Back up the board

[lizbaby4]

I want to update to the new version of vBulletin (I am running on 3.6.4). How do I back up the board? Does it get saved to my home computer or laptop or to the server?

I am nervous about losing information, which is why I haven't upgraded yet.

[Steve Machol]

Unless you have moddified the vB files, you do not need to back those up (except for config.php) since you can always download these again from the Members Area.

The critical info is in the database and the only consistently reliable method of backing up and restoring a database is with shell access via telnet or ssh. This is because backing up with a PHP script like that in the Admin CP or phpMyAdmin can result in PHP timeout errors and an incomplete backup file.

Please see the instructions here:

Backup:

http://www.vbulletin.com/docs/html/maintenance_ssh_backup

Restore:

http://www.vbulletin.com/docs/html/maintenance_ssh_restore

If you don't have telnet or SSH access, some people have reported success with these scripts:

MySQLDumper:

http://www.mysqldumper.de/en/index.php

MySQLHotxcopy:

http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?t=134821&highlight=mysqlhotcopy

Bigdump (restore only):

http://www.ozerov.de/bigdump.php