Backup, Upgrade, and Recover Qlik Sense

01. What Are Backups?

I like to think that “backup” is just a fancy word for a “copy” of something. Perhaps we use the word “backup” because unlike a “copy”, a “backup” has a different and specific purpose.

When we duplicate something with the purpose of having more than one of that thing, we call that a copy. Think wedding invitation, for example. A bunch of copies of a single invitation is made and given to each person that you want to attend your wedding and celebrate with you.

However, when we make copies with the purpose of having the copy replace the original in case of an emergency, we call that copy a backup.

When you will be creating backups throughout this course, and in your career, you will effectively be copying a bunch of Qlik Sense content (databases, certificates, logs, apps, extensions, etc.) with a goal of being able to use that copied content in place of the original Qlik Sense server content in case something will go wrong with your Qlik Sense server.

That’s the essence of backups. Just making copies of stuff as sort of an insurance against losses of data and time. The trick is knowing what exactly you need to copy to have everything you’ll need to be able to recover a Qlik Sense server in case of a disaster.

The trick is also knowing how to create backups. Creating a copy of a file is simple. Creating a copy of a database…not as simple. In this course you will learn not only how to create backups, but also how to create them as fast as possible to reduce the downtime of your Qlik Sense server during backup process. The last trick is to know how to restore a Qlik Sense site from backups, whether the restoration takes on the same or different machine. We’ll cover all these topics in this course.

02. Preparation

Now that you have an idea of what a backup is and its purpose, let’s talk about four points to consider when preparing to do a backup of your Qlik Sense server.

Taking Qlik Sense Server Offline

In order to create an accurate copy of repository databases, and the rest of Qlik Sense components, one of the things that you will need to do is stop Qlik Sense services from running. We do this because we want to ensure that we get a consistent copy of all of the data and configurations. By “consistent” I mean that the data that was, for example, in the database when the backup process ended is the same as it was when the backup process began. Creating a backup of a Qlik Sense server takes time. Taking Qlik Sense offline will help you to avoid a scenario where someone creates an app, or a bookmark, or a task starts reloading, new logs are generated while you’re backing up your Qlik Sense server.

To ensure that you get a flawless snapshot of the database and other related components of Qlik Sense, you will need to take Qlik Sense offline for a short while by shutting down its services. Because you’ll need to take Qlik Sense server offline to complete a backup, it is a good idea to do backups at a time when your Qlik Sense server is used the least to reduce interruptions.

Communicating Scheduled Backups

Before taking Qlik Sense offline, it’s always a good idea to let those who rely on accessing Qlik Sense to do their work know of upcoming maintenance window. If you’re running Qlik Sense November 2022 or newer version, you have something that’s called Custom Banner Messages which can be used to display a message to all users letting them know of upcoming downtime, like this:

Alternatively, you may simply send a short email to your Qlik Sense users communicating the same message. I’ve used both options and both work well.

Keeping your users in the loop is more of a reminder than a hard requirement. Letting your Qlik Sense users know of upcoming server maintenance generally helps to avoid users reaching out to you and asking why Qlik Sense is down. It sets expectations and reduces support requests.

Qlik Sense Versions

Qlik Sense is fairly rigid when it comes to restoration from backups. What I mean by that is when you create a backup for May 2024 version of Qlik Sense, for example, you will only be able to use created backup to restore May 2024 version of Qlik Sense.

So, if you backed up May 2024 version of Qlik Sense, then upgraded your Qlik Sense server to November 2024 version, then the next day something happens and your server crashes, in order to restore from May 2024 backups, you’ll need to be running May 2024 version of Qlik Sense. You won’t be able to recover Qlik Sense that’s running November 2024 version from backups of May 2024 version of Qlik Sense.

Key takeaway here is that when you are creating backups of Qlik Sense, you should take note of the version of Qlik Sense that the backups correspond with. I recommend storing your backups in a folder that is named after the version of Qlik Sense that it corresponds with. Like this:

Alternatively, you may also use Qlik Sense version number, like this:

Both version name and number are available on Qlik’s product downloads page:

Either way, with the version mentioned in backup folder name you won’t have to remember or wonder about what version of Qlik Sense the backups are for.

Qlik Sense Installation Files

It is also a good practice to keep a copy of installation file for the version of Qlik Sense that the backups are for. Qlik removes installation files from their Downloads page at about a year after they stopped supporting that version of Qlik Sense.

For example, if you’ve backed up May 2021 version of Qlik Sense and you’ll need to restore it from backups, you won’t be able to download that version of Qlik Sense from the Downloads page anymore. Make sure to keep a copy of the installation file of Qlik Sense version that you’ve backed up to be able to restore Qlik Sense from created backups. I keep mine in a folder like this: