Localhost backup restored to Live

  • Resolved magicoders

    (@patopaiar)


    3 years, 10 months ago

    We work on many websites helping clients.

    Updraft is a common plugin installed in their sites, we’ve used it multiple times and had never had this problem.

    This client had updraft with the external storage option enabled.

    We made a copy of the production site and installed it in localhost to work on a feature.

    We installed a copy of the production database and used wp cli to search and replace the production URL to our localhost URL.

    We worked on our localhost site normally.

    5 days later, the client uses Restore to restore a version of his site and the production database got restored either using a copy of the database that has the localhost URLs, or updraft updated the production URL to locahost, but at one point his site went down and all URLs including siteurl and homeurl in the production database had got replaced with the localhost site URL.

    We wanted to report this on one side, and on the other hopefully get some input from you as to what to do to prevent this from ever happening again when installing sites in our local environment!

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
  • Plugin Contributor bcrodua

    (@bcrodua)

    Hi,

    It is because the saved backup still has the old URLs with it. It needs the Migrator add-on so UpdraftPlus can automatically change the URL’s or you can do the manual search and replace.

    Best Wishes,
    Bryle

    Thread Starter magicoders

    (@patopaiar)

    @bcrodua your reply has nothing to do with the issue I am reporting.

    I am telling you a client, from his Live site and server, clicked restored in his Live server with the intention of restoring his Live site with a backup of his Live database, and the plugin restored in his live server a database that had the NEW (the localhost) URLs.

    If you want to do something about it and fix your plugin, good.
    I thought you would want to know that this disaster scenario could happen with Updraftplus.

    The client has already decided to delete Updraftplus as a result of his experience, and we don’t use it either, this was information for you.

    Plugin Contributor aporter

    (@aporter)

    Hi,

    So this sounds like a backup of the localhost was restored on the production site and no search and repalce was performed. Which resulted in the site going down as the site url was pointing to a localhost site.

    You said that the external storage option was enabled, I assume by this you mean a remote storage location such as Dropbox?

    If so the local site likely created and uploaded a backup to Dropbox (either on a schedule or manually).

    Then on the live site the rescan remote storage link was pressed which brings in any backups found at the connected remote storage (the local site backup now appears in the list of backups on the live site)

    This backup was then restored, without doing a search and replace.

    To prevent this from happening again, you could disconnect the local site from remote storage or turn of scheduled backups so that no backups get sent to remote storage of the local site.

    If you do want backups being sent to remote storage so that you can install your changes on the live site, then you need to ensure that the option to search and replace is checked (there should be warnings on the restore screen, explaining this).

    If them warnings did appear and the checkbox to search and replace was checked, but it did not perform the search and replace then something went wrong or theres a bug, in which case please do open a support request and attach the restore log so we can investigate why.

    As migrator is a premium feature we can’t offer support for paid products here, so please open a support request here:

    https://updraftplus.com/paid-support-requests/

    Best Wishes,

    Ashley

    Thread Starter magicoders

    (@patopaiar)

    Hi Ashley,

    It does sound like that is what happened.

    The site owner who used to use Updraft has decided to not use it anymore, and we don’t use it either. There’s no need on my end for opening a support ticket.

    I now know that when using Updraft, it is a hazard and I must deactivate it as soon as localhost is installed.

    On your end, your plugin should probably detect a localhost site URL and automatically deactivate automatic backups from getting backed up to a 3rd party storage, with a warning that backups to external storage has been deactivated.

    So anyone who does want to still have them backed up there, still can, but you prevent this type of case like the one I described, where a non-technical client restores their live site to localhost without having a clue about URLs and databases, because the plugin has decided to backup to their external storage databases from different servers.

    • This reply was modified 3 years, 9 months ago by magicoders.
    • This reply was modified 3 years, 9 months ago by magicoders.
Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
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