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<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> Navigation: BACKING UP AND RESTORING YOUR DATA > Restoring Internet Backups |
Note: The OnDemand version does not have Internet backups, because its database is already on a server in the cloud so it does not seem necessary to store backups on a 2nd server. Backups that you make with the OnDemand version can be to the same server that it runs on.
Assuming that you have configured the options for Internet backups in the bottom half of the Backup/Restore ⇒ Backup Frequency and Options window, and you have previously made at least one Internet backup, if you ever need to restore an Internet backup, you do so with the Backup/Restore ⇒ Restore Internet Backup menu option.
Note: Users of the Local Network Client version of DONATION cannot do Internet backups or restore Internet backups - that must be done from the Local Network Server version.
Restoring a backup to the same computer it was made from should normally only be done if you have had your computer or hard drive die, and thus lost your database, or you have taken some action in DONATION that you need to reverse, there is no other way to reverse that action, and your backup is recent enough that you are willing to go back to it.
The other time you might want to restore Internet backups is if you have DONATION on multiple computers, with copies of the same database, and you are transferring that database between those computers. See the section on this in the Help page on configuring Internet backups for some important instructions in that case, because you have to first make sure they are using the same Unique ID for Internet backups.
When you select Backup/Restore ⇒ Restore Internet Backup, you will first be prompted for your Internet backup encryption password. This must be the same password that was used to make the backup you will be restoring.
Next, you will be shown a window containing the filenames of whichever Internet backups have been stored online. The filenames contain the date and time the backup was made, in the format YYYY-MM-DD.HH.MM.SS. A typical filename would be DONATION-YYYY-MM-DD.HH.MM.SS.DB.S4E. (The ".DB" part would be different if you are in a secondary database, which you have switched to with the Database ⇒ Switch Databases menu option.) Filenames from earlier versions of the program may omit the time component in the filename, but they can also be restored.
Only your three most recent Internet backups are retained online, in order that the amount of storage used on the Software4Nonprofits.com web server not become excessive. In addition, backups over 1 year old may be removed. (Of course, you should be making backups more often than three times per year, so this should not be an issue for you!) So, the maximum number of backups that will be displayed in the selection window will be three.
In the case where you have only ever made one online backup, the selection window is not displayed, and instead you are just prompted to confirm that you want to restore that one backup, with its filename (showing the date in the format mentioned above) displayed.
After this, a series of self-explanatory windows and messages will explain what steps are being done to restore your backup.
Restoring Older Backups
If you select a backup to restore that is older than your current data (i.e. you have entered further donations, with later dates, since that backup was made), the program will give you a very explicit warning about this, and ask you twice to confirm that you really wish to do this. That's because doing such a restore will cause the more recent data, entered since that earlier backup, to be lost!
See Also: Making Internet Backups, Configuring Internet Backups, Internet Backup Security