I have a web server running Fedora 10 located in a remote location. It is running Cron to automatically backup database and other critical files onsite. I would like to be able to automate a process to connect to it from here at home and pull backups off daily so that I have an off-site backup, too. My system here is Windows Vista. My server does not run FTP. So far, I have been using WinSCP to manually pull backups.

One problem I always run into is that I live in a dorm at a university. I think the network policies I live under are too strict to allow a push for backup strategy from the server side, as gaining access to my home computer behind this firewall would be difficult, and I am on DHCP, whereas the server is statically addressed. Otherwise, a pushed backup would probably be easy from the server.

Does anyone know of a good program that could implement a pull backup strategy like this over SCP?

There's about a million mini apps for doing rsync backups including Windows clients which will run your backup jobs on a schedule. Just google rsync backup, you'll find something. If nothing else, you can use rsync.net's client. Should work well.

- Arch

Another solution is to use (free+linux+windows+easy to use!) hamachi VPN on your two endpoints... This will get rid of your firewall issues, also its encrypted, so you can run ftp from point to point worry free. As scp tends to be rather heavy handed...

Install a ftp server on your windows box (cerebus or filezilla)

Then just push the backups using your existing crontab nad pointing at the hamachi IP's...

Unfortunalty crappy firewalls like bluecoat are now blocking hamachi's ip range.

Another tunnelling is ssh itself. Putty supports ssh tunnelling so u can google with "putty ssh tunnelling" keywords..
And i dont think ftp is as good as rsync to backup. I use rsync from windows to linux and linux to windows backups. i installed cwrsync on windows side.

best regards.