Easy 5 Step Automation of WordPress Backups

 

On November 11th McColo was turned off for hosting many spam, child porn, and malware sites (article at WashingtonPost.com). Although a small percentage, there were legitimates sites hosted there. And now they're scrambling to rebuild their blogs, sites, and all their content somewhere else. The discouraging thing is thinking about how many sites use Wordpress and all of the legitimate ones now trying to rebuild didn't have good backup. So they're in tough times right now.

You can take action now and have automatic backup to internet for your WordPress sites. We figured out a easy five steps that will automate your WordPress backups.

 

Automated WordPress Backup to Internet

A. First off, choose the email address you want to use to receive the initial backups. As long as you download email to your computer (using Outlook, SeaMonkey, etc.) you will receive your backups automatically.

B. You can do this by setting up a CRON job manually, or you can download a couple handy plugins (WP-DB-Backup and WP-Cron) to do the job for you. Activate both plugins in your WordPress plugin management page after you've downloaded, upzipped, and uploaded them to your site. A variety of plugins are included with WP-Cron. Just activate the ones called WP-Cron and WP-DB-Backup.

C. Click the "Manage" tab in WordPress now that the plugins are activated. You’ll see a menu item called “Backup”. This is the one you need. There are some optional settings for doing manual backups. Skip that and go to the section titled “Scheduled Backup” (at the bottom). You need to make sure to enable WP-Cron (if it's visible, it's enabled). In the settings for this section, set the schedule to “Daily” (or whatever timeframe is appropriate for your site). Where it says "Email Backup To:" put in your email address (Step A). The option to include noncore WordPress tables is the final step. We think backing them all up is a safe choice. The default is for the plugin to backup all native WordPress tables. After you've selected any other tables, click Submit.

D. Now the Rock Solid part. Grab yourself a copy of OPENRSM CloudBackup. It's the best backup to internet system we've tried. It's very simple to setup no matter if your a MAC, Windows, or Linux user. Just make sure you have selected to backup your email folders. Click "Daily" to set the schedule.

E. That's all! Your WordPress SQL backups should be emailed to you and they'll be using the backup to internet features of CloudBackup to make sure you don't lose your site. Check the email account and see the backup arrive. You can now quit worrying and let the plugins, your email account, and CloudBackup do all the work. Just make sure to delete older backups from your email occasionally and your work is done.

And if your site crashes? Your backups are now fully automatic, recovery is fast and easy, and your not going to have to suffer like the legitimate sites that were at McColo.