At this point I’ve upgraded all of our significant properties to the new WordPress 3.0 release and we’ve had only one “bump” so far with a caching plugin that needed to be updated as well.
But not a single drop of sweat has been shed as I’ve been able to upgrade all of them without worry feeling confident about my backups.
And although some would recommend waiting for a 3.1 release (just in case) so that bugs could be worked out and/or outdated plugins could be updated I felt extremely comfortable moving forward.
Here’s the process that I take to backup all of our 8BIT properties (3,000+ posts, 40,000+ comments) and how you can do it too:
Backing Up WordPress First
The first thing you’re going to want to do is backup your currently WordPress and the most-critical pieces of data which are your MYSQL database (posts, comments, etc) and your media/content (WP-CONTENT folder, etc).
You can, of course, do most of this manually but we’ve found two super-helpful plugins that we’ve tested extensively which have not failed us and that automate the process of backing up so you can “set it” and “forget it”.
1. DBC Backup 1.1
We’ve written about this plugin before and we think it’s one of the best MYSQL database backup plugins for WordPress out there, period.
Installation is simple and setting it up is simple. Just declare a folder in on your server where you’ll begin to save the files, schedule the backup timing period (we do daily) and then set a removal date of old backups (we do 30 days)
You can see above our history of backups for one of our blogs and here’s a look at our server confirming the files:
Easy.
2. Automatic WordPress Backup Plugin
We’ve written about this plugin as well before as one of the best uses of Amazon S3. Please note that although the plugin is free, Amazon S3 is not.
As you can see I’ve put in my access keys, created a new backup “bucket” (or folder), set the schedule to “daily” and then had it backup everything for me. It cleans older backups after a month.
Here you can see a screenshot of my Amazon S3 bucket with the resulting files, ready to download and be used for any restoration efforts. You can also notice the incremental increases of file size!
Of course, there’s a number of other paid services too.
Like Doing it Manually? Very “Free” too!
Some people just like having their “hands” in the process more than others and like manually backing up WordPress themselves. That’s cool! We’ve written about a manual process of backing up WordPress as well. Check it here.
Of course, you can also review WordPress’ own thoughts about backing up here.
Finally, one important thing that hasn’t been mentioned explicitly about backing up is to confirm that your backups have, indeed, worked! Download the files to see if it’s all there!
Don’t just assume!
Plugins, Plugins, Plugins!
The next step is simply making sure that most all of your plugins are as up-to-date as possible. You always want to upgrade your plugins before you upgrade WordPress. This can be a critical mistake if forgotten.
One of the best things that you can do is simply spend the time researching how other people have dealt with the upgrades to see whether or not plugins may or may not have problems. It is almost guaranteed that someone upgraded their WordPress installation without checking their plugin compatibility first and are “screaming” about it somewhere online (or crying).
So do your homework!
If you feel like there might be some potential conflicts then try de-activating the offending plugins before upgrading.
Time to Upgrade!
The next step could be as simple as pressing a button or a little more complicated depending on your system and hosting setup.
You may be able to upgrade by simply pressing the “Upgrade” button in your back admin panel and the username/password credentials are already set and you’re ready to go.
For others, especially those who are self-hosting on their own unique box, server, etc. it could be a little more time consuming.
If you’re smart and experienced enough to do SSH and Command Line uploading, unpackaging, overwriting, etc. then you know what you need to do. For many of us though we’re just going to have to do it the more simple way.
First, download the latest copy of WordPress (here!) and save it to your local drive:
Next you’ll want to unpack the file (unzip) and then open up the “WordPress” folder:
You’re going to then want to delete the “wp-content” folder so that when you upload the contents of the folder you don’t overwrite your media uploads!
So your “wordpress” folder should look like the above image without the wp-content folder.
Next, it’s time to upload the contents and overwrite your existing files on your server:
Click “yes” to overwrite (if it prompts you):
And then wait for the upload to be complete.
After you finish jump back into your WordPress admin panel and then click through to update your WordPress installation and database:
And hopefully you’ll then see this beautiful thing:
Congratulations!
You’ve successfully backed your WordPress installation up as well as upgraded! And, of course, if anything has gone wrong you can always revert back to your original WordPress installation just in case.
Time to party.
Stacey says
Oh good, this saved me the time from having to search for a good testimony to upgrading to WP 3.0 this weekend. Thanks!
John Saddington says
surely!
Dale Fletcher says
I’m having a difficult time setting up DBC Backup. It seems like I don’t quite understand how to type in the full and correct of the folder I created for the backups to go in.
My site is http://www.faithandhealthconnection.org.
I added a new directory in the root directory called DBCBackups
this is what I typed into the Sxport Directory area: faithandhealthconnection.org/DBCBackups
This is an error message i get:
Folder faithandhealthconnection.org/DBCBackups wasn’t created, check permissions.
Can you help suggest what to do?
Thanks,
dale
John Saddington says
make the directory 777 when you create it.
Dale Fletcher says
John,
It’s not clear to me how to do that…. and how much or a path to show in the Export directory space.
John Saddington says
do you have a web ftp service with your hosting? or an ftp client?
Dale Fletcher says
Yes John,
I use FileZilla.
Rodlie Ortiz says
I’m having an issue as well with DBC backups. I installed the plugin successfully. I created a folder where the backups should be sent. I clicked backup now and it shows that it backed it up successfully, but when I go to the folder, via ftp, where it was supposedly sent to, it is empty.
Not sure what that’s all about. I’m using cyberduck for the ftp client.
Any idea?
John Saddington says
hmm.is the folder writeable?
Rodlie Ortiz says
I can change the name of the folder, if that’s what you mean. I created a folder, inside of the modernekklesia.com folder (on my server) called “backups”. I can change the name of that folder.
Dale Fletcher says
I still have not figured this out.. per my post above. Sorry. 🙁
Daniel Decker says
Sweet. Thanks.
Bradley says
Thanks for the great post! This is a huge help.
What is the software in your screen shot that you are using to manage your Amazon S3 account?
PhillipGibb says
I took the compulsive plung, even though I waited a while.
then realized that I should have backed up. Doh
but no hassles fortunately 🙂
Still wondering what is so amazing about it (apart from the MU integration)
Dustin W. Stout says
I am also having the ‘check permissions’ problem. maybe i just don’t know enough about all this stuff, but i can’t get it to work. i really want to upgrade to Standard 2.6.0, but i have no way of backing up my blog… can anyone help? =/
Joe Burnham says
On the automatic backup, I’m getting two errors:
shell_exec – Disabled
zip – Unknown
Suggestions? Something I can do thorough cPanel? .htaccess?
Thanks!