For those who don't know,
NAnt is a .NET build scripting tool. It is a lot like the Java build tool Ant,
so everything in this article is probably also applicable for Ant. This article
assumes a intermediate knowledge of the NAnt tool.
Though the purists will
probably disagree, NAnt is essentially a high-level programming language, optimized
for automating common build tasks, such as source control operations, compiling,
moving files and deleting files. Because of the automation it allows, NAnt has
become very popular for use in continuous integration. But what else might NAnt
be good for?
The rest of this article
will work through a difficult backup problem that I solved with Nant. I will
demonstrate how to use NAnt to create a customizable, heterogeneous and effective
backup system. This article assumes basic familiarity with NAnt. If you would
like to learn more about this tool, lots of information is available on the
NAnt site (http://nant.sourceforge.net).
The server being backed
up in this article runs Windows 2003, .NET, SQL, MySQL, MSDE, PHP, and a mail
server. There are ninety-five clients hosted on the server and they have a variety
of backup requirements. Some clients have never considered backups, some prefer
to manage it themselves, while some are paranoid that they will lose everything
and require a formal, reliable backup process. Due to the variety of different
requirements, combined with a limited budget, commercial tools are not a viable
solution to this bakcup problem.
I categorized the various
backup types that I needed as follows: IIS metadata backup, MySQL data backup,
MS SQL data backup, and backup of each of the sites files. Looking at this
list
it seemed that perhaps NAnt might be capable of fulfilling my needs. There was
also the question of what to do with the backups. The options that I could see
were: zip the files and store them on the server, zip the files and store them
on a network backup drive, zip the files and send them with email. Once again,
different clients needed different solutions.
Other design goals for my
new backup system were that it should be scheduled, and adding new clients to
the server should not result in an excessive amount of work configuring my backup
process.
The IIS metabase stores
the configuration of IIS. This combined with the site data is enough to restore
a web server in the event of some dramatic failure. One way to backup the IIS
metabase is to right-click the computer to backup in the IIS snap-in and select
'Backup/Restore Configuration...' from the 'All Tasks' menu item. Fortunately,
this functionality is also available with scripting.
In Windows 2000 or Windows
XP a backup can be made with the following command line call:
cscript metaback.vbs
For Windows 2003, use this
command line call:
cscript iisback.vbs /backup
/b <backup name>
Executing these commands creates an IIS backup that can later be used to restore
the IIS configuration. Because they are simple command line calls it is simple
to include them in a NAnt script, such as this one:
(NB: In my NAnt scripts,
the values listed in the <!-- Parameters --> section at the start of the
script are values that the script expects to have been set as properties by
the calling script.)
Save this script as IIS.build.
Because this script requires a property to be set before it is called, it cannot
be run directly from the command line. A script to run the IIS script looks
like this:
<property name="backupName"
value="IISBackup" /> <!-- For
this script to work, this must be set to the location of the script (metaback.vbs
or IISback.vbs) --> <property
name=" scriptDirectory" value="IISBackup" />
Save this script as BackupIIS.build.
Now when this backup is run it should create an IIS backup called 'IISBackup'.
To run the backup make sure the two scripts are in the same directory and that
nant.exe is in the system path. Open a command prompt and
change to the directory that the scripts are in, then type:
nant -buildfile:BackupIIS.build
and press enter.
To check that the backup
worked open the IIS snap-in, right click on your computer node, and select 'Backup/Restore
Configuration...' from the 'All Tasks' menu. You should see a backup called
'IISBackup' in the Backups grid.
Backup Challenge 2: Backup the Site Files
The requirement is as follows;
backup all files in some sites. For each site that requires backup, zip the
files and email the archive to a secure storage location.
I started by writing a NAnt
script with two targets. The first target compresses a directory, the second
target compresses a directory and then sends the archive via email.
<!--parameters baseDirectory
This is the parent of the directory to be compressed targetDirectory
This is the directory to be compressed backupDirectory
This is the location to store the archives -->
<target name="CompressDirectoryAndEmail"
depends="CompressDirectory"> <mail
from="backup@anon.com" tolist="secure@anon.com" subject="${
targetDirectory} backup" mailhost="localhost"> <files> <include
name="${backupDirectory}${ targetDirectory}.zip" /> </files> <attachments> <include
name="${backupDirectory}${ targetDirectory}.zip" /> </attachments> </mail> <!--
The backup has be mailed so the file is no longer required. --> <delete
file="${backupDirectory}${targetDirectory}.zip" /> </target>
</project>
Save this file as FileBackup.build.
