May I ask a staff person to do another backup of my forum?

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 27th 2017, 5:34 am

Technical Details

Forum version : #PunBB
Position : Founder
Concerned browser(s) : Mozilla Firefox
Who the problem concerns : All members
When the problem appeared : Last week
Forum link : http://darrencrissfanforum.forumotion.com/

Description of problem

Hello,

Due to an error on my part, some posts were lost last week. I did a back-up as of the most recent date (January 19). I was wondering if a staff person in the office would be so kind as to do another back-up, so that I can restore all the posts that I lost?

Thank you in advance.

by Guest January 27th 2017, 6:42 am

Hello @CalvinNHobbs2,
I may not be 100% sure but I do not think that the FM team will be able to a backup of your forum? Maybe I am wrong but I am not 100% sure on that. Maybe @Derri or @SLGray can answer that more.

Cheers,
James

by **SLGray** January 27th 2017, 7:28 am

Your forum can only be restored to the dates listed in the forum's utilities. If you restored your forum back to December 31, 2016, all new posts, topics, members, etc. will be gone. You will have to restore your forum again to a more recent backup date (January 26, 2017). Everything, it will depend on what type of restore you pick, between December 31, 2017 through January 26, 2017 will be restored.

This is just an example.

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 27th 2017, 8:10 am

Thank you James for your answer. I thought that sometimes we may ask a staff person to ask the head office to do a back-up? I may be wrong on that too. Thanks again for your help. I appreciate it.

Thank you, SLGray, for your reply. I restored my forum to the latest date listed in Founder's Tools (January 19). It seems the most recent pattern has been for it to have back-up dates listed every 7 days, so the latest date would have been January 26. However, as of now, the last date listed on the forum utilities is January 19. I was just wondering if it is possible to see if the head office can do another back-up?

by **SLGray** January 27th 2017, 6:02 pm

Do you mean a back up or a restore?

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 27th 2017, 10:12 pm

Hello SLGray,

I apologize, but I'm not sure what the difference is between "back up" or "restore."

Basically, I want to have the forum returned to the same state as it was before I accidentally deleted the topic/thread. I went to Utilities/Founder's Tools, and I did have my forum returned to the original state it was in (with posts not yet accidentally deleted by me), as of the latest date available, which was January 19 on the Founder's Tools. But I need a date after January 23 (when I made the accidental deletions) to be available on Founder's Tools. I was hoping there would be a new date available on Founder's Tools, since the recent pattern has been for there to be a new date available on Founder's Tools every 7 days for my forum. But the latest date available on Founder's Tools is January 19.

I hope I answered your question. Thank you in advance for your help.

by **Ape** January 27th 2017, 11:05 pm

ok when you did the backup /system restore you clicked Jan 19th 2017 now did you do this one time or two ?

The backup system works in a funny way.

when you do a backup / restore you need to click the older date then when the page says done you can then ask the system to restore your forum posts by clicking on the last date showing in the list this should then fix the post problem.

Now if you only clicked the restore once then you may still get your forum to go back by clicking post backup and then clicking on the 19th again this will reset your forum to how it was before you did the backup / restore.

the problem is out teach team will only restore the forum to the same date as you did or last listed in your tools.

the only time we do a full backup / restore is when we have something wrong our end then we have to restore all forums in one go.

Sotry and do a post and members restore to the 19th of jan again if you only did one restore

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 28th 2017, 1:20 am

Hello APE,

Thanks for your response.

Let's see if this works. I'm trying to post a a screenshot of the backups listed on my Founders Tools.

May I ask a staff person to do another backup of my forum? Founde10

May I ask a staff person to do another backup of my forum? Founde10

Just to make sure I didn't confuse or mislead you, this is my problem. I accidentally deleted an entire Topic/thread on January 23, so all the posts by members in that Topic/thread disappeared. I went to my Founders Tools/Utilities, and restored my forum to the latest date available, January 19. This brought back the Topic/thread and all the posts in that Topic/thread (harrah!), up to the date of January 19. But there were posts that were lost (that were posted by members from January 20-23), that were not brought back, because the latest date available on my Founders Tools was January 19. So I am hoping that sometime soon, that another more recent date than January 19, will appear on my Founders' Tools so that I can bring back the members' lost posts from January 20-23.

I guess what I'm trying to say, and I apologize if I'm not being clear, is that I want to know if I can do a partial backup to bring back the posts of that Topic/thread that I lost between January 20-23?

Thank you for your help. I appreciate your time.

by **brandon_g** January 28th 2017, 1:53 pm

Hello,

No, unfornatelly I do not believe there is any way. Our system only does back ups of the forum once a week. This is why it only shows in the utilities one every 7 days. There is no in between back up for restore it to.

