Python Backup Cleaner Script

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StorageVirtualisation
#python#xsibackup

A Python script I've written to clean up old backups, keeping only the newest specified amount.

As I covered in a previous post, I am currently backing up my VMs using XSIBackup. There is an option in XSIBackup to delete folders older than N days. This option --del-dirs however is only available in the Pro version.

So I've took it upon myself to script it up, using the available Python 3.5 executable in ESXi and XSIBackups' built-in cron functionality.

Find the code on GitHub Gist.

ESXi Instructions

  1. Copy the script to a datastore
  2. Edit the xsibackup crontab: vi xsi-dir/conf/root-crontab
  3. Add in the script with it's required options. -p for path, -r for regex and -k for how many to keep.
# This crontab belongs to the root user, thus it starts by root-
# Add cron jobs to this file in the classic crond Linux way.
# This is an example of a backup job being run everyday at 2:00 a.m.
# change according to your needs and run ./xsibackup --update-cron
# min hour day mon dow command
# 0 2 * * * "/vmfs/volumes/datastore1/xsi-dir/jobs/001"
0 4 * * * "/vmfs/volumes/files/Misc/VMs/xsi-dir/jobs/002"
0 6 * * * /bin/python /vmfs/volumes/files/Misc/VMs/clean_backups.py -p '/vmfs/volumes/files/Misc/VMs/' -r 'backup*' -k 5
  1. Install xsibackup's crontab: ./xsibackup --install-cron
  2. Update xsibackup's crontab: ./xsibackup --update-cron
  3. Double check ESXI's crontab: cat /var/spool/cron/crontabs/root