aem-backup-cli

A Developer CLI utility to backup local AEM instances, and save lives!

If you like this utility, please consider starring 🤩 to let me know you like it!

windows users: let me know if it works on windows 😅

About

If you're an AEM dev, you understand the frustration of a broken AEM instance during development. This CLI will backup your instance so you can restore it at any time!

How it works

Consider this AEM instance directory structure:

|-- aem-instance-directory       # The AEM instance directory
    |-- quickstart.jar
    |-- crx-quickstart
    |-- license.properties
    |-- crx-quickstart.backup    # folder added by aem-backup-cli
        |-- some-backup.tar      # sample user-generated backup  
        |-- another-backup.tar   # another sample user-generated backup

Moving forward, I will be referring to aem-instance-directory above as the "AEM instance Directory"

Using the node-tar module, this CLI creates a tar archive (tarball) of the crx-quickstart folder and saves the resulting tar into a sibling folder called crx-quickstart.backups.

Please note:

Since this is a filesystem backup, the AEM instance must be completely shutdown.
This CLI does not perform compression, as it's aimed for speed not saving disk space.

Install and Usage

# install the cli (adds 'aemb' to the command line)

$ npm install -g aem-backup-cli

# before running `aemb`, make sure you `cd` into  your
# AEM instance directory (`aem-instance-directory` from above)

$ aemb

Interactive cli is now open! typing help generates:

aemb$ help

  Commands:

    help [command...]              Provides help for a given command.
    exit                           Exits application.
    backup [options] [backupName]  Archive crx-quickstart in current directory and move archive to crx-quickstart.backups folder in current directory
    list                           List all available backups
    delete [options]               Delete a backup from available backups
    restore [options]              Restore a backup from a list of available backups

Examples

# create backup named my-first-backup
aemb$ backup my-first-backup

# List available backups
aemb$ list

# restore a backup from a list of backups
aemb$ restore

# delete a backup from a list of backups
aemb$ delete

Interacting with `crx-quickstart.backups` folder

You can manually add/remove/rename backup tars to your hearts content. you can also safely remove the whole folder if you no longer need it.