Parallels Backup And Restore CLI Plesk Panel 9.5 Reference Guide En

User Manual: parallels Plesk Panel - 9.5 - Reference Guide Free User Guide for Parallels Plesk Software, Manual

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Parallels Plesk Panel

Contents
Preface

About This Guide ........................................................................................................................... 3
Typographical Conventions ........................................................................................................... 3
Feedback ....................................................................................................................................... 4

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Backup Objects: Hierarchy and Volume ....................................................................................... 7
Backup Logical Structure ............................................................................................................ 10
Specifying Location of Temporary Directory ............................................................................... 14

Performing Backup

Defining Data for Backup ............................................................................................................ 17
Examples........................................................................................................................... 21
Defining Properties of Files That Compose Backup ................................................................... 24
Setting Up Backup Export ........................................................................................................... 26
Defining How the Backup Process is Performed ........................................................................ 28
Checking Free Disk Space Before Starting the Backup Process ............................................... 29

Performing Restore

Defining Objects for Restore ....................................................................................................... 31
Defining How the Restore Process is Performed ........................................................................ 34
Conflict Resolution Rules and Policies ........................................................................................ 35

Reference

pleskbackup Commands and Options Reference ....................................................................... 38
pleskrestore Commands and Options ......................................................................................... 42
Custom Conflict Resolutions ....................................................................................................... 44
Conflict Description Messages .......................................................................................... 44
Resolutions Description Format ........................................................................................ 45
Samples of Policy Description........................................................................................... 54
Samples of Conflict Resolution With Rules ....................................................................... 55

Preface

Preface
In this section:
About This Guide............................................................................................... 3
Typographical Conventions ............................................................................... 3
Feedback .......................................................................................................... 4

About This Guide
This guide is intended for administrators of servers with Parallels Plesk Panel who wish to
perform Plesk backup and restore operations via command line interface (using the
pleskbackup and pleskrestore utilities).

Typographical Conventions
Before you start using this guide, it is important to understand the documentation
conventions used in it.
The following kinds of formatting in the text identify special information.
Formatting convention

Type of Information

Example

Special Bold

Items you must select,
such as menu options,
command buttons, or
items in a list.

Go to the System tab.

Read the Basic Administration
Titles of chapters,
sections, and subsections. chapter.
Italics

Used to emphasize the
The system supports the so
called wildcard character search.
importance of a point, to
introduce a term or to
designate a command line
placeholder, which is to be
replaced with a real name
or value.

Monospace

The names of commands,
files, and directories.

The license file is located in the
http://docs/common/licen
ses directory.

Preface

Formatting convention
Preformatted

Preformatted Bold

Type of Information
On-screen computer
output in your commandline sessions; source code
in XML, C++, or other
programming languages.
What you type, contrasted
with on-screen computer
output.

Example
# ls –al /files
total 14470

# cd /root/rpms/php

CAPITALS

Names of keys on the
keyboard.

SHIFT, CTRL, ALT

KEY+KEY

Key combinations for
CTRL+P, ALT+F4
which the user must press
and hold down one key
and then press another.

Feedback
If you have found an error in this guide, or if you have suggestions or ideas on how to
improve this guide, please send your feedback using the online form at
http://www.parallels.com/en/support/usersdoc/. Please include in your report the guide’s title,
chapter and section titles, and the fragment of text in which you have found an error.

CHAPTER 1

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview
Backup and restoration are among the most critical processes of hosting environment
management. Parallels Plesk Panel provides graphical user interface (GUI) and
command line interface (CLI) solutions to perform backup and restore tasks.
The main features of the command-line backup/restore solution are the following
(marked with asterisk (*) present in GUI, too):


Flexible backup and restore
Supported are not only full backups and restores, but also partial which allow to
choose the level of Plesk objects that should be backed up or restored (resellers,
clients, domains), and, moreover, to select almost any specific set of the objects.



Even more flexible backup: only configuration*
Every backup object is understood as composed of configuration and content:
configuration is a set of all object properties and settings, and content is the object’s
binary data. It is possible to created “light-weight” backups which include only
configuration of the selected objects.



Mail-oriented backups
One may create a backup which contains only content and configuration of mail
system owned by the selected objects.



Web site oriented backups
One may create a backup which contains only content and configuration of Web
sites on domains owned by the selected objects.



Various options of storing backups
Plesk provides a dedicated storage - Backup Repository*, in addition to this, a
backup can be exported as a single file directly to a specified FTP server or any
location on file system.



Calculating domain backups in disk usage statistics*
Plesk disk space usage statistics can be set up so that the domain backup size is
count in overall domain disk usage and in overall disk usage of the domain owner,
irrelevant to where the backup is stored.



Prudent restore*
Restore adds the data from backup to that existing in destination Plesk, not
replaces it.



