Corrupt Database - Lost Backup-shutdown procedure

[Bedspring]

Hi,
the other morning I turned Actinic on and got a corrupt database, error message, something to do with Microsoft, this has happened before and I have used the overwritten backup to save the day.
This time searched for the overwritten backup with the help of Actinic support and it was not there luckily I am in the process of transferring everything over to another computer and had a snapshot on there which was only a few days old, not perfect but a lifesaver in the situation.
Problem is support had no explanation for the missing overwritten back up and suggested that in future I take a snapshot to an external drive every night, now that maybe best practice but terribly clunky and I should not have to do that, I try and take a snapshot once a week but every night seems a bit much.
So has anyone else had this issue and what is your end of day shutdown procedure and backup methods.
ps Development are looking into the missing overwritten DB but that IME can take months with the answer wait for the next version. Sorry if this seems a rant but Actinic should be usable once set up by someone with very limited computer skills and taking external backups is beyond that IMHO
Regards Steve

[Duncan Rounding]

My machines are on 24/7 and have an automated backup to a separate dedicated internal drive scheduled to run daily at 3am using Acronis.

I also make weekly backups to an external drive as well as keep those weekly snapshots and other data uploaded to some private server space.

Some people go to much greater lengths than this. I personally would never rely on program software for my backups, be that Actinic or other software.

In addition to what you are doing now I recommend you take a look at Acronis and consider installing a large backup drive in your PC - then set a backup schedule and let it get on with it.

[Bedspring]

A scheduled backup would be ace, is it possible to specify various locations, ie the PC itself, an external drive and "the cloud" also with your system are you constantly overwriting or are you saving a sequence of backups. My problem is that a corrupt database has been stored over a good database, wheras what actinic should have done is have archived wednesdays when i shut down thursday, thereby leaving thursdays to use and wednesdays as extra back up, Does that make sense?

[leehack]

Storing an up to date copy off site is very very important. Catering for hard drive failures is fine, NEVER ever forget to cover yourself for incidents like fire or theft though. Backing up to the same drive or an attached drive in either of these cases is worthless, like hanging your front door keys on the outside of your door so you never get locked out.

Have a read of this guide I created - http://www.websitedesigned.co.uk/actinic-snapshots.htm - should cover you for everything but a nuclear war, but you'd be screwed then anyway.

I also use Acronis, scheduled automatically over night.

[Bedspring]

Great link that thank you, but is it possible to automate this?

[leehack]

Snapshotting automatically can be batched i believe, but snapshotting is something you should invoke yourself IMO, always press the button to do one when you shut down for instance and also before and after you do any considerable changes.

Remember too that if you use Acronis, and schedule it daily (automatic), technically everything to do with your site is backed up as part of that process.

[Duncan Rounding]

You can automate Acronis and also force Actinic to do a database backup on exit. You can't (I don't believe) automate Actinis to do a snapshot unless you use some macro program or similar - although there's little need to do so over and above your usual backup regime as Acronis has backups of everything anyway.

[NormanRouxel]

I too use Acronis scheduled to run at 4 a.m. Not lazy like Duncan and might still be up at 3 .

However my nightly backups are to a RAID1 NAS drive hidden in a cupboard. So hopefully immune to theft and drive failure (everything's on at least 3 drives split over 2 locations) but probably not to a big fire.

The backups are a single big initial file and subsequent daily incremental ones. A doddle to occasionally copy to another drive for off-site safekeeping. The initial file needs copied only once and after that the daily's are only a few Gb.

I've always (several decades now) backed up (floppies, then tapes, then removable disks, then USB disks, now NAS drives) and can still locate files from the 1980's.

IMHO a dual drive NAS box with something like Acronis on the PC is the way to go for daily backups.

[chris ashdown]

If you go to Moleend site http://www.mole-end.biz/acatalog/downloads.html you can download a free automatic actinic database backup software where you can define when it backs up the database

We use acronis to backup my main computer hard drive every two weeks onto raid hard drive unit

We take a snapshot every two days and copy of sage backup onto one of two hard drive we alternate and take home each day

We take moleend backups of the database every hour automatically to a raid drive and copy the last days entries at close of business onto the hard drive we take home each day

Paranoid you bet

Sleep well you bet

Learnt the hard way yup

Total time each night about 15-20 mins for 8 sites, 5 min if just copying mdb files

Edit

Please note the MDB backup does not contain all upgrades you have made to your site like images etc so still need snapshots at regular intervalls which save everything