Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?

[someoneyoulike]

Hello all,
Do we have any tool that can back up the entire nodebb forum ?
After searching in the forum, found a vary similar question ask in 2017.
https://community.nodebb.org/topic/11649/back-up-the-entire-nodebb-forum

Wonder if the community already tools /script for backing up the entire site? since we can switch different VPSs without too much headache.

Thank you.

[phenomlab]

@someoneyoulike I personally take a backup of the entire nodeBB folder, and also perform daily dumps of the MongoDB databases.

[someoneyoulike]

@phenomlab cool. that sounds vary practical. Wonder if you using your backups to restore your site in different machine/vps with the same domain ?
if so , how does the result like? any lost of data ?
Would love to learn more about the result and steps. Thank you.

[julian]

@phenomlab No need to back up the entire folder

Just the MongoDB database, public/uploads/ and node_modules/ if you're really paranoid.

[gotwf]

@someoneyoulike I run daily mongodumps. Then I daily rsync those dumps and nodebb's uploads dir to another box for safe keeping. If you want/need to restore to some other boxen rsync the db and uploads accordingly, mongorestore the dump and geronimo! You should be good to go. Well, yeah, okay, do not forget to also backup your config.json, your mongod.conf, nginx, conf, etc. and restore to the new box as well.

Edit: I guess I should add the not so obvious: Yes, I have used this process to move nodebb vm's about. More than once, even. Works fer' me. On my machines. Caveat emptor.

[phenomlab]

@someoneyoulike said in Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?:

Wonder if you using your backups to restore your site in different machine/vps with the same domain

I use Hetzner for the VPS itself out of Frankfurt, and also leverage the Storage Box facility from the same company via Helskini, but attached to the VPS as virtual storage. The backup is generated "locally" using the storage mount, but the data itself does not sit on the same VPS - it just "looks" that way

[julian]

@gotwf said in Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?:

boxen

Brian Regan?

[julian]

@phenomlab That's a nice setup very convenient.

Although that convenience does come at a cost, I think? A randomware virus could theoretically empty your MongoDB data directory and encrypt all of your backups

Not that that's likely, and mitigating this is probably overkill for most forums...

[someoneyoulike]

@phenomlab so you set up the forum where the DB and nodebb is not install on the same machine (? )
any reasons from your past experience this way will save us in the long run ?
Sounds like the storage box you use already comes with back up features, where you don't have to get your hand dirty doing all the back up yourself ?
While the DB and the nodebb is not on the same machine, any latency noticeable ?

[phenomlab]

@someoneyoulike said in Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?:

so you set up the forum where the DB and nodebb is not install on the same machine (? )

No, they are both on the same machine, but the "local storage" that contains the backups is located elsewhere - to the VPS, it looks as though it is local, because mnt is being used to make it appear as a local volume.

@someoneyoulike said in Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?:

Sounds like the storage box you use already comes with back up features, where you don't have to get your hand dirty doing all the back up yourself ?

No, it doesn't. it's just a storage box - nothing else.

@someoneyoulike said in Tools for backing up the entire nodebb forum?:

While the DB and the nodebb is not on the same machine, any latency noticeable ?

It is on the same machine

[julian]

@someoneyoulike We have set up instances where the db is not on the same machine as the server (mostly for horizontal scaling purposes, etc.)

We don't notice any real-world degradation of performance. MongoDB is plenty fast, it's almost never the database (or network connections to the db) that are the bottleneck.

Unless your app server is in Toronto and your database is in Singapore... but then you have other problems