A discussion is underway about restoring a backup in Discourse without reconfiguring the platform from scratch. Chopper proposes a solution where the discourse-setup script can directly install Docker and Discourse using variables from a passed backup file. However, Stephen explains that certain settings like hostname, SSL, and plugins are not contained in the backup and are separate from the container configuration. codinghorror suggests restoring the backup from the command line to skip the web GUI configuration part.
It will be great if there is a way to restore a backup without reconfiguring the Discourse from the beginning.
For now, the differents steps to restore a backup from a server to another are :
1 - make a backup
2 - reinstall Discourse with ./discourse-setup and complete the questions : host, smtp, port etc
3 - configure SSL
4 - load the backup
Why should I complete the step 2 (and 3) if all the data are replace by the backup two minutes laters.
Proposition :
The discourse-setup script have an option where a backup is passed in parameter to direclty install the Docker and Discourse regarding the backup variables (host, smtp etc)
I believe the best solution is to restore the backup from command line @techAPJ has a howto for this. Then you can skip the web GUI configuration part entirely.
They aren’t replaced by the backup. Those settings live in your app.yml which isn’t contained in the backup. The container configuration and the discourse container contents are entirely separate. Hostname, let’s encrypt and plugins are all outside the backup and are used when the container is rebuilt.
The backup holds all the posts, users, attachments, customizations and site settings which can be configured from /admin.