This script backups both the database and files of a WordPress blog into a remote FTP server (while keeping a local copy). It’s an update of my WordPress Backup to FTP script. The main changes are auto-detecting database settings and better support for caching plugins (specifically WP-Cache). The new version makes it easier to backup multiple WordPress blogs to the same FTP server.

Usage is pretty simple after a short initial configuration. First, save the the script and make it executable:

chmod +x wp-backup

(assuming you saved it under the name wp-backup). After saving it edit the file with your favorite editor and set the 5 configuration variable to whatever is appropriate for you. BACKUP_DIR is the folder to save the local backups to. FTP_HOST, FTP_USER, FTP_PASS control the FTP host, username and password, respectively, for the remote backup server. FTP_BACKUP_DIR sets the folder on the FTP server to save the remote backup to.

Now that the initial configuration is done, all you need to do is execute the script and give the path to the blog as an argument. For example:

./wp-backup /home/someuser/myblog

And that it, the script will backup your files (excluding cache) and database to both a local and remote locations. This allows using the same script to backup multiple WordPress blogs, unlike the previous script which had to be modified for each blog.

And now the script itself:

#!/bin/bash
 
# Copyright 2008, 2010 Guy Rutenberg <http://www.guyrutenberg.com/contact-me>
# WordPress FTP backup 2.0
#
# Easily backup wordpress instances via ftp.
#
# Change Log:
# ===========
# 2.0:
#  - Auto-detect database settings.
#  - Exclude cache data from backups.

BACKUP_DIR=
FTP_HOST=
FTP_USER=
FTP_PASS=
FTP_BACKUP_DIR=

# end of configuration - you probably don't need to touch anything below

PROG=`basename "$0"`
print_usage () {
    echo "USAGE: ${PROG} [options] BLOG_ROOT"
    echo "Backup a WordPress blog"
}

print_help ()  {
    print_usage
    cat << EOF
 
Options:
    -h, --help          show this help message and exit
 
EOF
}

TEMP=`getopt -o h --long help -n "$PROG" -- "$@"`
if (($?)); then
    print_usage
    exit 1
fi

eval set -- "$TEMP"
 
while true ; do
    case "$1" in
        -h|--help) print_help; exit ;;
        --) shift; break;;
    esac
done

if [ -z "$1" ]
then
 print_usage > /dev/stderr
 exit 1
fi

BLOG_DIR=$1
DB_NAME=`echo "<?php require_once(\"${BLOG_DIR}/wp-config.php\"); echo DB_NAME;" | php`
DB_USER=`echo "<?php require_once(\"${BLOG_DIR}/wp-config.php\"); echo DB_USER;" | php`
DB_PASS=`echo "<?php require_once(\"${BLOG_DIR}/wp-config.php\"); echo DB_PASSWORD;" | php`
DB_HOST=`echo "<?php require_once(\"${BLOG_DIR}/wp-config.php\"); echo DB_HOST;" | php`

BLOG_DIR=`dirname "$BLOG_DIR"`/`basename "$BLOG_DIR"`
BACKUP_DIR=`dirname "$BACKUP_DIR"`/`basename "$BACKUP_DIR"`

echo -n "dumping database... "
DUMP_NAME=${DB_NAME}-$(date +%Y%m%d).sql.bz2
mysqldump --user=${DB_USER} --password=${DB_PASS} --host=${DB_HOST} \
 --databases ${DB_NAME} \
 | bzip2 -c > ${BACKUP_DIR}/${DUMP_NAME}
if [ "$?" -ne "0" ]; then
	echo "failed!"
	exit 1
fi
echo "done"
 
echo -n "Creating tarball... "
TAR_NAME=${BLOG_DIR##*/}-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.bz2
tar -cjf ${BACKUP_DIR}/${BLOG_DIR##*/}-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.bz2 --exclude cache ${BLOG_DIR}
if [ "$?" -ne "0" ]; then
	echo "failed!"
	exit 2
fi
echo "done"
 
echo -n "Uploading SQL dump and tarball to FTP... "
lftp -u ${FTP_USER},${FTP_PASS} ${FTP_HOST} <<EOF
cd "${FTP_BACKUP_DIR}"
put "${BACKUP_DIR}/${DUMP_NAME}"
put "${BACKUP_DIR}/${TAR_NAME}"

EOF
if [ "$?" -ne "0" ]; then
	echo "failed!"
	exit 3
fi
echo "done"