As with the IIS backup before, this script can not be run directly because it
requires parameters to be set. Another script is required to set the parameters
and specify backup policies for each site that requires backup. For this example,
assume that I have all of my websites stored in a directory called C:\inetpub.
There is also another directory called C:\backup. I currently have three websites:
web1, web2 and web3. They are stored in C:\inetpub\web1, C:\inetpub\web2 and
C:\inetpub\web3 respectively. The owner of web1 requires that the site be backed
up nightly, and the archive be stored on the server in C:\backup. The owners
of web2 and web3 require that their sites be backed up nightly and emailed to
a secure location, but they do not require that a copy be stored on the server.
These requirements are implemented with the following script:
(NB: This script sends email
using the localhost SMTP server. Your local SMTP server must be configured to
allow this.)
<!-- These two properties
can be declared globally, because they are the same for all sites. -->
<property name="baseDirectory" value="C:\inetpub\" />
<property name="backupDirectory" value="C:\backup\" />
<!-- This target
exists only to specify which sites are to be backed up, and in what order. -->
<target name="Backup" depends="BackupWeb1,BackupWeb2,BackupWeb3"
/>
Save this script as BackupWebsites.build.
To run this backup make sure that FileBackup.build and BackupWebsites.build
are in the same directory. Open a command prompt and navigate to this directory.
Then run the following command:
nant -buildfile:BackupWebsites.build
The result of this script
should be that an archive called web1.zip is created in C:\backup, and archives
called web2.zip and web3.zip are emailed to secure@anon.com.
Backup Challenge 3: Backup the Server Databases
The server currently hosts
two databases servers that contain databases that need to be backed up. One
is a MySQL 5 database, and one is a MSDE database. The users who want their
databases backed up are requesting that the backups be zipped and emailed to
a secure location. The first step is to write a NAnt script to backup a single
database. The script needs to have a target for backing up a MySQL database,
and a target for backing up a MSDE database. For the MySQL backup, I will use
the mysqldump utility, executing the following command for the database that
is being backed up:
I recommend creating a read-only
user specifically for backup. To backup the MSDE databases I will use the osql
utility, executing the following command to backup a database:
osql -E -U <username>
-P <password> -Q "BACKUP DATABASE <databasename> To DISK =
<backupfile>;"
Once again, it is recommended
to create a read-only user specifically for backup.
(NB: This script sends email
using the localhost SMTP server. Your local SMTP server must be configured to
allow this.)
<!-- parameters mysqlPath
(optional) Only required for the MySQLBackup target. This is the path to the
mysqldump executable (in the mysql bin directory). databaseName
The name of the database to backup. username
The user account to use for the backup. password
The user's password. tempDirectory
A temporary directory to store the database backup, prior to emailing it. -->
Save this script as DatabaseBackup.build.
Once again, we need another script to control the database backup. Recall the
three websites hosted on the server: web1, web2 and web3. Each of this application
has a database. Web1 and web2 use MySQL databases named web1 and web2 respectively.
Web3 uses an MSDE database called web3. The owners of each of these databases
require their data to be backed up and emailed to a secure location. The script
to do this follows:
<!--
This property can be declared globally, because it is the same for all databases.
--> <property
name="tempDirectory" value="C:\backup\" /> <property
name="mysqlPath" value="C:\program files\mysql\bin\" />
<!-- This target exists
only to specify which databases are to be backed up, and in what order. --> <target name="Backup"
depends="BackupWeb1,BackupWeb2,BackupWeb3" />
Save this script as BackupDatabases.build.
To test this script make sure it is saved in the same directory as DatabaseBackup.build.
Open a command prompt, navigate to this directory, and run the following command:
nant -buildfile:BackupDatabases.build
The result of running this
script is that the contents of the three databases will be added to zip archives
and emailed to secure@anon.com.
Summary
So now we have scripts to
backup our IIS metadata, our website files, and the contents of our databases.
The only thing left to do is consolidate all of these backup tasks and set them
to run on a schedule. The easiest way to consolidate all of the build tasks
is to define a batch file, such as this one:
Thats it! With this system
in place you get a full backup every night without any manual intervention.
When new sites are added to the server it is a trivial matter to add them to
the BackupWebsites and BackupDatabases scripts. All of the tools used are free,
and reliable.
The potential of NAnt is
far greater than just being a build tool. I have demonstrated how it can be
used as a powerful automated backup tool, and there are many other possibilities.
Every time you find yourself performing a repetitive administration task, ask
yourself, "could NAnt be doing this for me?"
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