About scheduling backups
A scheduled backup automatically invokes a full backup of your sites at the scheduled date and time. Scheduling backups frees up manual resources and saves the inconvenience of remembering to invoke regular manual backups.
A full backup can be scheduled for:
User configuration information
Files in the site owned by you
Important: Ensure that the target server has enough disk space, failing which, the backup will terminate.
Ensure you have the following information ready.
The name of the FTP server on which you want to save your data
Your FTP login user name and password to log onto the FTP server
The directory path of the backup directory on the FTP server
Maximum file size that can be handled by the FTP server utility installed on your backup server
Important: Various file systems and FTP server utilities have limits on the file size they can handle. If the size of your backup file exceeds the file management threshold of the file system or the FTP server utility on your backup server, then WEBppliance splits the file into multiple files before continuing with the backup. The split files follow the naming convention as given below: <backupfilename.tar> <backupfilename.1.tar> <backupfilename.2.tar> where backupfilename is the name of your backup file.
A full backup consumes time and disk space. When you back up data, the existing archive is not overwritten; a new backup (in tar or tgz format) is written to your backup server.
It is important that you schedule the backup at a time of low activity.
Note: Files will be accessible even as the backup is in progress. But, please be aware that any data or configuration changes that occur after your backup is taken will be lost if you restore that backup to your system. For example, if you perform a backup at 1:00 P.M. and restore that backup at 5:00 P.M. the same day, all email messages that arrive during that time period will be lost.
A backup can be scheduled daily, weekly or monthly. The frequency of changes to information is a good indicator of how often you need to back up data. If the frequency of data revisions is high, then a backup must be scheduled daily, so that loss of data is minimal.
If the files are backed up successfully to the backup server, you will receive a mail notification to that effect. The mail is sent to the email address specified at the time of scheduling the backup.