Here is a remote backup script I've installed here as a three cron jobs
running at different frequencies. (rsync >=3 required)
So far, it seems to work as intended.
Is there anything we should do to improve this?


#!/usr/bin/env python
"""
Backup remote Durus database.
This assumes that you have configured your system so that
this user can ssh to the remote system without entering a
password.
"""
from commands import getoutput
import sys, os
try:
     remote_host, remote_path, local_path = sys.argv[1:]
except:
     print("%s   " % sys.argv[0])
     raise SystemExit

local_prepackstat_path = local_path + '.prepackstat'
local_prepackstat = ''

rsync_flag = '--append-verify'

if os.path.exists(local_prepackstat_path):
     local_prepackstat = open(local_prepackstat_path).read()

remote_prepackstat = getoutput("ssh %s stat -t %s.prepack" %
(remote_host, remote_path))
if local_prepackstat:
     if local_prepackstat == remote_prepackstat:
         rsync_flag = '--append'
f = open(local_prepackstat_path, 'w')
f.write(remote_prepackstat)
f.close()

command = 'rsync %s --rsh=ssh %s:%s %s' % (
         rsync_flag, remote_host, remote_path, local_path)
#print(command)
os.system(command)