Backup Jobs Keep Re-Starting

Hello,

Thank you for reaching out.

May I know if you tried troubleshooting steps from this doc – https://backwpup.com/docs/job-restarts-due-to-inactivity-for-more-than-5-minutes/?

You can try testing values between 20-30 to see what works for you.

Let us know how it goes.

Best Regards,

Thanks for your response.

I have tried values of 20, 25, 30 (the installed default), and 40. None had any effect in solving the problem. Since my initial post I have uninstalled BackWPup, re-started my blog, and reinstalled the latest 4.1.4 version. As it stands now (after much testing) the problem only occurs when trying to do a backup that contains the Job Task “File Backup”. Trying to narrow it down by the various selections in that job task, I find two areas that are causing the “hang-ups”: 1) Backup Uploads Folder -and- 2) Backup Plug-ins (which hangs-up only sometimes).

I’ve tried backing up as ZIP, TAR and TAR.GZ . . . none solve the problem, though the total time is a bit longer with ZIP and TAR.GZ.

The end result (trying to backup only Job Task “File Backup”) will sometime give me a very long-timed backup, but will occasionally fail with an aborted back-up due to too many failures.

Incidental information: my backup file for everything is generally in the 243 mb range (a backup of everything except the “File Backup” is under 3 mb).

Hi,

Thank you for reply.

Can you try splitting upload folder backup to reduce chance of failing? Is there any different error while backing up only upload folder?

Best Regards,

Again, thanks for your response.

I have created a job that only backs up the Uploads folder. This includes years from 2011 to 2024. No go, it has problems. I have experimented with excluding different years. Only when I restrict to the earlier years (where I don’t have that much content) does the backup run smoothly. When I go to only the later years (where I generally have 4 or 5 small jpeg photos uploaded each month), the backup keeps stalling and I get the 5 minute re-start happening. Sometimes one restart will see the job through, but frequently it takes two or even three re-starts. For the record, this problem has just surfaced within the past month. All backups prior to this problem were a single backup that included everything (the largest backup to date has been 243 mb).

If it’s any help, when backing using Job Task “File Backup” the compression progress (the bottom indicator) usually stalls around 70%. When backing up everything (all Job Tasks), it stalls at 63%, then again at 72%. Sometimes it will complete, sometimes it stalls around 91%. If it stalls a forth time the program will abort.

As the latest on this issue, I think I’ve stumbled onto a solution. Under the settings there is a provision to “Reduce server load“. By default it’s disabled. I tried setting it to minimum, then ran a Files backup, but that didn’t help. Next I tried medium and the backup ran without issue. I then ran a FULL backup of everything, and it also ran without issue. The total time was a minute or so greater than I have been getting before the re-start issue, but I can live with that if I can get a full backup without issue. I’m cautiously optimistic that the problem is solved.

Hi,

Thank you for your reply.

I’m glad you were able to resolve the issue. I’m sure to add this observation in our list for developers to check.

For now, I’m closing this and I appreciate your patience on this.

Best Regards,