If you are running self-hosted services, home automation, or custom web applications on a Raspberry Pi, you already know its Achilles’ heel: the microSD card. SD cards are prone to corruption, especially with heavy database read\/write cycles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To build a truly resilient architecture, your data cannot live solely on the Pi. It needs to be offloaded to a redundant, enterprise-grade storage solution. In this guide, we will walk through setting up a fully automated, daily backup from a Raspberry Pi directly to a Ubiquiti UNAS Pro<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We will build a script that targets specific critical directories and performs a complete Before the Raspberry Pi can send data, the UNAS Pro needs to be ready to receive it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We need the Raspberry Pi to treat the UNAS Pro network share as if it were a local physical drive. We will achieve this using 1. SSH into your Raspberry Pi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Install the necessary utilities:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Create a local mount point:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. Create a hidden credentials file so your UNAS Pro password isn’t exposed in plain text in the system configuration:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Add the following lines (replace with your UNAS Pro IP and user details):<\/p>\n\n\n\n Secure the file:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5. Edit the Add this line to the bottom:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 6. Mount the drive to test it:<\/p>\n\n\n\n To allow our script to perform a 1. Create a MySQL configuration file for the root user:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Add your database credentials:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Secure the file:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now we will create the bash script that handles the heavy lifting: exporting the database, compressing specific folders, and cleaning up old backups to prevent your UNAS Pro from filling up completely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Create the script file:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Paste the following code. (Make sure to modify the 3. Make the script executable:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final piece of the architecture is scheduling the script to run automatically every single day. The middle of the night is usually best to avoid resource contention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Open the cron table:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Add the following line to the bottom to run the backup every day at 2:00 AM:<\/p>\n\n\n\n You have now successfully engineered a robust, automated disaster recovery plan. Every night at 2:00 AM, your Raspberry Pi will dump its entire database, compress your essential configuration and application folders, and securely transfer them over the network to your Ubiquiti UNAS Pro. Furthermore, it will automatically prune archives older than two weeks, ensuring your storage remains optimized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If you are running self-hosted services, home automation, or custom web applications on a Raspberry Pi, you already know its Achilles’ heel: the microSD card. SD cards are prone to corruption, especially with heavy database read\/write cycles. To build a truly resilient architecture, your data cannot live solely on the Pi. It needs to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-it-networks"],"yoast_head":"\nmysqldump<\/code> of your databases, compressing everything neatly into daily archives.<\/p>\n\n\n\nStep 1: Prepare the UNAS Pro<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Pi_Backups<\/code>).<\/li>\n\n\n\nbackup_user<\/code>) with a strong password.<\/li>\n\n\n\nPi_Backups<\/code> folder.<\/li>\n\n\n\nStep 2: Mount the UNAS Pro on the Raspberry Pi<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
cifs-utils<\/code>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
sudo apt update\nsudo apt install cifs-utils<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsudo mkdir -p \/mnt\/unas_backup<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsudo nano \/etc\/.unas_creds<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nusername=backup_user\npassword=YourStrongPassword\ndomain=WORKGROUP<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsudo chmod 600 \/etc\/.unas_creds<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n\/etc\/fstab<\/code> file to ensure the NAS mounts automatically on boot:<\/p>\n\n\n\nsudo nano \/etc\/fstab<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n\/\/192.168.1.XXX\/Pi_Backups \/mnt\/unas_backup cifs credentials=\/etc\/.unas_creds,uid=1000,gid=1000,iocharset=utf8 0 0<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsudo mount -a<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nStep 3: Secure Your MySQL Credentials<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
mysqldump<\/code> without prompting for a password (which would break automation), we need to store the database credentials securely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
nano ~\/.my.cnf<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n[client]\nuser=root\npassword=YourDatabasePassword<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nchmod 600 ~\/.my.cnf<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nStep 4: Write the Backup Script<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
nano ~\/pi_backup.sh<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nTARGET_FOLDERS<\/code> to point to the actual directories you want to back up, like \/etc<\/code> or \/var\/www<\/code>):<\/p>\n\n\n\n#!\/bin\/bash\n\n# Define variables\nBACKUP_DATE=$(date +\"%Y-%m-%d\")\nNAS_MOUNT=\"\/mnt\/unas_backup\"\nDEST_DIR=\"$NAS_MOUNT\/$BACKUP_DATE\"\n\n# Define the folders you want to backup (separated by spaces)\nTARGET_FOLDERS=\"\/var\/www\/html \/etc\/nginx \/home\/pi\/docker-data\"\n\n# Check if NAS is mounted before proceeding\nif ! mountpoint -q $NAS_MOUNT; then\n echo \"Error: UNAS Pro is not mounted at $NAS_MOUNT\"\n exit 1\nfi\n\n# Create today's backup directory\nmkdir -p \"$DEST_DIR\"\n\n# 1. Database Backup (mysqldump)\necho \"Starting MySQL backup...\"\nmysqldump --all-databases | gzip > \"$DEST_DIR\/db_backup_$BACKUP_DATE.sql.gz\"\n\n# 2. File\/Folder Backup (tar compression)\necho \"Starting file backup...\"\ntar -czf \"$DEST_DIR\/files_backup_$BACKUP_DATE.tar.gz\" $TARGET_FOLDERS\n\n# 3. Cleanup: Remove backups older than 14 days\necho \"Cleaning up old backups...\"\nfind \"$NAS_MOUNT\" -mindepth 1 -maxdepth 1 -type d -mtime +14 -exec rm -rf {} \\;\n\necho \"Backup completed successfully!\"<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nchmod +x ~\/pi_backup.sh<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nStep 5: Automate with Cron<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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crontab -e<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n0 2 * * * \/home\/pi\/pi_backup.sh > \/home\/pi\/backup_log.txt 2>&1<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nSummary<\/h2>\n\n\n\n