Scheduling MySQL backups with Laravel

scheduling mysql backups with laravel.php

To manually dump the database you can run the following one-liner code

mysqldump -u[user] -p[pass] [db] > [file_path]

But what if you want to automate the process, here are the steps:

1. Setup cron entry to your server
* * * * * php /path-to-your-project/artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1

2. Create a command BackupDatabase by running the following code:
php artisan make:command BackupDatabase

3. Navigate to app/Console/Commands/BackupDatabase.php and replace the code with the following:
<?php

namespace App\Console\Commands;

use Illuminate\Console\Command;
use Symfony\Component\Process\Process;
use Symfony\Component\Process\Exception\ProcessFailedException;

class BackupDatabase extends Command
{
    protected $signature = 'db:backup';

    protected $description = 'Backup the database';

    protected $process;

    public function __construct()
    {
        parent::__construct();

        $this->process = new Process(sprintf(
            'mysqldump -u%s -p%s %s > %s',
            config('database.connections.mysql.username'),
            config('database.connections.mysql.password'),
            config('database.connections.mysql.database'),
            storage_path('app/backups/backup-' . time() . '.sql')
        ));
    }

    public function handle()
    {
        try {
            $this->process->mustRun();

            $this->info('The backup has been proceed successfully.');
        } catch (ProcessFailedException $exception) {
            $this->error('The backup process has been failed.');
        }
    }
}

?>

4. Schedule the backup task, navigate to app/Console/Kernel.php and append the following line of code inside schedule method to run database backups every Saturday at 11PM. You can set the frequency as per your requirements
$schedule->command('db:backup')->saturdays()->at('23:00');

5. Create backups directory inside storage/app directory and place a .gitignore file inside backups directory with the following code
*
!.gitignore

That’s it you’ve now enabled weekly automated database backups in Laravel.