Advanced restore conflicts resolution
Plesk restore, when encounters conflicts between backup data and data in Plesk
that cannot be automatically resolved, returns highly-detailed description of such
conflicts. Which allows admin to accurately perform restoration with applying
comprehensive set of conflict resolutions

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

In this chapter:
Backup Objects: Hierarchy and Volume ............................................................ 7
Backup Logical Structure................................................................................... 10
Specifying Location of Temporary Directory ...................................................... 14

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Backup Objects: Hierarchy and Volume
Plesk provides opportunities for backing up and restoring nearly all hosting data, which
includes its major objects: Administrator account, reseller accounts, client accounts,
domain accounts, mail accounts, databases, Web sites, and subdomains. These
backup objects are organized into a strict hierarchy where parent object is always an
owner of its children. The hierarchy is as follows:

Figure 1: Backup objects hierarchy
As you can see on the diagram, Plesk backup objects are levelled into 4 levels: server,
resellers, clients and domains levels. The levels are such that a higher level includes
objects on the lower levels but a lower level is completely separated from the higher
objects.

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

You can create either full or partial backup. Full backup is the highest-level backup, it
includes all Plesk data: server, admin and all descendant backup objects. Partial
backup includes only backup objects you need, of any of the levels. For information on
available options when creating partial backup, refer to the Defining Data for Backup
section (on page 17).
Note: Full backups do not include Plesk modules data.
Restoring a backup, in turn, can also be either full or partial. Full restore revives all data
contained in a backup, and partial revives a part. For information on available options
when restoring data from backup, refer to the Defining Objects for Restore section (on
page 31).
As mentioned, each backup object has own data. These data consist of backup object
configuration and content:


Configuration defines properties of the backup object and its descendants.



Content contains binary data related only to the backup object (database backups,
mail attachments, etc).

This means that, for instance, client configuration includes configuration of the domain
he/she owns, but their content is completely independent.
This table shows what data (configuration and content) is related to each backup
object.
Backup Object
Type

Own Configuration

Own Content

server

Settings of server-level services (mail and
database servers, SSO, application vault,
spam filters and antivirus), server preferences,
Sitebuilder configuration, Plesk account
templates, license keys, certificates, interface
preferences, Plesk billing settings.

License keys, custom
button icons, Plesk skins,
Plesk locales, Web
application packages.

admin

Personal Plesk Administrator information.

reseller

Personal reseller information, limits and
permissions on resources, IP pool and Web
application pool configuration, personal
domain and client templates settings, custom
buttons settings.

Virtual host templates,
custom button icons.

client

Personal client information, limits and
permissions on resources, IP pool and site
application pool configuration, personal
domain and client templates settings, custom
buttons settings.

Virtual host templates,
custom button icons.

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Backup Object
Type

Own Configuration

Own Content

domain

Resource usage limits, permissions, domainlevel service settings (IP address, mail
system, mailing lists, DNS, tomcat
applications, traffic statistics), custom button
and domain alias settings, domain
administrator personal information, SSL
certificates, hosting type settings.

Mailing lists, tomcat
applications, custom
button icons.

mailuser

Personal mail user information, permissions,
mailbox settings, mail aliases, forwarding
settings, mailgroup settings (only for mailgroup
accounts), autoresponders configuration,
addressbook (horde turba),
SpamAssassin/drweb settings, custom buttons
settings.

Mail box content,
autoresponder
attachments,
SpamAssassin files,
custom button icons.

database

Database server settings and database user
settings.

Database dump.

phosting

System user account settings, scripting
settings, Web applications settings, Frontpage
user credentials, log rotation settings,
anonymous FTP settings, list of web-protected
site locations, list of domain web users,
subdomain settings, web statistics settings,
hotlinking protection settings, performance
and shared SSL settings.

Virtual host content,
content of installed Web
applications, virtual
directories content, web
user home directories
content.

subdomain

System user account information, scripting
options, Web applications list, hotlink
protection settings, protected directory
settings, and shared SSL settings.

Content of virtual “subhost”, content of installed
Web applications,
custom button icons.

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Backup Logical Structure
By default, all Plesk backups are created in Plesk backup repository located on Plesk
server:


in Plesk for Linux/Unix, repository location is specified by the DUMP_D variable
defined in the /etc/psa/psa.conf configuration file



in Plesk for Windows, repository is located in the %plesk_dir%\Backup\ folder,
where %plesk_dir% is environment variable specifying directory where Plesk is
installed (if installed to default locations, it is “C:\Program
Files\Parallels\Plesk\”)

The repository is structured as follows, starting with the content of repository root folder
(we omit auxiliary files and folders which are irrelevant for backing up/restoring Plesk
data using pleskbackup/pleskrestore utilities):
.xml

Metadata files of full and server-level
backups, one per backup, describe
configuration and content of server,
admin, and all their descendants.

Archives with content of server and
admin.

clients/

Directory containing the following
backup data:


clients owned by admin or having
no owner



objects owned by the clients

Organization of the directory is the
same as that of
/resellers//clients/.
domains/

Directory containing the following
backup data:


domains owned by admin or having
no owner



objects owned by the domains

Organization of the directory is the
same as that of
/resellers//clients//domains.
resellers/

Directory containing the following
backup data:


resellers



objects owned by the resellers

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Directories containing backup data of
particular resellers, one reseller per
directory, and the objects owned by
them.
The reseller ID stands for the
reseller login name.

.xml

Metadata files of the reseller backups,
one file per backup, describe
configuration and content of the reseller
and the objects she owns.