You might just have to ask your members to repost back up the lost posts.

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 28th 2017, 9:57 pm

Thank you, Brandon for your answer.

Do you know when the next back up will be done by your system?

The last backup date that is shown on my Utilities/Founders' Tools is January 19. A week from that would have been January 26 (Thursday, a couple of days ago), but that date did not appear on my Founders' Tools (see my screenshot).

Is it safe to assume a back up will be done by your system at the 2-week mark from the last backup (January 19)? If so, I will just wait until 2 weeks after January 19, which will be this coming Thursday, February 2. I will report back at that time (February 2).

Thank you for your time.

by **SLGray** January 28th 2017, 10:57 pm

When you did this, did you do a full restore? If it was just a message that you wanted back, you should only did a restore of messages.

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 28th 2017, 11:17 pm

Hello SLGray,

SLGray wrote: When you did this, did you do a full restore? If it was just a message that you wanted back, you should only did a restore of messages.

Yes, I did a "full restore." I was thinking of doing only "messages and users." I guess I should have done that one. Thank you for pointing that out.

May I ask are there any down sides/problems, since I chose the wrong option ("full restore")? I'm still learning, as I'm pretty much new to how Forumotion works.

And do you know when the next back up will be done by your system?

by **SLGray** January 28th 2017, 11:23 pm

Full Restore includes everything which could include coding.

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 29th 2017, 8:35 am

Thank you for your reply, SLGray.

I will report back on February 2. Have a good weekend.

by **Ape** January 29th 2017, 4:00 pm

This thread will help you understand how the backup should be done right
https://help.forumotion.com/t64905-how-does-a-backup-work

More up to date thread https://help.forumotion.com/t131122-backup-of-your-forum#878826

by CalvinNHobbs2 January 30th 2017, 7:57 am

Thanks APE. Those links were helpful. I just need to do the second backup then. Hopefully, I'll get a new date this week on Founders' Tools. Have a good week.

by **SLGray** January 30th 2017, 10:14 pm

The only thing is the back up will not have what is missing now. It will only back up what is on the forum now.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 1st 2017, 7:56 am

Sorry, I've been distracted by all the horribleness happening in the U.S. right now.

But back to the issue of my forum, if you don't mind, I'll like to wait a couple of days. The last backup done by your system was January 19, so this Thursday (February 2) should be the next backup, 2 weeks from the last backup. I will report back at that time. Have a good day!

by **SLGray** February 1st 2017, 9:45 am

I understand that, but it will only backup what is on your forum now. If you are missing anything after you did the restore, it will not be backed up on the recent backup date. Backups only store what is on your forum at the time of the backup.

If you do a restore that remove things that you want back, you have to do another restore right after the first restore.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 3rd 2017, 9:52 pm

Thank you for your answer.

I still would like to know when is the next date that your system will do a backup. I checked today, and there is no new date on my Founders' Tools.

Does anyone know when the next back up will be done by your system?

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 9th 2017, 10:42 pm

Hello, I just checked my Founders' Tools, and the latest date that is listed as available to do a backup is still January 19. Today's date is February 9, which is 3 weeks after the January 19 date.

I tried researching this topic, found several inquiries by members about backups, and read that backups of forums are done usually every week, sometimes every 2 weeks.

Is the server that is supposed to backup my forum, having problems that results in more infrequent backups? Recently, there was a nice pattern of backups being done every week. But before November 2016, there was no pattern to the dates of backups. Backups would be done every 2 weeks, or every 3 weeks, or once/month. The month of July 2016 had no backup done, so 2 months passed from the backup in June, to the backup in August 2016. So I am wondering if the server that is supposed to backup my forum is having some type of problem?

If the next backup is in a week, I'm happy to wait until that date (February 16). However, if the next backup is going to be more than 4 weeks since the last backup (January 19), I was wondering if I can ask a staff to do a backup by the 4th week (February 16), so that a date that is more recent than January 19 on my Founders' Tools will be available for me to do a backup.

Thank you in advance for any help that you may offer.

by **Ape** February 9th 2017, 11:44 pm

None of the staff will doa backup the data your are asking for will no longer be open to you or us as you did the backup wrong the first time so all data you are looking for (lost posts ) will now be gone,

we can only backup the forum the same as you have already done.

as for the dates of the backups well all sites i have looked at is showing the same date as yours so i think there is a problem with the system after the update of software i will make a report on this as this should have been updated by now.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 10th 2017, 12:46 am

Thanks for your reply, APE.

APE wrote: as for the dates of the backups well all sites i have looked at is showing the same date as yours so i think there is a problem with the system after the update of software i will make a report on this as this should have been updated by now.

