I got my bill for last month’s bandwidth usage from Amazon S3 and apparently I’m using a lot more traffic than last month by the cost ($10.11). Exciting! Generally this means that I’m getting more traffic which is reasonable since I’ve had some posts (like this one) which got hit hard.
So far, Amazon S3 has done some great work for me in terms of my site speed; in fact I’m really satisfied, and now I’ve found another great WordPress plugin that connects directly with S3: Automatic WordPress Backup!
Here’s what the download file looks like. It backups your wp-content folder and your wp-config.php. All you need!
Now, I’ve always done my backups manually since I can never truly trust an automatic program. I’m just a control-freak like that, but after a few tests with this plugin I’m sold and I’m never doing a manual backup ever again (well, maybe…).
It took me literally 30 seconds to install and then a few more minutes to test the backup. Perfect. If you need a great reason for S3, then you’ve found one:
Anyone else using Amazon S3? What are your thoughts? How do YOU backup your WordPress site?
I currently use the WordPress Database Backup plugin: http://ilfilosofo.com/blog/wp-db-backup/
It's configured to backup the database locally and email me a copy every morning where I promptly archive it in Gmail.
ah. that's a good one too!
FOR FREE!
(Because I'm not a big-baller-blogger such as yourself.)
not yet.
mozy……. haven't heard that word in a long time.
This is timely for me, as I’ve just begun a self-hosted WordPress site (as of Oct.). I’m in need of updating to WP 2.9, and I am clueless about the process. I want to do things right, and I definitely don’t want to lose what I currently have.
Would something like this (or the WP free plugin) be what I need?
upgrading automatically hasn't given me any problems, but that is risky advice.
sure, this is one part of it…!
Careful with 2.9. It was nasty for me. 2.9.1 has been fine so far. Go with the back up first though. I've lost everything before. It's enough to make you quite blogging… for a long time.
As for me, I've used the WordPress Database Backup plugin. It's worked well for the database backup. I still do everything manually, though, before a major upgrade or something. I actually just recommended the plugin over at Mosaic Mercies. I'm curious about your suggestion though. I might go for the switch. Thanks for the review/nod.
-Marshall Jones Jr.
I'm kind of like you in that I'm an absolute control freak (to my detriment, really) so I'm always iffy about an automated tool. As such, I tend to do all my backups by hand. It's time consuming (especially when I backup several databases), but I sleep better.
S3 is so attractive to me, but I'm currently at a stage where fixed-cost is easier to budget.
My backup strategy is basically:
- Pull all stuff down from the web each week.
- Archive on a separate internal hard drive.
- Perform nightly backups of internal hard drive to an external hard drive
- Daily push nightlies to Mozy.
So it's just backing up the database contents? Or the whole WordPress install?
Nevermind. I see it all. Very cool. Thanks, as always, for sharing.
just content.
I don't do regular updates
So basically, if I lose it, she's gone.
But I don't have the need for S3, can you post about backing up for mere mortal (ie non S3
) bloggers. Sorry if you already have…
*quit blogging
Sorry about that.
-Marshall Jones Jr.
sure thing. that's a good plugin, so continue to use it!
Thanks for the help.
-Marshall Jones Jr.
Just set it up. Took longer for Amazon to email me account confirmation than it did to set up. Very quick and easy.
Thanks for the mention John! I really appreciate it.
sure thing! great stuff. i'm using it.
Thanks for this post. I had been using ‘WordPress Backup’ plugin, but it somehow crashed my whole site with a big white screen error that didn’t even let me into the admin panel until I disabled the plugin through FTP, so I figured it was time for a change. Just opened up an S3 account and set this up and it looks great so far.
Also, to respond to some of the others that think that S3 is overkill/too expensive for them… I’m definitely small time as well, but based on my estimated usage, Amazon estimates that the service will cost less than $.20 per month–yes, less than 20 cents per month. To avoid taking the time to move backups to other servers or disks and to not have to worry at all about is definitely worth 20 cents a month to me. Seems to be worth a try for anyone.
Thanks again!
Ryan