Archives with the reseller content.

domains/

Directory containing the following
backup data:


domains owned by the reseller



objects owned by the domains

Organization of the directory is the
same as that of
/resellers//clients//domains/.
clients/

Directory containing the following
backup data:



clients owned by the reseller



objects owned by the clients

Directories containing backup data of
particular clients, one client per
directory, and the objects owned by
them.
The client ID stands for the client
login name.

.xml

Metadata files of the client backups, one
file per backup, describe configuration
and content of the client and the objects
he owns.

Archives with the client content.

domains/

Directory containing the following
backup data:


domains owned by the client



objects owned by the domains

Directories containing backup data of
particular domains, one domain per
directory, and the objects owned by
them.
The domain ID is omitted if the domain
IDN is less than 47 symbols.

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

.xml

Metadata files of the domain backups,
one file per backup, describe
configuration and content of the domain
and the objects it owns.

Other files and folders which contain
domain contents, and its children
contents and configurations.

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Files of each backup are placed in the repository folders according to the described
structure.
If a partial backup is created, its files will be places according to the place the backup
objects have in the hierarchy. For example, if backing up domain example.com owned
by reseller JaneDoe, its files will be located in the /resellers/JaneDoe/domains/example.com/ folder. If backing up
reseller JohnDoe who owns a domain joe.info and has one client DukeNukem who
owns domain sample.org, the backup files will be located in the following folders:
1. /resellers/JohnDoe/
2. /resellers/JohnDoe/domains/joe.info/
3. /resellers/JohnDoe/clients/DukeNukem/
4. /resellers/JohnDoe/clients/DukeNukem/domains/sample
.org/
To distinguish files belonging to different backups of the same object, specific prefix
and suffix are added to the file names:


prefix backup is added by default, and, if you like, you can change it to your own
on a per-backup basis (details (on page 24))



suffix designating the backup creation date is always added to each backup file, the
date format is . For example, files of backup created on March 8,
2009, 1:30 am will have suffix 0903080130.

Plesk is capable of exporting backup as a single file (.tgz in Linux/Unix and .zip in
Windows). Each archive has the same structure as the repository, the only difference is
that there is only one .xml file on each level.
In case a partial backup is exported, the resulting file structure is reduced from the top
so that the highest level corresponds to the level of the highest backup object. For
example, if a single client (called, say, SandyLee) backup is exported, the resulting file
will have the following structure:
zip {


.xml



n*.zip



domains/


domain1/


}

...



domainN/



...

Plesk Backup and Restore Overview

Specifying Location of Temporary
Directory
By default, the following directories on the server are used for storing temporary files
during Plesk hosting data backup and restoration:


/tmp on Linux and FreeBSD systems.



\PrivateTemp on
Windows systems.

If you have large amounts of data to back up and restore and are not sure that there is
enough free disk space in the default temporary directory location, then you can specify
another location for storing temporary files.
This is done by setting environment variables in the operating system of the server.

 To set a new location of the temporary directory on Linux or FreeBSD
servers:
1. Connect to the server over SSH.
2. Open for editing the file /etc/psa/psa.conf.
3. Locate the variable DUMP_TMP_D and replace the /tmp value with a
path to the new location of the temporary directory.
The new directory must be present in the file system and writing to this directory
must be allowed for all users.

4. Save the file.

 To set a new location of the temporary directory on Windows servers:
1. Connect to the server as administrator.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. In the Run dialog box, type regedit, and then click OK. This will start
Registry Editor.
4. Locate the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\PLESK\PSA
Config\Config\ and specify the new location of temporary directory
in the DumpTempDir variable.
The default value of the DumpTempDir variable is %plesk_dir%\PrivateTemp\.

5. Quit Registry Editor.

CHAPTER 2

Performing Backup
To perform backup of Plesk hosting data, you need to execute the pleskbackup utility
command composed so that it does the following:
1. defines Plesk data which is going to be backed up
2. defines the way of how the backup process will be performed
3. defines properties of the files that will be contained in backup
4. defines options for exporting backup as a single file
Note: Only first component is obligatory, others are optional.
The following sub-sections explain each component meaning and implementation in
detail.
The pleskbackup utility location is:


in Plesk for Linux/Unix: /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskbackup



in Plesk for Windows: %plesk_dir%\bin\pleskbackup
where %plesk_dir% is environment variable for Plesk installation directory. By
default, it is “C:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk”

To see a complete list of the pleskbackup commands and options, refer to the
pleskbackup Reference (on page 38).
If the command execution succeeds, backup is created in the default server backups
location or exported to a file in case exporting options were specified. (For details, refer
to the Setting Up Backup Export section (on page 26).) If the command execution fails,
backup is not created.
In case domain backup files are set to be included in the statistics on disk space usage
(in Plesk GUI: Server Settings > System Preferences) and backups are stored in Plesk
backup repository, Plesk works as follows:


Disk space occupied by a domain backup files is count in the overall domain disk
space usage.



Overall reseller’s/client’s disk space usage includes disk space occupied by
backups of all domains that the reseller/client possesses, stored in the Plesk
backup repository.

