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Akeeba Solo and Backup for WordPress User's Guide
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Akeeba Solo and Backup for WordPress User's Guide

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Copyright © 2014-2025 Akeeba Ltd

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the appendix entitled "The GNU Free Documentation License".

Abstract

This book covers the use of the Akeeba Solo backup application for PHP-powered web sites, Akeeba Backup for WordPress plugin and its associated tools and utilities.

Table of Contents

I. User's Guide to Akeeba Solo
1. Introduction
Introducing Akeeba Solo
Introducing Akeeba Backup for WordPress
Indicative uses
A typical backup/restoration workflow
Server environment requirements
2. Installation, updates and upgrades
Installing Akeeba Solo (Standalone)
Installing Akeeba Backup for WordPress
WordPress roles and Akeeba Backup privileges
Using on sites with BulletProof Security installed
Using on CloudWays and other hosts which limit access to .php files
Updating to the latest version
Requesting support and reporting bugs
Understanding PHP versions
3. Quick Start
Installing Akeeba Solo / Akeeba Backup
Basic concepts
Setting up and taking your first backup
Restoring a backup
Backing up your site to a cloud storage service
Introduction
Basic configuration
Using Amazon S3
Using Dropbox
Where to go from here?
4. Akeeba Solo / Akeeba Backup application reference
First steps
The login page
An overview of the interface
The main page (control panel)
Main operations
Configuration wizard
Configuration
The main settings
Basic Configuration
Advanced configuration
Optional filters
Quota management
Fine tuning
Database dump engines
Native MySQL Backup Engine
File and directories scanner engines
Smart scanner
Large site scanner
Archiver engines
ZIP format
JPA format
Encrypted Archives (JPS format)
DirectFTP
DirectFTP over cURL
DirectSFTP
DirectSFTP over cURL
ZIP using ZIPArchive class
Post processing engines
No post-processing
Send by email
Upload to Amazon S3
Upload to BackBlaze B2
Upload to Box.com
Upload to CloudMe
Upload to DreamObjects
Upload to Dropbox (v2 API)
Upload to Google Drive
Upload to Google Storage (JSON API)
Upload to Google Storage (Legacy S3 API)
Upload to OneDrive and OneDrive for Business
Upload to OneDrive (LEGACY)
Upload to OneDrive (App-specific Folder)
Upload to Microsoft Windows Azure BLOB Storage service
Upload to OVH Object Storage
Upload to OpenStack Swift object storage
Upload to RackSpace CloudFiles
Upload to Remote FTP server
Upload to Remote FTP server over cURL
Upload to Remote SFTP server
Upload to Remote SFTP server over cURL
Upload to SugarSync
Upload to iDriveSync
Upload to WebDAV
Backup now
Manage backups
Downloading backup archives
Manage remotely stored files
View Log
Troubleshooter - ALICE
Site Transfer Wizard
Import archives
Import archives from S3
Update (a.k.a. "Live Update")
Include data in the backup
Multiple Databases Definitions
Off-site Directories Inclusion
Exclude data from the backup
Files and Directories Exclusion
Database Tables Exclusion
RegEx Files and Directories Exclusion
Regular Expressions recipes for files and directories
RegEx Database Tables Exclusion
Regular Expressions recipes for database tables
System Management
WordPress Roles and Capabilities
User manager
Resetting your password or creating a new user if you can't log in to Akeeba Solo
Two Factor Authentication
Two factor authentication with Google Authenticator
Two factor authentication with YubiKey
Profiles management
Schedule Automatic Backups
System configuration
Automating your backup
Taking backups automatically
Front-end backup, for use with CRON
Native CRON script
Alternative CRON script
Scheduling backups with WP-CRON (WordPress only)
Supported CRON Expressions
Caveats of using WP-CRON for backup scheduling
Checking for failed backups automatically
Front-end backup failure check, for use with CRON
Native CRON script for failed backup checks
Alternative CRON script
WordPress and the wp-config.php file
Remote Storage and OAuth2 Helpers
Understanding OAuth2
Custom OAuth2 helpers for more than one sites
Custom OAuth2 helpers by storage provider
Box.com
Creating the custom helper
Using the custom helper
Dropbox
Creating the custom helper
Using the custom helper
Google Drive
Creating the custom helper
Using the custom helper
OneDrive
Creating the custom helper
Using the custom helper
Miscellaneous features
Enabling the debug mode
WordPress admin dashboard widgets
WordPress CLI (WP-CLI) integration
5. Restoring backups and transferring sites
General guidelines for backing up and restoring sites
General guidelines for backing up and restoring your site
Guidelines for storing your backups remotely / "cloud backup"
Overview of the backup restoration procedure
Extracting your backup archives
Using the integrated restoration feature (most common)
Using Akeeba Kickstart
Using third party software
Unorthodox: the emergency restoration procedure
6. Information for removed or canceled features
Microsoft OneDrive for Business
Formerly supported platforms
II. Security information
7. Introduction
Foreword
Why you need to care about ownership and permissions?
8. How your web server works
Users and groups
Users
Groups
How users and groups are understood by UNIX-derived systems
Ownership
Process ownership
File ownership
Permissions
The three types of permissions
What permissions can control
Permissions notation
The textual notation
The octal notation
9. Securing your Akeeba Solo (Standalone) installation
Access rights
Protection through .htaccess
Securing the output directory
Securing file transfers
III. Appendices
A. The JPA archive format, v.1.2
B. The JPS archive format, v.2.0
C. GNU Free Documentation License

List of Figures

4.1. CRON Cheatsheet
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   Part I. User's Guide to Akeeba Solo

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