With Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, you can back up and restore
information about your server configuration
and about each site you host on your server
or server farm. You can back up and restore
the configuration database and content
databases for your server or server farm.
This backup and restore method allows you to
recover from a server failure. You must be
running Microsoft SQL Server 2000 or SQL
Server 2005 to perform a database backup and
restore.
.gif) Note:
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| You can also back up and
restore individual Web sites
hosted on your server or server
farm. This backup and restore
method is not dependent on the
type of database you are using.
You can perform this backup and
restore even if you are running
Microsoft SQL Server 2000
Desktop Engine (Windows) (WMSDE)
instead of SQL Server 2000 or
SQL Server 2005. For more
information, see
Backing Up and Restoring Web
Sites (Windows SharePoint
Services 2.0). |
In Windows SharePoint Services, all
server and site configuration information is
stored in the configuration database, and
all site content is stored in content
databases. If you want to back up all the
Windows SharePoint Services information on
your server or server farm, you must back up
these databases by using the SQL Server 2000
or SQL Server 2005 backup and restore tools.
Backing Up the Databases
If you installed Windows SharePoint
Services with SQL Server on the same
computer, the configuration and content
databases are stored in the
%drive%\Program
Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL\Data
folder, by default. If you are using a
server farm or remote SQL Server
environment, the databases are stored on
another server or multiple servers.
There is always one configuration
database for the entire server or server
farm, and there is at least one content
database.
Before you can back up the
databases, you must identify which
databases you need. By default, the
databases are named as follows:
- The configuration database is
named sts_config.mdf by default.
Note that this is only the default
name. When you created the
configuration database, you had the
option to specify a different name.
- The content databases are
created with names based on the
server name by default. For example,
STS_server_name_1.mdf,
STS_server_name_12.mdf, and so on.
The database names are not
sequential. Again, you may have
chosen a different naming scheme for
the content databases when you
created them.
You use the SQL Server 2000 and SQL
Server 2005 backup and restore tools to
back up these databases. Be sure to back
up both the configuration database and
all of the content databases used by
Windows SharePoint Services. To find out
how to back up databases in SQL Server,
see the SQL Server documentation.
|
Note:
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| When you back up the
database using the SQL
Server 2000 or SQL Server
2005 tools, the backup file
includes personalizations
made by site users and
personal data about site
users. This data is also
included when you restore
from a backup. As part of
your own internal privacy
policies, you may want to
inform users that this data
is collected and stored
during database backups. |
Restoring from a Backup
Creating regular backups allows you to
restore your servers and sites in case
they happen to fail. To restore a server
or server farm from a database backup,
you must perform the following steps.
- On your server, or on the
front-end Web servers in your server
farm, in Internet Information
Services (IIS), create the virtual
servers to host your Web site
content. For more information about
creating a virtual server, see
Extending Virtual Servers (Windows
SharePoint Services 2.0).
- Using the SQL Server restore
tools, restore the databases from
the backups.
For more information
about restoring databases in SQL
Server, see the SQL Server
documentation.
- In IIS, create the application
pools for the content virtual
servers.
Be sure that you use domain
accounts for the application pools,
and that these accounts are members
of the Security Administrators and
Database Creators roles in SQL
Server. For more information about
creating application pools, see the
Help system for Internet Information
Services.
- On your server or front-end Web
servers, install Windows SharePoint
Services, and connect to the
restored configuration database.
For more information about
installation, see the appropriate
deployment scenario:
- Set the default content database
server to the restored database
server.
You can use the Set
Default Content Database Server page
in SharePoint Central
Administration. For more
information, see
Managing Content Databases (Windows
SharePoint Services 2.0).
- Extend each virtual server for
your server or server farm using the
Extend and map to another
virtual server option on
the Extend Virtual Server page, or
by using the
extendvsinwebfarm
command-line operation.
This option allows you to connect
a new virtual server to a restored
content database. Repeat this step
for each new virtual server. For
more information about mapping one
virtual server to another virtual
server, see
Extending Virtual Servers (Windows
SharePoint Services 2.0).
- Add any additional content
databases that have been restored.
Use the Manage Content Databases
page in SharePoint Central
Administration to add content
database to a virtual server. Repeat
this step for each virtual server.
For more information, see
Managing Content Databases (Windows
SharePoint Services 2.0).
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Note:
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| As you reconnect
the content databases to
your virtual servers,
the Web sites for those
content databases are
restored. Note that only
Web sites contained in
the list of included
paths for the virtual
server are restored. |
When you have completed these steps,
your restoration is complete. All sites
included in your backup should be
functioning again, complete with the
site content, users, and settings as
they were when the sites were backed up.