Performing Backup

In this chapter:
Defining Data for Backup................................................................................... 17
Defining Properties of Files That Compose Backup........................................... 24
Setting Up Backup Export ................................................................................. 26
Defining How the Backup Process is Performed ............................................... 28
Checking Free Disk Space Before Starting the Backup Process ....................... 29

Performing Backup

Defining Data for Backup
Defining data that should be backed up includes the following:
1. Defining backup level and, unless it is server level, optionally, selecting which
resellers|clients|domains should be backed up.
2. (optional) Defining which resellers|clients|domains should be excluded from the
backup.
3. (optional) Restricting backup to either only mail or only physical hosting, and only to
configuration.
4. (optional) Defining that log files are excluded from backup.

Generally speaking, the data that can be backed up with one call of the pleskbackup
utility is represented by any single cell of the following table.

Performing Backup

Example 1: With one call of pleskbackup, you can backup hosting data for several
resellers (row 5 or 6 in the table, depending on what’s more convenient: to list resellers
that should be included or those excluded) and restricting the backup data to
configuration of physical hosting on domains owned by the resellers or their clients
(column 4 in the table).
Example 2: With one call of pleskbackup, you can backup mail configuration and
content (column 5) for all domains existing on the server (row 12).
The rest of this section explains each option in detail. Possible command syntax and
examples of commands are in the Examples sub-section (on page 21).

Defining backup level and selecting objects
To define backup level and select backup objects, the commands of pleskbackup
utility are used.
If performing a selective backup, resellers, clients or domains selected for the backup
should be specified by their identifiers which are either logins/names or IDs. The
specification can be done in one of the following two ways:


Command line specification. The backup command takes objects identifiers as
arguments separated with spaces.



File specification. The backup command takes the—from-file option which
specifies the file where the identifiers of objects are listed. The file must be in plain
text format, and object identifiers are separated by line breaks (i.e., one identifier
per line).
Note: If a command contains both specifications, file specification is used and the
command line specification is ignored.

Command syntax and samples (on page 21).

Defining which objects should be excluded
Objects that should be excluded from backup are specified by their logins (reseller,
client accounts) or names (domain accounts). The specification can be done as
follows:


Command line specification. The backup command takes objects identifiers as
values of the—exclude- option separated by
commas.



File specification. The backup command takes the objects identifiers from the file
specified by the—exclude--file option. The file
must be in plain text format, and object identifiers are separated by line breaks (i.e.,
one identifier per line).
Note: It is acceptable to use both specifications in one command. In such case, all
specified objects are excluded from backup.

Command syntax and samples (on page 22).

Performing Backup

Restricting backup to only mail or only physical hosting, and to only
configuration
The amount of backup data can be further narrowed to backing up either mail or
physical hosting content and configuration by using the—only-mail or—onlyhosting options, respectively.
Specifying the—only-hosting option results in backing up only Web-site-specific
data which includes the following, for each domain with physical hosting:


Web site content (including protected directories, Web users, MIME types)



Web hosting configuration (including settings of anonymous FTP, log rotation,
hotlink protection, shared SSL, web users)



installed site applications



databases



subdomains

Specifying the—only-mail option results in backing up only mail-specific data which
includes the following:




if used for the partial backup, for each domain included in backup:


configuration of domain-level mail system (including domain keys)



mail accounts



mailing lists

if used for the full backup, in addition to previous:


SPF spam protection configuration



RBL protection settings



ACL white and black list configurations

The amount of backup data can also be narrowed in another way: by specifying that
only configurations of the selected objects should be backed up. The specification is
done by using the—only-configuration option.
Such backups are useful when the objects content is backed up by a third-party
system.
Command syntax and samples (on page 23).

Excluding log files from back up
In case Plesk log files related to the hosted objects are not required to be backed up,
they can be excluded from the backup by using the—skip-logs option.
Command syntax and samples (on page 23).

Performing Backup

In this section:
Examples .......................................................................................................... 21

Examples
Defining backup level and selecting objects
 To back up the whole Plesk server data:
pleskbackup—server
To back up all reseller|client|domain accounts: pleskbackup --
For example, to back up all client accounts:
pleskbackup—clients-name

or
pleskbackup—clients-id

 To back up several reseller|client|domain accounts defined in command
line:
pleskbackup --- [
[
... []]
For example, to back up three resellers defined in the command line:
pleskbackup—resellers-name johndoe janedoe josephine

if under Linux/Unix, and
pleskbackup—resellers-name ―johndoe janedoe josephine‖

if under Windows
To back up several reseller|client|domain accounts listed in file: pleskbackup -- --from-file=
For example,
pleskbackup—resellers-name—from-file=/usr/local/backup-lists/j.txt

if under Linux/Unix, and
pleskbackup—resellers-name—from-file=‖E:\backup lists\j.txt‖

if under Windows

Performing Backup

Defining which objects should be excluded
 To back up all reseller accounts except for several selected resellers:
pleskbackup—resellers-name—exclude-reseller=,[,]
or
pleskbackup—resellers-name—exclude-reseller-file=
For example,
pleskbackup—resellers-name—exclude-reseller=johndoe,janedoe

or
pleskbackup—resellers-name—exclude-reseller-file=/usr/local/backuplists/j.txt

if under Linux/Unix, and
pleskbackup—resellers-name—exclude-reseller-file=‖E:\backup
lists\j.txt‖

if under Windows

 To back up a selected reseller without several domains belonging to him
or her, or his or her clients:
pleskbackup resellers-name --exclude-domain=,,
or
pleskbackup resellers-name --exclude-domain-file=
For example,
pleskbackup—resellers-name johndoe—excludedomain=example.com,example.net,example.org

or
pleskbackup—resellers-name johndoe—exclude-domainfile=/usr/local/backup-lists/excl-example-domains.txt

if under Linux/Unix, and
pleskbackup—resellers-name johndoe—exclude-domain-file=‖D:\backuplists\excl-example-domains.txt‖

if under Windows

Performing Backup

Narrowing backup data to only hosting, mail, configuration,
skipping log files
 To back up the whole Plesk server configuration without log files:
pleskbackup—server -c—skip-logs

