Hi,
I've set my automated backups in the administration page, but I can't seem to find the backup files on the server. I've looked in all the places that the documentation suggests but I simply don't see any backup files. I also tried a custom location of /etc/backup which i created but I still don't see any backup files appearing. Can anyone help?
Welcome to the new file system!!! Backups (.mbz's now) are spread over moodledata/filedir/ in sub directories and filename that have been hashed ... no longer humanly recognizable. The 'humanly recognizable' names of those backup files you might see in the Moodle UI is really generated by the DB now and the DB knows the contenthash given all files.
A little bit more information would have been helpful as Bitnami can be installed on Linux (locally hosted or remotely hosted), Windows and MacOSX. So the following is related to Linux based OS ... similar to MacOSX and dis-similar to Windows.
The designated directory (alternative) you created in /etc/ is probably restricted ... ie, apache user cannot write to it.
Bitnami is one of those 'easy button' thangs (or is supposed to be). While it might be easy to install, that's just tip of the iceburg when it comes to Moodle (there are, as you are experiencing now) server administration duties .. like backups of courses, backups of DB (by file or SQL dump), backups of code directories (which, in Bitnami is where?), and backups of the data directory.
So here are some references for Bitnami:
http://wiki.bitnami.com/Components/Apache
http://wiki.bitnami.com/Components/MySQL
http://wiki.bitnami.com/Components/PHP
http://wiki.bitnami.com/Components/PHP_Frameworks/Zend_Framework
Those, should you continue to use Bitnami, might be your primary resources for your system.
Back to your alternative directory issue ... that directory could be located anywhere on the system really, but to assure it works one must allow the user under which apache runs at least write access to it. Would advise that /etc is not a good location for alternate location Moodle backups. Do you have a home directory (for the user you login under)? - like /home/mspit You could create a 'moodlebackups' in home and set ownerships/permissions to it where apache could write to it: chown apache:apache /home/moodlebackups/
The alternative directory will not be seen in the Moodle UI ... it's purpose, I think, is strictly archival.
Hope that helps!
'spirit of sharing', Ken
Thanks for the reply, Ken. I actually changed the settings back to the defaults. I found the page on the moodle site that displays the moodle backup files and allows you to restore or back them up which is great. My only question is why are the files so small? I have one course, about fifty users but I also have about 8 SCORM modules that are around 1mb each in size. My total mbz file is only 13k. Do these automated backups save my SCORM files? I have those backed up as well, but it would be nice to have one single file with all my data should things go sideways. I am also going to set up a cron job for AWS (running an EC2 linux server) to take a snapshot on a weekly basis for a full backup in addition to the moodle backups. Thanks again!
edit:
Nevermind on the size question, I see that there are course backup files that are around 200mb each. That makes more sense.
