Using backupios from cron

Technote (FAQ)

Question

How can I run the backupios command automatically from the crontab?

Cause

I get errors when I try to configure the crontab to run a backupios automatically.

Answer

Many commands fail when run from cron, even though they work when run from the padmin command line interface (CLI). 

Failing commands include mount <NFS directory> and backupios.

This is because /home/padmin/.profile is an important part of the CLI, changing the path and aliasing many commands.

The cron function does not read a user's .profile, and so the commands fail. This is working as designed.

To enable the cron to run commands in the same way as the CLI, the command should start with /usr/ios/cli/ioscli

For example:

/usr/ios/cli/ioscli mount nimserver:/export /mnt
/usr/ios/cli/ioscli backupios -file /mnt/vios_backup -mksysb

If you want to redirect the output to a file you must use the "tee" command instead of the ">"

For example:

/usr/ios/cli/ioscli backupios -file /mnt/vios_backup -mksysb | tee /home/padmin/backupioserror.log