To back up mail configuration on domains belonging to a client: pleskbackup—clients --only-mail—configuration
For example,
pleskbackup—clients-id 42 --only-mail—configuration

 To back up web sites content and web hosting configuration on domains
belonging to all resellers:
pleskbackup—resellers-id—only-hosting

Performing Backup

Defining Properties of Files That
Compose Backup
Defining properties of the files that will be contained in backup includes the following:
1. Defining that archives with backup object contents should not be compressed.
2. Defining that a prefix should be added to names of the backup files.
3. Defining that backup files should be split into parts of the specified size.

Defining that archives with backup object contents should not be
compressed
By default, Plesk backup archives the backup objects content to compressed archives
(.tar, .tgz or .zip) in order to save disk space when the backup is stored.
However, restoring backups that contain compressed archives requires almost two
times more disk space than restoring those with uncompressed files. In case when disk
space while the restoring procedure is more critical to you, you may want to create your
backups without compression. To do so, use the -z|--no-gzip option in your backup
command.

Defining that a prefix should be added to names of the backup files
In order to better distinguish files that were created during one backup session from
another, pleskbackup adds a prefix to backup file name. By default, it is backup, so
every backup file name looks like backup_.. The prefix in
names of the files that compose a particular backup can be customized by using the—
prefix option. The option’s value will be added as a prefix to names of files of the
created backup.
For example, to create a backup of the server mail configuration so that all files in
backup have prefix mail-friday:
pleskbackup—server—only-mail—configuration—prefix=‖friday‖

Defining that backup files should be split into parts of the specified
size
The pleskbackup utility is capable of splitting backup files into parts of a particular
size, which is vitally useful in cases when the file size is critical. Such cases can be, for
example, the following:


if backups are burnt to DVDs, file size should not exceed approximately 4 Gbytes



if backups are stored on the FAT32 file system, file size should not exceed
approximately 4 Gbytes

Performing Backup



if backups are stored on FTP, FTP server may have its own restrictions on the size
of a single file transferred to the server

To make pleskbackup split the backup files to parts of a particular size, use the -s|-split option and specify the required size as the option value. For details on the
format of size specification, refer to the pleskbackup reference (on page 38). The
default value used by pleskbackup if no custom size is specified is 2 Gbytes. The
utility numbers file parts created as a result of split by adding numerical suffixes to the
file names starting from .1.
For example, to back up Web hosting on a domain splitting backup files into parts of no
more than 700 Mbytes:
pleskbackup—domains-name example.com—only-hosting—split=700M

Performing Backup

Setting Up Backup Export
By default, pleskbackup stores backups in Plesk backup repository located on the
Plesk server (/var/lib/psa/dumps/ folder in Plesk for Linux/Unix and
%plesk_dir%\Backup\ in Plesk for Windows).
Plesk is capable of exporting the created backup as a single file (.tar on Unix and
.zip on Windows) in one of the following ways:


to stdout



to local file system



to FTP server

To export backup as a single file, use the—output-file option. Particular export
mode requires specific option values.
Important: After a backup is exported, pleskbackup removes it from the Plesk
backup repository.
The exported file can also be created not compressed and/or split in parts of a
particular size, just as the files composing backup in repository (details (on page 24)).

Exporting to stdout
To export a backup as file to stdout, use the—output-file option with a minus
sign as its value.
For example, to create backup of a domain with ID 1 and export it to stdout:
pleskbackup—domains-id 1 --output-file -

Exporting to local file system
To export a backup as a file to local file system, use the—output-file option with a
/ value.
For example, to create backup of a domain with ID 1 and export it to the file domain1.tgz
located at /usr/local/irregular-backups/ folder:
pleskbackup—domains-id 1 --output-file=/usr/local/irregularbackups/domain1.tgz

Exporting to FTP server
To export a backup as a file to a FTP server, use either of the following options:


--output-file=ftp://:@/



--output-file=ftp:///
login> --ftp-password=

--ftp-login= free disk
space is required.
Note: The free disc space will be checked only before starting the backup process.
Thus, this option will not be effective, if the free disc space is occupied during the
backup process by other processes, such as a simultaneous upload.
Note: The backup size estimation does not consider possible content compression.
Actual size of a backup is usually less than its estimated size.

CHAPTER 3

Performing Restore
To perform a restore of Plesk hosting data, you should execute the pleskrestore
utility command composed so that it does the following:
1. defining Plesk objects to be restored
2. defining the way of how the restore process will be performed
3. defining conflict resolution rules and policies
The following sub-sections explains each component in detail.
The pleskrestore utility location:


in Plesk for Linux/Unix: /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskrestore



in Plesk for Windows: %plesk_dir%\bin\pleskrestore
where %plesk_dir% is environment variable for Plesk installation directory. By
default, it is “C:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk\”.