Thank you. I appreciate it. I checked and the January 19 date still is currently the latest date available. I will check in an hour or two.

APE wrote: None of the staff will doa backup the data your are asking for will no longer be open to you or us as you did the backup wrong the first time so all data you are looking for (lost posts ) will now be gone,

I'm sorry, I don't think I'm expressing myself clearly. I'm not asking your staff to return anything on my forum that can't be returned.

If I did the backup incorrectly on January 23 (when I made the first backup), well, there's nothing that can be done about that. I understand that.

When I asked if a staff can do a backup sometime before February 16, I was trying to ask if someone can make a new date on my Founders' Tools available (that is more recent than the January 19 date). That was all I am asking for at this point. The latest date available on my Founders' Tools was the January 19 date, 3 weeks ago. I was asking for help so that a new date would be available on my Founders' Tools. I don't expect your staff to return posts that I lost on my forum due to a mistake I made on January 23 when I tried to back up my forum. I'm at this point, asking for a new, more recent date on my Founders' Tools than the January 19 date. I just wanted to clarify that, because I don't think I explained it well in my previous post. You do not need to respond to this paragraph (because you just said you will look into the issue of the system possibly having a problem after the software update). I just wanted to explain to you what I am asking for.

Thanks again for your help.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 10th 2017, 4:55 am

Just an update. I checked my Founders' Tools again, and the most recent date available is still January 19.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 10th 2017, 9:08 pm

Thank you. My Founders' Tools have a couple of new dates, with today being the latest date.

Just to clarify, because I'm not sure what I did exactly that would result in data being lost when I did the first backup on Jan. 23. I want to try to understand, for future reference.

I looked at this thread that APE referred me to: [url= https://help.forumotion.com/t131122-backup-of-your-forum#878826] https://help.forumotion.com/t131122-backup-of-your-forum#878826[/url] I'm going to quote from it:

You can choose between:
- A full forum backup
- Theme only
- Messages and user only

Several restoration dates are available. Each date is a backup of your forum.

If you restore your forum date X, ALL the forum will be restored (Note: "gains" of the forum may be deleted if the structure of the forum has changed in the meantime). The forum is restored in the exact state of the chosen date, ie a backup on a date x is a copy of the forum at the time x. To overcome this problem, you must make a second back-up.

If I choose to restore the forum 2014-09-08 - all posts from September 8 will be deleted as well for all registered members since that date.

After the back-up 2015-09-08, you have to make a second back-up dated 2015-10-15 - to retrieve all new members & new messages posted between September 08 and October 15.

In the back up field there is a drop down menu and you can now choose what you want to restore:

If you removed a user and want to restore, select User for back up.
If you removed users and messages and want to restore, select user and messages.
If you have made errors with your theme or want an old one back, select theme to restore.
If you want to restore all the above select full back up.

I accidentally deleted a thread/topic on January 23. On January 23, I selected "Full backup" and the latest date available on my Founders' Tools, which was January 19.

According to the directions above (https://help.forumotion.com/t131122-backup-of-your-forum#878826) , I should select a date on my Founders' Tools, which was "January 19." And then according to the directions, I should select the next more recent date (which for me, the newer date needed to be on or after January 23, the day I accidentally deleted a thread/topic), but on January 23, there was no date listed on my Founders' Tools that was after January 19. So I waited until today to do a second backup, when the "February 9" date appeared on my Founders' Tools.

So I thought I followed the directions that were in the link that APE provided, but I know I messed up somewhere.

For future reference, I wanted to know, what mistake did I make that resulted in my losing the new posts (posts made after the date I selected for the first backup, so posts made after January 19)?

Was it because I selected "Full Backup," instead of "Messages"?

Or was the mistake I made (that resulted in my losing any new posts/data after the January 19 date) because: As APE said, I should have (a) selected "January 19" and select restore, and (b) selected January 19 again and selected restore again? And this needed to be done on one/same day?

But if I selected January 19 twice, wouldn't the new data (after January 19) still be lost?

So is this correct: I should not select a date on my Founders' Tools and do a backup on one day, and then select another date on my Founders' Tools and do a backup on a different day? The two backups must be done on the same day?

I just want to understand what I should avoid doing in the future. Thank you for your time. I know you tried to explain to me, but I'm still a little confused. I appreciate your patience.

by **Ape** February 10th 2017, 9:30 pm

Hello i have spoke to the pro admin and he now tells me that your forum backup's are now on you forum tools.

