Documentation

VPS Snapshots

Complete guide to creating, managing, and restoring VPS snapshots for backup and cloning purposes.

What are Snapshots?

Snapshots are point-in-time copies of your VPS instance, including:

  • Operating system and all files
  • Applications and configurations
  • Data stored on the instance
  • Complete system state at capture time

Snapshots vs Backups

Feature Snapshots Traditional Backups
Speed Very fast (minutes) Slower (hours)
Downtime None required May require downtime
Restore Complete system restore File-level restore
Use Case System cloning, migrations Data recovery
Storage Block-level File-level

Why Use Snapshots?

Backup Before Changes

Take a snapshot before:

  • System updates
  • Application upgrades
  • Configuration changes
  • Installing new software
  • Database migrations

Disaster Recovery

  • Quick recovery from failures
  • Protection against mistakes
  • Rollback bad deployments
  • Restore corrupted systems

Cloning & Scaling

  • Create identical instances
  • Scale horizontally
  • Test environments
  • Development copies

Migration

  • Move to different region
  • Upgrade instance size
  • Change configurations
  • Platform migration

Creating Snapshots

Via Dashboard

  1. Navigate to Pods (VPS)
  2. Click on your instance name
  3. Go to Snapshots tab
  4. Click Create Snapshot
  5. Enter snapshot details:
    • Name: Descriptive name
    • Description: Purpose and context
  6. Click Create

Creation Time: 2-5 minutes depending on disk size

Snapshot Naming Best Practices

Good Names:

pre-update-2024-10-11
before-nginx-upgrade
production-backup-daily
staging-clone-v2
migration-source

Poor Names:

snapshot1
backup
test
my-snapshot

Naming Convention

[environment]-[purpose]-[date]
prod-pre-deploy-2024-10-11
staging-backup-2024-10-11
dev-clone-2024-10-11

Snapshot Details

What's Included

✅ Operating System: All OS files
✅ Applications: Installed software
✅ Configurations: All config files
✅ Data: Application data, databases
✅ Users: User accounts and permissions
✅ Logs: System and application logs

What's NOT Included

❌ RAM Contents: Active memory state
❌ Network Connections: Active connections
❌ Temporary Files: /tmp contents may vary
❌ Process State: Running processes

Best Practices Before Snapshot

  1. Stop Services (optional but recommended):

    # Stop database
sudo systemctl stop mysql

# Stop application
sudo systemctl stop nginx

  2. Flush Caches:

    # Sync filesystem
sync

# Drop caches
sudo sh -c 'echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches'

  3. Database Backup:

    # MySQL
mysqldump -u root -p --all-databases > backup.sql

# PostgreSQL
pg_dumpall > backup.sql

  4. Document State:

    • Running services
    • Important processes
    • Configuration details

Managing Snapshots

View Snapshots

  1. Go to VPS instance page
  2. Click Snapshots tab
  3. See all snapshots:
    • Name and description
    • Creation date
    • Size
    • Status

Snapshot Statuses

  • Creating: Snapshot in progress
  • Available: Ready to use
  • Restoring: Being restored
  • Deleting: Being removed
  • Error: Failed creation/restore

Delete Snapshot

Warning: Deletion is permanent!

  1. Go to Snapshots tab
  2. Click Delete next to snapshot
  3. Confirm deletion
  4. Snapshot removed immediately

Note: You're charged for snapshot storage until deleted.

Restoring from Snapshots

Restore to Existing Instance

Warning: This will overwrite your current instance!

  1. Backup current data if needed
  2. Go to Snapshots tab
  3. Click Restore next to snapshot
  4. Select Restore to Existing Instance
  5. Confirm action
  6. Wait 5-10 minutes

What Happens:

  • Instance stops
  • Data replaced with snapshot
  • Instance reboots
  • You may lose data created after snapshot

Create New Instance from Snapshot

Safer option - doesn't affect existing instance:

  1. Go to Snapshots tab
  2. Click Restore next to snapshot
  3. Select Create New Instance
  4. Configure new instance:
    • Name: New instance name
    • Profile: Can change size
    • Region: Can change location
  5. Click Create

Result: New instance identical to snapshot state

After Restore

  1. Verify System:

    # Check system status
uptime
df -h
free -h

# Verify services
sudo systemctl status nginx
sudo systemctl status mysql

  2. Update Configurations:

    • Update IP addresses
    • Update DNS records
    • Update environment variables
    • Update API endpoints

  3. Start Services:

    sudo systemctl start nginx
sudo systemctl start mysql
sudo systemctl start your-app

