern

Capture rsync's exit code and report it to CronRabbit. Use /start to track duration — a backup that suddenly takes 3x longer may indicate network or disk issues.

Code Examples

Monitored rsync backup

Bash

#!/bin/bash
set -euo pipefail

PING="https://ping.cronrabbit.com/your-id"
curl -fsS -m 5 --retry 3 --retry-all-errors "$PING/start"

rsync -avz --delete \
  -e "ssh -i /root/.ssh/backup_key" \
  /data/ backup@remote:/backups/daily/

RSYNC_EXIT=$?

if [ $RSYNC_EXIT -eq 0 ]; then
  curl -fsS -m 10 --retry 5 --retry-all-errors "$PING"
else
  curl -fsS -m 10 --retry 5 --retry-all-errors "$PING/fail"
  echo "rsync failed with exit code $RSYNC_EXIT"
  exit $RSYNC_EXIT
fi

Related Guides

Shell & Bash

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