Plex Media Server database backup script.

plexDatabaseBackupScript.sh

#!/bin/bash

# Backup a Plex database.
# Author Scott Smereka
# Version 1.0

# Script Tested on:
# Ubuntu 12.04 on 2/2/2014	[ OK ] 

# Plex Database Location.  The trailing slash is 
# needed and important for rsync.
plexDatabase="/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/"

# Location to backup the directory to.
backupDirectory="/srv/raid10/backups/plexmediaserver/database/"

# Log file for script's output named with 
# the script's name, date, and time of execution.
scriptName=$(basename ${0})
log="/srv/raid10/backups/logs/${scriptName}_`date +%m%d%y%H%M%S`.log"

# Check for root permissions
if [[ $EUID -ne 0 ]]; then
  echo -e "${scriptName} requires root privledges.\n"
  echo -e "sudo $0 $*\n"
  exit 1
fi

# Create Log
echo -e "Staring Backup of Plex Database." > $log 2>&1
echo -e "------------------------------------------------------------\n" >> $log 2>&1

# Stop Plex
echo -e "\n\nStopping Plex Media Server." >> $log 2>&1
echo -e "------------------------------------------------------------\n" >> $log 2>&1
sudo service plexmediaserver stop >> $log 2>&1

# Backup database
echo -e "\n\nStarting Backup." >> $log 2>&1
echo -e "------------------------------------------------------------\n" >> $log 2>&1
sudo rsync -av --delete "$plexDatabase" "$backupDirectory" >> $log 2>&1

# Restart Plex
echo -e "\n\nStarting Plex Media Server." >> $log 2>&1
echo -e "------------------------------------------------------------\n" >> $log 2>&1
sudo service plexmediaserver start >> $log 2>&1

# Done
echo -e "\n\nBackup Complete." >> $log 2>&1

Working on 18.04. Thanks!

It worked in focal fossa, good job, thank you!

Thank you for the script! I've modified somewhat it so that:

1. Now EXCLUDES the /Cache directory (that was trickier than expected) which for me saves ~700 mb of space per backup.
2. Also updated log to append so log is a continuous track of when and what.
3. Also updated as I have both a READ ONLY mount and a READ/WRITE mount, so now the R/W share is ONLY mounted at run time of script (me and my “this user should ONLY ever have READ access to my media” paranoia… lol)… NOTE: this also then requires the /mnt/buplex share to have the “noauto” option in /etc/fstab file…
4. Creates a different backup file via TAR each time, vs using RSYNC (which I found walking my tree rather slow and painful, and I want separate DB backups in case DB gets corrupted somehow... I don't to overwrite a good backup with a bad one etc).
5. Possibly a few other tweaks I'm forgetting. Sorry.

NOTE: the LAST bit of the file (unmounting R/W share) happens AFTER logging and r/w access to the log file (in my setup) ends... so NO ERROR will be caught if unmount of r/w mount fails. Move your log file somewhere else if this concerns you more than me (ie, you set this up to be automated, not manually run) ;-)

Some of the above others probably don’t want or need, but just FYI might prove useful (and as a note to self for my own future sanity!)

SCRIPT CODE BELOW HERE

#!/bin/bash


# Backup a Plex database.
# Original Author Scott Smereka
# Edited by Neil C.
# Version 1.1


# Script Tested on:
# Ubuntu 20.04 on 2020-Aug-9 [ OK ] 


# Plex Database Location. The trailing slash is 
# needed and important for rsync.
plexDatabase="/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server"


# Location to backup the directory to.
backupDirectory="/mnt/buplex/Archive/Plex_Backups"


# Log file for script's output named with 
# the script's name, date, and time of execution.
scriptName=$(basename ${0})
log="/mnt/buplex/Archive/Plex_Backups/logs/buplex.log"


# Check for root permissions
if [[ $EUID -ne 0 ]]; then
echo -e "${scriptName} requires root privileges.\n"
echo -e "sudo $0 $*\n"
exit 1
fi


# Mount Plex Media Share in R/W mode
sudo mount /mnt/buplex 

# Create Log
echo -e "***********" >> $log 2>&1
echo -e "$(date '+%Y-%b-%d at %k:%M:%S') :: Mounted Share in R/W Mode." | tee -a $log 2>&1


# Stop Plex
echo -e "$(date '+%Y-%b-%d at %k:%M:%S') :: Stopping Plex Media Server." | tee -a $log 2>&1
sudo service plexmediaserver stop | tee -a $log 2>&1


# Backup database
echo -e "$(date '+%Y-%b-%d at %k:%M:%S') :: Starting Backup." | tee -a $log 2>&1
# WORKING Line: sudo tar cfz "$backupDirectory/buplex-$(date '+%Y-%m(%b)-%d at %khr %Mmin').tar.gz"  "$plexDatabase" >> $log 2>&1
# cd into  directory so the magic --exclude below works per:
# https://stackoverflow.com/questions/984204/shell-command-to-tar-directory-excluding-certain-files-folders
cd "$plexDatabase"
sudo tar cz --exclude='./Cache' -f "$backupDirectory/buplex-$(date '+%Y-%m(%b)-%d at %khr %Mmin').tar.gz" . >> $log 2>&1


# Restart Plex
echo -e "$(date '+%Y-%b-%d at %k:%M:%S') :: Starting Plex Media Server." | tee -a $log 2>&1
sudo service plexmediaserver start | tee -a $log 2>&1


# Done
echo -e "$(date '+%Y-%b-%d at %k:%M:%S') :: Backup Complete. Unmounting R/W Share..." | tee -a $log 2>&1
echo -e "***********" >> $log 2>&1
sudo umount /mnt/buplex

Tested on Linux Mint 19 Mate, works great

Can you add the feature to delete Backup-Version there are older then like 14 versions?

Create another bash file and add the following then run a cron weekly to keep things tidy, this is set to 10 days but depends how often you backup.

#!/bin/bash
#Name:
#Author:
#Date:
#Description: Cleanup files older than 10 days inside DIRECTOR_TO_CLEANUP

DIRECTORY_TO_CLEANUP="/mnt/buplex/Archive/Plex_Backups"
LOGFILE="/home/cleanup.txt"

/usr/bin/find ${DIRECTORY_TO_CLEANUP} -type f -mtime +10 -delete >${LOGFILE} 2>&1

Sadly I have a huge /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Media folder that rsync and tar got killed within the process to backup that 'Media' folder.

Any other idea?

tar -zcvf is running for a while and it gets killed:

Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitle Contributions/com.plexapp.agents.localmedia/
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitle Contributions/com.plexapp.system/
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/GoP-0.xml
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitles/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Subtitles.xml
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Thumbnails/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Thumbnails/thumb1.jpg
Killed

Sadly I have a huge /var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Media folder that rsync and tar got killed within the process to backup that 'Media' folder.

Any other idea?

tar -zcvf is running for a while and it gets killed:

Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitle Contributions/com.plexapp.agents.localmedia/
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitle Contributions/com.plexapp.system/
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/GoP-0.xml
Media/localhost/1/571848b10aa99619bf4b3fab7e89847194a46fe.bundle/Contents/Subtitles/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Subtitles.xml
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Thumbnails/
Media/localhost/1/ef636c36896a6c53e515dd3c07a4df2d8dbd532.bundle/Contents/Thumbnails/thumb1.jpg
Killed

I'm unsure if you still have issues with this, but I went from 244G used on media to 24 after deleting video previews.