rclone-backup — cron-safe, Docker-aware server backup orchestration using rclone and Backblaze B2 with automatic email-delivered logging

SYNOPSIS

rclone-backup.sh

Executed non-interactively (typically via cron) to perform structured backups of filesystem paths and Docker Compose–managed services, emitting per-job logs and a summary report via SMTP.

DESCRIPTION

rclone-backup is a Bash-based backup orchestration system designed for self-hosted servers running Docker Compose workloads.

It coordinates:

• filesystem backups using rclone sync
• container quiescence (docker compose down → backup → up)
• structured job definitions via a human-readable config file
• post-run status reporting via SMTP

The system prioritizes correctness, inspectability, and failure visibility over abstraction or cleverness.

DEPENDENCIES

Required:

• bash (POSIX-compatible shell with arrays)
• rclone (recent version with Backblaze B2 support)
• docker
• docker compose (v2; Compose plugin)
• msmtp (send-only SMTP client)
• cron (or compatible scheduler)

Optional but assumed:

• Backblaze B2 account and bucket
• password manager (e.g., pass) for SMTP credentials
• mail client capable of RFC-compliant message parsing

FILES

rclone-backup.sh          main backup script
rclone-backup.jobs       job definition file (pipe-delimited)
~/.config/rclone/rclone.conf
~/.msmtprc                SMTP configuration

JOB FILE FORMAT

Each non-comment line defines one backup job:

TYPE|LABEL|SOURCE|DESTINATION

Where TYPE is one of:

• SYNC Direct rclone sync of a filesystem path.

• SYNC_HOME Sync of a home directory with symlink exclusion.

• COMPOSE Docker Compose–aware backup: containers are stopped, data is synced, containers are restarted.

Example:

SYNC|Media|/storage/media|b2:server/media
SYNC_HOME|Home|/home/william|b2:server/home
COMPOSE|Websites|/storage/williamsoutherland.com|b2:server/websites

DOCKER BEHAVIOR

For COMPOSE jobs:

• Docker services are controlled via Compose project names, not container names.
• Each docker-compose.yml must define a top-level name: field.
• Backup sequence is strictly:

docker compose down
rclone sync
docker compose up -d

This avoids inconsistent snapshots of live databases and volume mounts.

LOGGING AND REPORTING

• Each job emits its own rclone log file.
• Exit status and timing are captured per job.
• A summary report is assembled and sent via msmtp.
• Email formatting is RFC-compliant (explicit headers, single blank line).

EXIT STATUS

• 0 — all jobs completed successfully
• non-zero — one or more jobs failed or aborted

Failures are reported via email; silent success is considered a bug.

DESIGN NOTES

• Uses rclone sync, not copy, to surface deletions.
• Assumes backups may be audited manually.
• Avoids embedding credentials in scripts.
• Optimized for unattended execution and post-mortem clarity.

SEE ALSO

• rclone(1)
• docker-compose(1)
• cron(8)
• `msmtp(1)'