Using Mineshire
Why your Mineshire backup plan did not run
You set up a backup plan for Tuesday night, checked on Wednesday, and there’s no new backup. Nothing is broken. A plan has two conditions, and it needs both before it does anything.
Condition one: the server has to be stopped
A backup copies the server’s files, and files that are being written to can end up half saved. So Mineshire only backs up a server that’s stopped. If the server is still running when the plan’s time arrives, the plan skips it.
The practical answer is to schedule backups for a time when nobody is playing and the server is off, or to stop the server yourself before the plan’s time.
Condition two: Mineshire has to be open
Plans run inside Mineshire, so they only run while it’s open. Open can mean hidden in the notification area, which is where it goes when you close the window. It can’t mean switched off. If your PC was asleep or off at that time, or you quit Mineshire from the tray, no backup was made.
If you want plans to work without thinking about it, turn on “Start Mineshire when I sign in to Windows” in Settings. Then the app is there whenever the computer is.
Where backups live
Backups are kept on your computer, and you can also copy them to your Google Drive. Each backup row shows where it is: on this computer, in Google Drive, or both. You can remove a backup from the computer and keep the Drive copy when you need the space.
It’s a good habit to have at least one copy somewhere other than the PC that runs the server. A drive failure takes the server and the local backups together.
Backup, export and duplicate are not the same thing
They all copy files, which is why they get mixed up.
- A backup is a copy you keep so you can go back. It lives in Mineshire’s Backups page.
- Export as zip packs the whole server folder into one file, wherever you choose to save it. Import puts it back into Mineshire later, which is how you move a server to another computer.
- Duplicate makes a second server with the world, settings and plugins of the first, on its own port, and leaves the original alone. It’s for trying things out.
For the last two the server also has to be stopped first, for the same reason as backups.
A simple routine
Pick a time when the server is normally off, add a plan for it, and keep Mineshire starting with Windows. Then look at the Backups page once a week and open one backup to make sure it’s there. That habit has saved more worlds than any setting.