Question about Search Option
 

Currently on my board, the search function is off. This is because I heard when it is on, the file size of your backup increases tremendously...is this true?

Almost all my members want the search function back, but i dont' want to turn it on, unless somebody tells me it doesn't affect the file size of the backup.

Yes it does increase the size incredibly, however if you are doing a backup from the control panel you have the option to not include the search files in your backup saving time. In the options just click "no" to not include the search files.

If you have to restore from your backup you can just click rebuild search index to restore it.

Whenever I backup I always exclude it.

This however may not be the case if you are using Telnet though.
I am not to familar with Telnet backing up, but you could probably just dump your search engine in the control panel before doing a backup (go into update counters field to do this).

Hope this helps.

Mike

Oh my god! I never knew that! Thanks you so much, I can now offer it to my members again! Wuhooo!

There's one problem that remains. When I do backups, I save the file on my server directly....but when backing up this way, there is no option to not include the search index....or is there?

I don't think there is a way to exclude it except to empty the indexes in Rebuild search index function in the Update Counters screen and to rebuild it again after each dump. May take some time since you have a large forum.

Personally I always save offline about once a week, I am on a dial up modem and it's a long and painful process, but I sort of feel safer with a hard copy in my hand. You probably need a cable or dsl or spend the whole day doing a backup.

Most hosts also make a daily backup of your site in case you srew something up and have to revert back to it. I am not sure about Rackshack though.

You have a large forum (and it's very good by the way) and no matter which way you go it will still be a time consuming process.

Hopefully some other members on this forum who have large boards can give some tips on how they back up their boards.

Mike

yes, thank you very much....
and yeah, i could backup the whole server myself because I bought a dedicated server from Rackshack
If anybody else who has a large board can give me some tips on backing up quickly, please let me know...
the current size of my backups including the search index when I save it on the server is 502MB....