To see a list of the pleskrestore commands and options, refer to the pleskrestore
Reference (on page 42).

In this chapter:
Defining Objects for Restore ............................................................................. 31
Defining How the Restore Process is Performed ............................................... 34
Conflict Resolution Rules and Policies .............................................................. 35

Performing Restore

Defining Objects for Restore
Defining objects for restore includes the following:
1. Defining target backup file
2. Defining the level of restored objects
3. Applying filter on the specified level

Generally speaking, the data that can be restored with one call of the pleskrestore
utility is represented by any blue cell of the following table.

Performing Restore

Defining Target Backup File
Target backup file defined for restoration can be of one of the following types:


.xml - backup metadata file, in case of restoring from backup located in
Plesk repository



. - archived backup file, in case of restoring from exported
backup

For example, to restore the whole server backup, you choose a /.xml file, or an exported server backup file. To
restore a client belonging to a reseller, you choose a /resellers//clients//.xml
file.

Defining level of restored objects
Defining level of restored objects allows you to narrow the amount of restored data
according to your needs. For example, you may want to restore only domains which
belong to a client or a reseller, skipping the client’s/reseller’s own data and objects
belonging to him different from domains.
To define the level of restored objects, use the -level option with appropriate value.
The option is required, so in cases when you don’t need any narrowing but just
restoring all data from a backup, define the level equal to the level of file.

 To restore entire server:
pleskrestore restore /.xml -level
server

Note: When the whole server backup is restored, license keys are not restored by
default. To restore license keys along with other server content, use the -license
option in your restore command.

 To restore entire server with license keys:
pleskrestore—restore /.xml -level
server -license

 To restore all domains belonging to a reseller:
pleskrestore—restore /resellers//.xml -level domains

 To restore all reseller accounts:
pleskrestore—restore /.xml -level
resellers

Applying filter on the specified level

Performing Restore

To perform a more selective restore, use a filter (the -filter option) which selects for
restore particular objects of the specified level (resellers, clients, domains). The objects
are specified by their names, which are domain names, and logins for resellers and
clients. The specification can be done as follows:


Command line specification. The restore command takes objects identifiers as
values of the -filter option defined in the following string:
list:,,...,.



File specification. The restore command takes the objects identifiers from the file
specified as argument of the -filter option. The file must be in plain text format,
and object identifiers are separated by line breaks (i.e., one identifier per line).

 To restore two resellers from a server backup:
pleskrestore—restore /.xml -level
resellers -filter list:JohnDoe,JaneDoe

or
pleskrestore—restore /.tar level resellers -filter list:JohnDoe,JaneDoe

 To restore two domains owned by Plesk admin:
pleskrestore—restore /.xml -level
domains -filter list:example.com,sample.org

 To restore client’s several domains defined in a file:
pleskrestore—restore /resellers/SandyLee/clients/JaneDow/.xml -level domains filter /restore-domains.txt

Performing Restore

Defining How the Restore Process is
Performed
Define the way how the restore process will be performed includes the following:
1. Defining restore verbosity
2. Suspending the domains being backed up

Defining level of restore verbosity
pleskrestore works in one of the following verbosity modes:
1. Non-verbose mode. Default mode. The minimum level, only general errors are
displayed, like, for example, syntax errors (no or wrong command specified, invalid
input parameters), runtime errors and unhandled exceptions, and so on.
2. Verbose mode. Restore runs with verbosity level 3, which includes, in addition to
the previous level, deployer errors, information about conflicts (read about restore
conflicts in the Conflict Resolution Rules and Policies section (on page 35)), and so on.
Enabled by adding the -verbose option to the pleskrestore command.
3. Debug mode. Restore runs with verbosity level 4, the highest possible, includes the
most extensive information on the restore process. Enabled by adding the -debug
option to the pleskrestore command.

Suspending domains
In case you are going to restore domains, it is recommended to use the -suspend
option to suspend the domains during the restore process. Doing this ensures from
errors in the restored domains that may be caused by changes done to the domain
configuration and/or content during the restoration.
The suspension is made up to be as short as possible: each domain is suspended only
for the time it is being backed up, the domain is started automatically as soon as the
domain data is processed.

Performing Restore

Conflict Resolution Rules and Policies
Conflict is a situation when settings in a backup and settings in a destination Plesk are
such that restoring backup objects leads to an error, or unpredictable Plesk behavior,
including misbehavior.

Types of Conflicts
The restoration process can encounter several types of conflicts, which are the
following:




Timing conflicts. An object being restored might exist in the system and its last
modification date might be more recent than the date of backup. Or an object could
be deleted from the system later than the backup was created.
Resource usage conflicts. There are two groups of resource usage conflicts:


Common resource usage conflict: The total amount of measurable resources
after restoration might appear to be over the limits for this particular user (e.g.,
disk space limit).



Unique resource usage conflict: An object being restored requires a unique
resource which is already used by another object in the system or does not exist
(e.g., domain).

Configuration conflicts. It might happen that configuration being restored is not
enabled on the destination server. Two types of cases can happen here:


Configuration options are not enabled for the domain.



