CMS Backup and Restoration Methods

As you have just seen, manually backing up and restoring is no walk in the park. So, now take a look at backup and restore methods that are some of the best of the class in their respective open source projects.

The first section covers Joomla! and the tool Akeeba Backup.

Joomla! Backup and Restoration

The Akeeba Backup backup utility for Joomla! v1.5 and Joomla! v1.6 is available from www.akeebabackup.com. Formally known as JoomlaPack, this utility is offered in two versions — a free version and a professional version. They both work identically. The professional version offers a wealth of additional features such as offsite backups to Amazon, Rackspace, and more.

Akeeba is capable of running a full restoration using its special .jpa format without your having to first install Joomla!. That means that you can restore or move a site simply using the archived .jpa file(s) and the utility known as Kickstart.

The extension installs using the normal Joomla! installer, so let's move on to configuration and operation. This section starts by describing features common to both versions, and then highlights the differences in the professional version.

Requirements

Following are server-side requirements:

  • Joomla! 1.5.xx or later in the 1.5.x or 1.6.x range. As of this writing, the latest version of Joomla! 1.5 is 1.5.22, and Joomla! 1.6.
  • PHP 5.1.3 or greater; 5.2.1 or later highly recommended.
  • Akeeba Backup will not work on PHP 4. PHP 5.2.4 and 5.2.5 are ...

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