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Check borgbackup

Overview

Checks the status of the last borgbackup run by parsing the borg logfile. Alerts on non-zero return codes from the create or prune steps, and warns if the last successful backup is older than a configurable threshold (default: 24 hours). Also detects active borg mounts in /proc/mounts. Requires root or sudo.

Important Notes:

  • The logfile must contain lines in the format start: YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS, end: YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS, create_retc: N, prune_retc: N
  • Borg return code 1 (warning) is treated as OK by the check; return codes >= 2 trigger alerts
  • If the logfile is missing or incomplete (any of the four fields not found), the check exits with UNKNOWN
  • Active borgfs mounts are reported as WARN immediately, before evaluating the logfile

Data Collection:

  • Parses /var/log/borg/borg.log for four fields: start, end, create_retc, and prune_retc
  • Checks /proc/mounts for active borgfs mounts
  • Calculates the time since the last backup started and the backup duration

Fact Sheet

Fact Value
Check Plugin Download https://github.com/Linuxfabrik/monitoring-plugins/tree/main/check-plugins/borgbackup
Nagios/Icinga Check Name check_borgbackup
Check Interval Recommendation Every day
Can be called without parameters Yes
Runs on Linux
Compiled for Windows No

Help

usage: borgbackup [-h] [-V] [-c CRIT] [-w WARN]

Checks the status of the last borgbackup run by parsing the borg logfile.
Alerts on non-zero return codes from the create or prune steps, and warns if
the last successful backup is older than a configurable threshold (default: 24
hours). Also detects active borg mounts in /proc/mounts. Requires root or
sudo.

options:
  -h, --help           show this help message and exit
  -V, --version        show program's version number and exit
  -c, --critical CRIT  CRIT threshold for the time since the last backup
                       started, in hours. Default: None
  -w, --warning WARN   WARN threshold for the time since the last backup
                       started, in hours. Default: 24

Usage Examples

./borgbackup

Output:

Last Backup started 2021-06-02 23:05:07, ended 2021-06-02 23:05:43, took 36s.
* Create retc: 0, State: 
* Prune retc: 0, State:

States

  • OK if the last backup completed successfully (return codes < 2) and is within the time threshold.
  • WARN if active borgfs mounts are detected.
  • WARN if create_retc or prune_retc is >= 2.
  • WARN if the last backup started more than --warning hours ago (default: 24).
  • CRIT if the last backup started more than --critical hours ago (default: None).
  • UNKNOWN if the logfile /var/log/borg/borg.log is not found, empty, or missing expected fields.

Perfdata / Metrics

Name Type Description
create_retc Number Return code of the borg create step (0 = success, 1 = warning, >= 2 = error).
duration Seconds Duration of the backup run (end - start).
prune_retc Number Return code of the borg prune step (0 = success, 1 = warning, >= 2 = error).

Troubleshooting

Could not find all expected values in the logfile.
If either starttime, endtime, create_retc or prune_retc is missing from the logfile, the backup has failed in some way. Check the borg logs for details.

Credits, License