Required configuration options are not available (e.g., site applications are not
available for the client, database server is not configured on the host, IP
address is not in the client’s IP pool, etc.)

Conflict Resolutions
The following types of conflicts resolutions are possible:


Overwrite. Means that all objects will be restored from the backup files regardless
of their current presence in the system. Overwrite works as follows:


If an object/setting from backup does not exist in Plesk, it is created.



If an object/setting from backup exists in Plesk, it replaces the existing.



If an object/setting exists in Plesk but is missed in backup, the existing remains.



Proceed with current. Means that objects which currently present in the system
won’t be affected by the restoration process. The restoration process will move to
the objects belonging to that one, not touching the object itself.



Do not restore. Means that the objects which currently present in the system or
were deleted after the backup won’t be restored together with the lower level
objects belonging to it.

Performing Restore



Automatic. Means that configuration option that should be enabled for domain is
enabled automatically.



Overuse. Means that objects are restored with the resources overuse. Can be
applied only to objects that belong to a reseller who works in the oversell mode.
Rename. Means that unique resources for the restored domain are reassigned with
the specified, existing in the system (mapping).



Conflict Resolution Policies and Rules
Depending on the scope of a conflict resolution, we distinguish conflict resolution rules
and policies:


Rule defines the way of how a specific single conflict should be resolved.



Policy defines the way of how all conflicts of a particular type should be resolved.

Conflicts Resolving Mechanism: Default Policies, Custom Policies,
and Rules
Plesk restore brings a set of default, hard-coded conflict resolution policies, which are
as follows:


for timing conflicts - Overwrite



for common resource usage conflicts - Overuse




for unique resource usage conflicts - Do Not Restore
for configuration conflicts - Automatic

The default policies are always applied during restore and cannot be changed or
overridden.
Applying default policies may resolve not all the conflicts occurred. In such cases,
those who perform restore should additionally define custom rules and/or policies that
resolve the remaining conflicts. Custom rules and policies are defined in an XML format
as described in the Resolutions Description Format section (on page 45).
Simplified presentation of the conflicts resolving during restore is as follows:
1. Administrator runs pleskrestore with specific parameters.
2. pleskrestore detects the conflicts occurred and resolves them with the default
policies.
3. pleskrestore checks if any conflicts remain unresolved.
In case all conflicts are resolved, the restoration continues.
4. pleskrestore stops the restoration and, if run in debug or verbose mode,
returns detailed description (in XML format) of each remaining conflict.

Performing Restore

5. Basing on the returned description of the conflicts, administrator creates a file that
defines a resolution for each conflict (with rules) and/or in bulk (with custom
policies).
6. Administrator runs the pleskrestore utility with the—conflicts-resolution
option and the file created at the previous step as its argument.
7. pleskrestore detects the conflicts occurred and resolves them with the default
policies.
8. pleskrestore gets to the remaining conflicts:
a

pleskrestore applies resolution rules from the file.

pleskrestore applies resolution policies from the file to the rest of the
conflicts.

9. pleskrestore checks if any conflicts remain unresolved.


In case all conflicts are resolved, the restoration continues.



In case any conflicts remain unresolved, pleskrestore stops the restoration
and, if run in debug or verbose mode, returns detailed description (in XML
format) of each remaining conflict.
To have such dump restored, admin should add resolution rules for each
remaining conflict to the conflict resolution file and repeat the restoration task.

CHAPTER 4

Reference
This chapter contains reference materials on pleskbackup and pleskrestore
utilities.

In this chapter:
pleskbackup Commands and Options Reference .............................................. 38
pleskrestore Commands and Options................................................................ 42
Custom Conflict Resolutions ............................................................................. 44

pleskbackup Commands and Options
Reference
Location


Plesk for Linux/Unix: /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskbackup



Plesk for Windows: %plesk_dir%\bin\pleskbackup
where %plesk_dir% is environment variable for Plesk installation directory. By
default, it is “C:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk”.

Usage
pleskbackup [] []

Commands
Command
--server

Argument

Description
Backs up whole Plesk server.

Reference

Command

Argument

Description

-resellersname

[ <...> ]
Windows, enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
resellers specified in the file are backed up and resellers
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no logins are specified and the -f option is not used,
all resellers are backed up.

-resellersid

[ <...> Backs up all data for the resellers specified by IDs.
]
IDs should be separated by spaces, and, if on Windows,
enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
resellers specified in the file are backed up and resellers
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no IDs are specified and the -f option is not used, all
resellers are backed up.

--clientsname

[ <...> ]
Windows, enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
clients specified in the file are backed up and clients
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no logins are specified and the -f option is not used,
all clients are backed up.

--clientsid

[ <...> Backs up all data for the clients specified by IDs.
]
IDs should be separated by spaces, and, if on Windows,
enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
clients specified in the file are backed up and clients
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no IDs are specified and the -f option is not used, all
clients are backed up.

--domainsname

[ Backs up all data for the domains specified by names.
<...> ]
Names should be separated by spaces, and, if on
Windows, enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
domains specified in the file are backed up and domains
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no names are specified and the -f option is not used,
all domains are backed up.