Now if you read the post i posted before it say's do a backup of say 2 or 3 down from the date showing at the top then when the backup is done do the backup again say the top on on the list it will then give you back the posts missing as the system will place older posts in the backup date last saved.

as long as you follow the post i gave everything will be ok.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 10th 2017, 9:51 pm

Hi APE,

Yes. Thank you, two new dates appear on my Founders' Tools: Feb. 2 and Feb. 9. I really appreciate it!

You are so kind.

Before I read your message, I tried to back up using the last date (February 9) and I did it 2 or 3 times. Did not bring back the new posts I lost.

Then I saw you had posted your comment, and I selected the date just before February 9, which was February 2 and did a backup. I then tried to select the February 9 date and do another backup, but a message popped up that I reached my limit of backups. So I don't know if I lost my opportunity, or if I can try again tomorrow.

If I try a backup tomorrow (first select the "February 2" date and backup, then select the "February 9" date and backup), will I lose posts made today (February 10)? I'm guessing that the answer is "no," I will not lose any posts made today?

Thanks again for all your time and your patience.

by **SLGray** February 10th 2017, 10:27 pm

There is a limit on how many backups you can do in certain period of time. Wait and try tomorrow.

When you do a backup, it restores your forum to that date.

Example: You want to restore your forum on January 1, 2017. There were 5 new topics and 100 new posts on January 31, 2017. When you restore your forum to January 1, 2017, you will lose the ones on January 31, 2017. If there is a bcakup date of February 1, 2017, you can restore those on January 31, 2017. So you will have to do 2 restore dates: January 1 and February 1, 2017. This also applies to members. It depends on what kind of backup you pick to do.

by **Ape** February 11th 2017, 12:30 am

ok as i told you in the last post about this when you made the backup first of all you did a backup of a set date and there was no other dates to back up from so you did the one at the top of the list that was something like the 19/01/17 then you did the same one again. now there was no other date newer than that so the backup took you to the last date showing. you then lost posts made after that date.

Now i told you after that that you would have lost them posts made after that date you backed it up to (19/1/17)

so making a backup again will not bring back the missing posts they have gone for ever sorry.
there is nothing we can do to get them back as the backup you did the first time was done wrong.

by CalvinNHobbs2 February 11th 2017, 4:06 am

Thank you both for your replies.

Thanks for the answer about the limit of how many backups can be done on a day.

So I understand that I lost some posts and they are gone and cannot be brought back, because I made a mistake in the backup process. I understand nothing will return those posts. I accept that. I just want to understand what mistake I made that resulted in my losing the data, so that I do not repeat that mistake the next time I need to do a backup.

SL Gray wrote: Example: You want to restore your forum on January 1, 2017. There were 5 new topics and 100 new posts on January 31, 2017. When you restore your forum to January 1, 2017, you will lose the ones on January 31, 2017. If there is a bcakup date of February 1, 2017, you can restore those on January 31, 2017. So you will have to do 2 restore dates: January 1 and February 1, 2017. This also applies to members. It depends on what kind of backup you pick to do.

I thought I did this, but I must have done something wrong, because the members' posts made January 20-23 were not returned. On January 23, I accidentally deleted a thread. So on January 23, I went to my Founders' Tools and selected "January 19" to do one backup. Then I waited until today, when I did a backup using the date of "February 9" on my Founders' Tools. But the posts from January 20-23 did not return. What did I do wrong? I know I did something wrong, just not sure what. I know my posts are lost forever. I accept that. I just want to know what I did wrong so I don't make the same mistake in the future.

APE wrote: . . . first of all you did a backup of a set date and there was no other dates to back up from so you did the one at the top of the list that was something like the 19/01/17 then you did the same one again. now there was no other date newer than that so the backup took you to the last date showing. you then lost posts made after that date.

APE, your understanding of what I did is mostly correct. I did one backup for the date January 19. (I did not do a second backup for that same date January 19; I only used the date January 19 once).

Then today, I did a backup today using the date of February 9.

I'm ok now with the realization that due to a mistake I did, that I lost the posts after January 19. But can you tell me a step-by-step way that I would have done the backup correctly (so that I will know for future reference how to do a backup without losing data).

Is this the correct way to have done the backup, so that I would not have lost the posts after January 19:

--Wait until there was a backup date was available on my Founders' Tools that was on or after the date I accidentally deleted a thread/topic (so I should have waited until a date on/after January 23, which was the day that I accidentally deleted a thread).

--Once a date on/after January 23 became available, do a backup using the second most recent date on my Founders' Tools (February 2),

--Then do a second backup with the most recent date on my Founders' Tools (February 9)?

Would this had been the correct way so that I would not have lost the posts after January 20. I guess I should have waited, because I did the first back up using a date (January 19) that was too early?

May I ask a staff person to do another backup of my forum?