How to create custom schedule with CloudBerry Backup

Note: this post applies to CloudBerry Backup 1.4 and later.

CloudBerry S3 Backup is a powerful Windows backup and restore that automate backup and restore processes to Amazon S3 cloud storage. With CloudBerry Backup GUI you can schedule backup plan to run at most every day at specified time. For most of the businesses and home users this is a reasonable default. However, sometimes you might need to schedule backup plan to run more frequently. Currently, you can’t do that using the console, but this is exactly the case where our command line interface and Windows Task Scheduler will help

Important update: as of release 1.7 you can configure the schedule down to 1 hour. You don't have to use command line interface for that. You can download CloudBerry Backup 1.7 here.

Command Line Interface

CloudBerry Backup command line interface is implemented by a little tool called cbb.exe

To try it out run windows console cmd.exe. Make sure you change your current folder to CloudBerry Backup product installation folder by default at C:\Program Files\CloudBerryLab\CloudBerry Online Backup\

Run cbb ? to get some basic help

Run cbb –l to get the list of existing backup plans. It is necessary to run this command to get the plan ID. You will use it in the future to schedule the plan. There are 10 plans in my system. You can quickly spot a plan you want to schedule by looking at the plan names.

To run a given backup plan you can use CloudBerry Backup console executable with the plan ID as a command line argument. You should replace {Plan ID} with the ID you found using cbb – l command.

C:\Program Files\CloudBerryLab\CloudBerry Online Backup>“CloudBerry Online Backup Service.exe” {Plan ID}

Windows Task Scheduler

To create a Windows Task go to Control Panel | Scheduled Tasks and click Add Scheduled Task. Copy the command above with the plan ID into the Run field.

Now you can take advantage of all advanced scheduling options available for Windows Task:

Conclusion

Even though CloudBerry Backup doesn’t provide very flexible scheduling options through CloudBerry Backup console you can always use command line interface and Windows Task Scheduler to make your schedule run according to your needs.

CloudBerry Backup command line interface is capable of doing much more than simply listing and scheduling plans. You can create plans, configure various settings, run backup and restore operations. To learn more about it please refer to the online documentation.

CloudBerry Backup is a Windows program that leverages Amazon S3 storage. You can download it at http://cloudberrydrive.com/ . It comes with onetime fee of $29.99 (US) per copy.

Like our products? Please help us spread the word about them. Learn here how to do it.

How to delete files from Backup Storage with CloudBerry S3 Backup

Note: this post applies to CloudBerry Backup 1.4 and later.

CloudBerry S3 Backup is a powerful Windows backup and restore that automate backup and restore processes to Amazon S3 cloud storage.

With the release 1.4 we added an ability to delete files from backup storage. This is something our users have been asking for a long time. Now you can go to Backup Storage tab, select some files and right click them. Choose Delete Selected Items in the context menu.

Use this option carefully as it can’t be undone. Note, that you can also delete the whole folder.

This is a small enhancement that makes a long way towards improved usability and flexibility of the product.

CloudBerry Backup is a Windows program that leverages Amazon S3 storage. You can download it at http://cloudberrydrive.com/ . It comes with onetime fee of $29.99 (US) per copy.

Like our products? Please help us spread the word about them. Learn here how to do it.

How to back up to multiple Amazon S3 accounts with CloudBerry Backup

Note: this post applies to CloudBerry Backup 1.4 and later.

CloudBerry S3 Backup is a powerful Windows backup and restore that automate backup and restore processes to Amazon S3 cloud storage. In the newer releases we are introducing an ability to back up data to multiple Amazon S3 accounts and buckets.

Every time you create a new backup plan you have an option to create a new account. This is basically what you need to choose if you want to associate your new backup plan with a new Amazon S3 account (or a bucket).

If you already have several accounts set up you can simply choose the right account from the list and your new account will be associated with the new backup plan.

If you want to change the account for an existing plan simply go the Backup Plans tab and run edit backup plan wizard. Notice how the account name shows up next to the backup plan name: Demo and Private Accounts in the example below.

Note: if account is not specified your backup plan will not run and you have to update the account information exactly as explained above.

CloudBerry Backup is a Windows program that leverages Amazon S3 storage. You can download it at http://cloudberrydrive.com/ . It comes with onetime fee of $29.99 (US) per copy.

Like our products? Please help us spread the word about them. Learn here how to do it.

Want to learn more about Amazon S3?

Janakiram MSV, Cloud Computing Strategist from India hosts a show called TheCloud9Show.net which is dedicated to the developers and architects. This show aims at providing the big picture of the Cloud Computing. The objective of this show is to cover various aspects of the Cloud without the marketing pitch or bias towards a vendor specific service offering.

‘Data as a Service’ is a series of multiple episodes. In this series, he will be covering the data and the storage offerings from Amazon, Microsoft and Google. The objective is to introduce various Cloud data storage services and also discuss the patterns of consuming these services. You will see demos of S3, SimpleDB, SQS, RDS from Amazon; Blobs, Tables, Queues and SQL Azure from Microsoft Windows Azure Platform and finally BigTable and Persistent Storage from Google.

In the current episode, Janakiram provides a quick introduction to Amazon S3. He covers the basic concepts like Buckets, Objects and Access Control Lists. Watch this show to get a grasp of S3 in less than 7 minutes!

How to sign-up for Azure storage account and register it with CloudBerry Explorer

Note: this post applies to CloudBerry Explorer for Windows Azure.

Microsoft Azure blob storage is alternative cloud storage service that helps store unlimited amount of binary data at low cost. As of February, 1 2010 the service is out of beta and you have to start paying for usage. One of the exciting thing about Microsoft Azure and I can’t help sharing it here is that there is actually a so called Introductory Special offer that enables you to try Windows Azure at no charge! It includes 500 MB of free storage and 10 000 free storage transaction per month.

In this post we will show you how to get Microsoft Azure project, create storage account and register the account with CloudBerry Explorer for Windows Azure

Full description of Azure sign-up process is outside the scope of this article but it is suffice to say that this process involves choosing the package that best fits your usage requirements and entering payment information. Once your account is set up you can go to the control panel and start creating services.

Click to Windows Azure and then to “+New Service” link you will see a screen like the one below. Click on the Storage Account as this is what you need to create to be able to use Blob Storage.

The configuration screens will guide you through the process and once the service is created you will see the screen like below with the service access parameters.

Now let’s look how you can register an account in CloudBerry Explorer. Go to the program menu File| Azure Accounts. Click Add button in the opened window and you will be presented with the windows similar to the one below. On the Display name field enter anything you want. This is just to help you to identify your account if you have several accounts. It is just a display name. In the Account field enter the first part of your endpoint URL. In our example the endpoint looks like this:

http://cloudberrylab.blob.core.windows.net/

and you need to use only cloudberrylab part of it for account.

In the shared key field enter the Primary Access Key as displayed above.

If everything is entered correctly you should be able to access your account. Don’t forget to click test connection button. If you see a message like the one below you entered everything correctly.

CloudBerry Explorer for Windows Azure is a Windows freeware product that helps managing Azure Blog storage. You can download it at http://azure.cloudberrylab.com/

Like our products? Please help us spread the word about them. Learn here how to do it.