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Working with Files

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I worked on:

Task 2: Create a backup

In this task, I created a backup of an entire file structure.

My work environment had the following folder structure:

I used tar to create a backup.

To ensure that I was in the /home/ec2-user/ folder, I entered the following command into the terminal and pressed Enter.

pwd

Output:

/home/ec2-user

To validate that the CompanyA folder exists, I entered the following command into the terminal and pressed Enter.

ls -R CompanyA

Output:

/home/ec2-user/CompanyA CompanyA/: Employees Finance HR IA Management SharedFolders CompanyA/Employees: Schedules.csv CompanyA/Finance: Salary.csv CompanyA/HR: Assessments.csv Managers.csv CompanyA/IA: CompanyA/Management: Promotions.csv Sections.csv

To back up the entire CompanyA folder structure recursively, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

tar -csvpzf backup.CompanyA.tar.gz CompanyA

Output:

CompanyA/ CompanyA/Management/ CompanyA/Management/Sections.csv CompanyA/Management/Promotions.csv CompanyA/Employees/ CompanyA/Employees/Schedules.csv CompanyA/Finance/ CompanyA/Finance/Salary.csv CompanyA/HR/ CompanyA/HR/Managers.csv CompanyA/HR/Assessments.csv CompanyA/IA/ CompanyA/SharedFolders/ ls backup.CompanyA.tar.gz CompanyA

To verify that the archive was created, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

ls

Output:

CompanyA backup.CompanyA.tar.gz

The backup.CompanyA.tar.gz folder contains all the folders and files in the CompanyA folder. I can copy it and unzip it to get the entire structure on another location or host.

Task 3: Log the backup

In this task, I created a file for logging the date, time, and file name of the backup tar file that I created. This file indicates when I created backups and could be useful to avoid creating unnecessary backups in the future.

To navigate to the CompanyA folder, I entered the following command into the terminal and pressed Enter.

cd /home/ec2-user/CompanyA

Output:

/home/ec2-user/CompanyA

To create an empty backup file named backups.csv, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

touch SharedFolders/backups.csv

To add the date, time, and file name to the backups.csv file, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

echo "25 Aug 25 2021, 16:59, backup.CompanyA.tar.gz" | sudo tee SharedFolders/backups

Output:

"25 Aug 25 2019, 16:59, backup.CompanyA.tar gz" | sudo tee SharedFolders/backups 25 Aug 25 2019, 16:59, backup.CompanyA.tar.gz
The tee command and | redirector, were learned about later. You can use the tee command to write information both in the terminal and in a file. The | redirector redirects the output of the echo command to the second command, tee, which writes it to both the terminal and the SharedFolders/backups file.

To display the content of the file, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

cat SharedFolders/backups.csv

Output:

SharedFolders/backups.csv 25 Aug 25 2021, 16:59, backup.CompanyA.tar.gz

Task 4: Move the backup file

In this task, I transferred the backup file to the IA folder.I could follow these steps to make the file accessible to another user or team that does not have access to the folder where I created the backup file.

To validate that I was in the CompanyA folder in the terminal, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

pwd

Output:

/home/ec2-user/CompanyA

To transfer the backup file to the IA team computer, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

mv ../backup.CompanyA.tar.gz IA/

To verify that the backup file was moved, I entered the following command and pressed Enter.

ls . IA

Output:

. IA .: Employees Finance HR IA Management SharedFolders IA: backup.CompanyA.tar.gz

This command lists the content of both the current folder, CompanyA, and the IA folder. The backup file is not in the current folder anymore and was moved to the IA folder.

Related Topics

Folder Structure Folder Structure