Retention Based File-Cleanup Script (Bash)

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Description

It's a bash script and it's used to clean files with retention period. So, it might be useful to clear large-scale backup storing servers to delete these files with a particular retention period. I just built the same script with 3 ways of working.

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Feature

• Easy to handle this script
• Files removing with a retention period
• Easy to schedule it as a cron job.
• Easy to manage Backup/Log's on a Linux machine (Cron Job/Manual)

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Pre-Requested Packages Installation

sudo yum -y install git 

please note that this is a bash script where I used for Linux-based distros and servers.

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How to get this script

git clone https://github.com/yousafkhamza/retention-based-cleanup-script.git
cd retention-based-cleanup-script
chmod +x cleanup*.sh

How to use and sample using templates with output

Method 1 - (Standard)

yousaf@MSI:/mnt/c/Users/Downloads$ bash cleanup.sh
Enter your directory path: ./wordpress                    <--------- Enter your absolute path of that directory you need
Enter retension period: 2200                              <-------- Retention period
--------------------------------------------------------------
The below-listed files are older than 2200 days under this directory ./wordpress
--------------------------------------------------------------
./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

Do you want to remove these above-listed files? (Please verify it before) [Y/N]: y                                  <------------------ Ask you a confirmation before deleting

Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

Method 2 - (Command-line value passing)

yousaf@MSI:/mnt/c/Users/Downloads$ bash cleanup_cmd_variable_passing.sh ./wordpresss/ 4000                          <---------- First value should be absalute path and second one is the retetion period
--------------------------------------------------------------
The below-listed files are older than 2200 days under this directory ./wordpress
--------------------------------------------------------------
./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

Do you want to remove these above-listed files? (Please verify it before) [Y/N]: y                                  <------------------ Ask you a confirmation before deleting

Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

Method 3 - (For Cronjob and Commandline script (without asking any confirmation before deleting))

yousaf@MSI:/mnt/c/Users/Downloads$ ./cleanup_for_cron.sh ./wordpress/ 2000
--------------------------------------------------------------
The below-listed files are older than 2000 days under this directory ./wordpress/
--------------------------------------------------------------
./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

!...........................WARNING..............................!
We are going to start deleting these above files within 10sec....
if you do not need to execute this purging task, please quite this script on here using with [ctrl + c]
!...........................WARNING..............................!

Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/css/farbtastic.css
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/browser.png
Deleting ./wordpress/wp-admin/images/comment-grey-bubble-2x.png

CronJob Example

crontab -e
0 3 * * * /path/to/cleanup_for_cron.sh /path/to/location/ 30                    <---------------------- Run cleanup_for_cron.sh at 3 am every day

Who you guys need to set up an automation backup/log removing as per the retention period please use the script with cronjob.

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Architecture

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Behind the Code

vim cleanup.sh

#!/bin/bash

read -p "Enter your directory: " directory
read -p "Enter retension period: " rp

rm -f ./delcleanup.txt
if [[ -z "$directory" || -z  "$rp" ]]
then
    echo "Please specify a valid absalute direcotry path and retionsion period!"
    exit 1
else
    if ! [[ "$directory" =~ ^[[:alnum:]]*$ || "$rp" =~ [^0-9] ]];
    then
        if [[ -d "$directory" ]];
        then
            echo "--------------------------------------------------------------"
            echo "The below-listed files are older than $rp days under this directory $directory"
            echo "--------------------------------------------------------------"
            find "$directory" -type f -iname "*" -mtime +"$rp" -exec ls {} \; | tee -a ./delcleanup.txt
            echo ""
            if [ -s "./delcleanup.txt" ]
            then
                read -p "Do you want to remove these above-listed files? (Please verify it before) [Y/N]: " con
                echo ""
                    if [[ "$con" =~ ^([yY][eE][sS]|[yY])+$ ]]
                    then
                        for delete in $(cat ./delcleanup.txt); do echo "Deleting $delete"; rm -f $delete ; done;
                        rm -f ./delcleanup.txt
                    else
                        rm -f ./delcleanup.txt
                    fi
            else
                echo "There is no files found with this $rp days retention period!"
                rm -f ./delcleanup.txt
            fi
        else
            echo "No such direcotry found!"
        fi
    else
        echo "Please enter a valid path and period!"
        exit 1
    fi
fi

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Conclusion

It's a simple bash script and it's used to clean files with retention period. So, maybe it's useful for those who handled backup/log management on Linux system engineers. Please let me know if you have to face any issues while using this script and please find the below contact details of who needs to connect me.

⚙️ Connect with Me