Trac Backup

Since Trac uses a database backend, it requires some extra care to safely create a backup of a TracEnvironment. Luckily, TracAdmin has a command to make backups easier - hotcopy.

Note: Trac uses the hotcopy nomenclature to match that of Subversion, to make it easier to remember when managing both Trac and Subversion servers.

Creating a Backup

To create a backup of a live TracEnvironment, simply run:

  $ trac-admin /some/where/mytracenv hotcopy /my/vault/mytracenv-backup

Note: TracAdmin will lock the database while copying.

The resulting backup copy is safe to handle using standard file-based backup tools like tar or dump/restore.

Restoring a Backup

Backups are simply a copied snapshot of the entire TracEnvironment directory structure, including the SQLite database.

To restore an environment from a backup, simply shut down your Trac service (Web server or tracd), restore the directory structure from backup and restart the service.