Reference

Command

Argument

Description

--domainsid

[ <...> Backs up all data for the domains specified by IDs.
]
IDs should be separated by spaces, and, if on Windows,
enclosed in quotes.
Can be used with the—from-file option. In such case,
domains specified in the file are backed up and domains
specified as command arguments are ignored.
If no IDs are specified and the -f option is not used, all
domains are backed up.

--help

Displays help on the utility usage.

Exclude Options
Option

Description

--excludeSkips resellers with the specified logins during backup.
reseller[=,,.
..]
--exclude-resellerfile[=]

Skips resellers listed in the specified file during backup.

--excludeSkips clients with the specified logins during backup.
client=[,,...
]
--exclude-client-file=

Skips clients listed in the specified file during backup.

--excludedomain[=,,...]

Skips domain with the specified names during backup.

--exclude-domain-file=

Skips domains listed in the specified file during backup.

General Options
Option

Description

-v|--verbose

Shows more information about backup process. Multiple -v options
increase verbosity, for the maximum verbosity level, define 5 options.

-c|--configuration

Backs up only configurations of Plesk objects, excluding their content.

Splits the backup files into parts of the specified size. The parts are
-s|-split[=[K|M| numbered by appending numerical suffixes starting with .1.
G]]
Size is specified in Kbytes, Mbytes or Gbytes. If none is defined, then
interpreted as being in bytes.
If no argument is specified, default value of 2 Gbytes is used.
-z|--no-gzip

Sets that objects content is archived without compressing.

Reference

Option

Description

--only-mail

Backs up only mail configuration and content.

When used with the resellers|clients|domains-login|id
commands, backs up configuration of domain-level mail system, and
content and configuration of mail accounts.
When used with the server command, backs up also server-wide
mail configuration.
Cannot be used together with the—only-hosting option.
--only-hosting

Backs up only physical hosting configuration and Web site content,
including site applications, databases and subdomains.
Cannot be used together with the—only-mail option.

--suspend

Suspends domains during backup operation.

-f| --from-file= Backs up resellers|clients|domains listed in the specified file, ignoring
those specified in the command line as arguments.
The file should be in plain text format and should contain a list of
resellers|clients|domains, one per line.
Used only with the resellers-name, resellers-id, clientsname, clients-id, domains-name, domains-id commands.
Depending on the command, resellers|clients|domains are listed in
the file by either logins or IDs.
--skip-logs

Sets that log files are not saved to backup.

--prefix=

Adds specified prefix to the backup files names.
Used to customize backup file name which is created with the backup
prefix by default.

FTP Options
Option

Description

--ftplogin=

Specifies FTP login that will be used for uploading backup file to the
FTP server.

--ftppassword=

Specifies password that will be used for uploading backup file to the
FTP server.

--ftp-passive-mode

Specifies that a passive mode FTP connection should be used.

Output File Option
Option

Description

--output-file

Exports backup as a single file to stdout and removes
backup from Plesk repository.

Reference

Option

Description

--outputfile=

Exports backup as a single file with the specified name to
a local file system and removes backup from Plesk
repository.

--outputExports backup as a single file to the specified FTP
file=[:]@]/>
The FTP_PASSWORD environment variable can be used
for setting password.
The—ftp-login and—ftp-password FTP options
can be used for setting login and password.

pleskrestore Commands and Options
Location


Plesk for Linux/Unix: /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskrestore



Plesk for Windows: %plesk_dir%\bin\pleskrestore
where %plesk_dir% is environment variable for Plesk installation directory. By
default, it is “C:\Program Files\Parallels\Plesk\”.

Usage
pleskrestore [] []

Commands
Command

Argument

Description

--restore

Restores data from the specified backup.

--checkbackup

Requires the -level option.
Checks integrity of the specified backup file, which is:

-i|--info
-h|--help



backup digital sign match



backup file format



content files integrity

Shows the backup file description.
Displays help on the utility usage.

Reference

Options
Option

Argument

Description

-level

clients|resellers
|domains|server

Specifies restoring level.

|[,[,...]]>

Specifies list of domain, client or reseller names for
restore. The object names are listed either in a specified
file, one per line, or as the option argument, separated
by commas.

-filter

Required with the—restore command.

-license

Restores Plesk license key from the backup.

-verbose

Enables verbose restore mode.

-debug

Enables debugging restore mode.

-conflictsresolution
-suspend

Specifies file which describes conflict resolution policies
and rules.
Suspends the domains being restored.

Reference

Custom Conflict Resolutions
This Reference section is devoted to implementing custom conflict resolutions during restore.

In this section:
Conflict Description Messages .......................................................................... 44
Resolutions Description Format ......................................................................... 45
Samples of Policy Description ........................................................................... 54
Samples of Conflict Resolution With Rules ........................................................ 55

Conflict Description Messages
Conflict descriptions returned by pleskrestore utility contain message elements included
for the GUI generation purposes. Despite of the self-explaining character of XML conflict
descriptions, values of the message elements may be confusing, so this section references
the meanings of these messages as they are displayed in Plesk GUI.
Value of message element

Message displayed in Plesk GUI

backup__restore__object_vhost

Virtual host

backup__restore__object_plesk_admi Plesk server administrator
n
backup__restore__conflict_object_n

Parallels Backup And Restore CLI Plesk Panel 9.5 Reference Guide En

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