UBB.Developers Forums UBB.threads 7 Development How Do I? Back up and other disaster recovery issues

Yesterday our site vanished from the net, together with the site of our isp for several hours... (Not nice)

I was not sure when , if ever, it would, come back

I was not prepared for a catastrophe... and recovering the site, so all i could really do was wait to see if things got solved which they did

1. What do i need to do to keep my board backed up and ready to restore in a new server?

2. It there a way to set DNS' so if the primary site is gone, ISP bankrupt, it would go to a back up site?

3. Is there a way to keep a second ISP, and a weay to have everything that happens on ISP 1 copyed to ISP 2... so qhen disarter strikes all that is needed is to change DNS's?

What is the safest, easyest, and cheappest way to be ready if something wrong happens?

Thank you and sorry for so many questions

#3 could be done using scripts to backup the database, transfer via ftp to secondary server, load backup into secondary server's database. You could also have the secondary server check to see if the primary server is running and if not it could be made to send you a notice so you could make any needed adjustments.

Backing up of your board depends on what kind of access you have. The most important thing to backup for threads is the database. This can be done through phpMyAdmin. You can download a complete copy of your database. With my host I have C-Panel. It has a section called backup. I have the option to download a database backup or a full site backup. I regularly back up the database. Before I apply any mods I do a full site backup. After the mods are successfully installed I do a full site backup again. I also have my hacked files in thier own folder on my hardrive. The hacked files are placed in the proper folder structure so that I can simply ftp the folder up to reaply my hacks.

You should have ftp access to your site. You can ftp all files that you need to back up. You should also have these files locally from when you created them. If not, then use an ftp program to download your entire site. Once you have it locally, you can zip it up using something like winzip or stuffit.

Hope this helps.

I was suggesting something more automated, using cron.

I prefer to do it manually. Then I no its done and hasn't timed out or something like that. That's just me though. I prefer rear wheel drive and I hate traction control.

this looks like the best option :-)

do those scripts exist or do they have to be created?

my isp does not have cpanel or any other way to backup the site with just the press of a button

I have myphpadmin but I do not understand it

I do backup my site weekly by just downloading the whole thing to my hard drive... but if something crashes or my isp goes out of business i do not think i have much chance of getting that back up file online and working on another isp...

I've been playing with your site.

Downloading everything to your hard drive does not get any data. Only the program files which change very rarely. With only those - you'd have a totally empty forum.

Her host is running in safe mode - so we are at the edge in what phpMyAdmin can do without timing out - as her databases have become almost too big for that. In safe mode you can't override the max_execution time.

I've got some automated PHP scripts (phpmybackup), which could backup the Database and FTP it somewhere, or make it so you could download it... - but again - they time out given the size of the database.

To my knowledge we don't have shell access.

So the access to the server leaves our hands pretty tied.
We need something that can backup a large database through the browser without timing out.

With the information Josh provided he is quite correct in that the options are very limited without shell access. Perhaps a new host is no order?

You can limit the number of rows that should be exported in phpMyAdmin. Don't export the post table at once, only choose f.e. 1000 rows.
You can try bigger values, until the script times out.

Takes some time but it should work.

Thank you very much for all the answers and suggestions.
It does not look like I will be in good shape if something goes wrong...
I may be able to get shell or telnet access. Will ask my ISP. Should be pretty standards

Can i properly back up when having them

Thank you Josh

How big can a database be before the timeout problems?
I could delete a lot of posts... but it will be painful :-(

(I like this idea of having a secong isp hold a duplicate site, a site that get updated by itself every two or three days...)

It depends on the timelimit set in the server's PHP setup. They can mandate that a script not run for more than X number of seconds. So when it hits that point the script stops running.

They do this so someone doesn't start a script running on the server that runs for days and uses resources.

Last time I backed you up - I had to do the tables separately - particularly the w3t_Posts table which was about 30 MB (about 44,000 lines (posts) ) and that is probably approaching the limit.

Don't really have any idea of how it can be automated given the limitations on your server though.

[]JoshPet said:
I've got some automated PHP scripts (phpmybackup), which could backup the Database and FTP it somewhere, or make it so you could download it...[/]

Josh, is there anyway that I could get a copy of the scripts you have for the backups?

I've been terribly worried about losing my data. Early on when the site came up...we had lost the entire board...I want to ensure I have a good backup. I'm still new at learning all of this (rookie).

Thanks

Great Script.

http://www.normsland.co.uk/phpmybackup/

Looking for backup solutions myself. I found this thread, but it doesn't mention that the forums should be shut down before a backup? I was thinking of somehow using CPanel's backup function, but the forums would be open when that executed. Couldn't that create a corrupt backup?

I think there's a possibility of winding up with an inconsistent backup, if the backup is made while people are using (updating) the database.

MySQL has the capability to lock its tables, but I'm not sure how to do that when making a backup.

My solution was to write a shell script that temporarily puts an .htaccess file containing "Deny from all" in the web document root, does the backup, and then restores the normal .htaccess file. That prevents any access to the database while the backup is being performed. The script also checks all the tables.

I use the built in CPanel backup to back everything up.... but then I also use phpMyBackup to backup another copy of the database. You can automate it from a cron task.