Snapshot Use Cases

Use Case 1: Safe System Updates

Scenario: Ubuntu system update

# 1. Create snapshot via dashboard
# Name: "pre-update-2024-10-11"

# 2. Perform update
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt dist-upgrade -y

# 3. Test system
# If problems occur, restore from snapshot
# If all good, keep running

# 4. Delete old snapshot after confirmed working

Use Case 2: Application Deployment

Scenario: Deploy new application version

# 1. Create snapshot
# Name: "pre-deploy-v2.0"

# 2. Deploy new version
git pull origin main
npm install
npm run build
sudo systemctl restart app

# 3. Test thoroughly
# If issues, restore snapshot
# If successful, keep and delete old snapshot

Use Case 3: Development Environment

Scenario: Create dev copy of production

  1. Create snapshot of production instance
  2. Restore to new instance
  3. Rename new instance to "dev-environment"
  4. Update configurations:
    • Change database credentials
    • Update API keys (use test keys)
    • Disable production integrations
    • Update application URLs

Use Case 4: Horizontal Scaling

Scenario: Add more web servers

  1. Prepare one server perfectly:

    • Install all software
    • Configure everything
    • Test thoroughly

  2. Create snapshot "web-server-template"

  3. Create multiple instances from snapshot:

    • web-server-01
    • web-server-02
    • web-server-03

  4. Configure load balancer to distribute traffic

Use Case 5: Migration

Scenario: Move to larger instance

  1. Create snapshot of current instance
  2. Create new instance from snapshot
    • Choose larger profile
    • Same region (or different)
  3. Test new instance
  4. Update DNS to point to new instance
  5. Delete old instance
  6. Delete old snapshot

Automation with API

Create Snapshot

import requests

headers = {
    "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_TOKEN",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

data = {
    "name": f"auto-backup-{datetime.now().strftime('%Y-%m-%d')}",
    "description": "Automated daily backup"
}

response = requests.post(
    "https://api.danubedata.com/v1/vps/vps-abc123/snapshots",
    headers=headers,
    json=data
)

snapshot = response.json()
print(f"Snapshot created: {snapshot['data']['id']}")

List Snapshots

response = requests.get(
    "https://api.danubedata.com/v1/vps/vps-abc123/snapshots",
    headers=headers
)

snapshots = response.json()["data"]
for snap in snapshots:
    print(f"{snap['name']}: {snap['created_at']}")

Automated Daily Backup Script

#!/usr/bin/env python3
import requests
import os
from datetime import datetime, timedelta

API_TOKEN = os.environ['DANUBEDATA_API_TOKEN']
VPS_ID = "vps-abc123"
RETENTION_DAYS = 7

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_TOKEN}",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

# Create new snapshot
data = {
    "name": f"daily-backup-{datetime.now().strftime('%Y-%m-%d')}",
    "description": f"Automated backup - {datetime.now()}"
}

response = requests.post(
    f"https://api.danubedata.com/v1/vps/{VPS_ID}/snapshots",
    headers=headers,
    json=data
)

if response.status_code == 201:
    print(f"Snapshot created successfully")
else:
    print(f"Error: {response.json()}")
    exit(1)

# Delete old snapshots
response = requests.get(
    f"https://api.danubedata.com/v1/vps/{VPS_ID}/snapshots",
    headers=headers
)

snapshots = response.json()["data"]
cutoff_date = datetime.now() - timedelta(days=RETENTION_DAYS)

for snap in snapshots:
    snap_date = datetime.fromisoformat(snap['created_at'].replace('Z', '+00:00'))
    if snap_date < cutoff_date and snap['name'].startswith('daily-backup'):
        print(f"Deleting old snapshot: {snap['name']}")
        requests.delete(
            f"https://api.danubedata.com/v1/vps/{VPS_ID}/snapshots/{snap['id']}",
            headers=headers
        )

Schedule with Cron:

# Add to crontab
0 2 * * * /usr/local/bin/backup-vps.py

Snapshot Pricing

Storage Costs

  • Price: $0.05 per GB per month
  • Billed: Hourly (prorated)
  • Size: Based on used disk space

Cost Examples

Instance Size Used Space Monthly Cost
25 GB disk 10 GB used $0.50
50 GB disk 25 GB used $1.25
80 GB disk 40 GB used $2.00
160 GB disk 80 GB used $4.00

Cost Optimization

  1. Delete old snapshots regularly
  2. Clean disk before snapshot:
    sudo apt clean
sudo journalctl --vacuum-time=7d
docker system prune -a
  3. Keep only necessary snapshots
  4. Use compression before snapshot
  5. Remove unused files

Best Practices

Regular Snapshots

Daily Production:

  • Before any changes
  • Automated nightly backups
  • Keep 7 days

Weekly Development:

  • End of sprint
  • Before major updates
  • Keep 4 weeks

Pre-Change Always:

  • Before system updates
  • Before deployments
  • Before configuration changes

Naming Strategy

[frequency]-[environment]-[date]
daily-prod-2024-10-11
weekly-staging-2024-10-11
pre-deploy-prod-2024-10-11

Testing Restores

Monthly: Test restore process

  1. Create test instance from snapshot
  2. Verify all services work
  3. Confirm data integrity
  4. Document restore time
  5. Delete test instance

Documentation

Keep a snapshot log:

Date       | Name              | Purpose           | Retention
-----------|-------------------|-------------------|----------
2024-10-11 | pre-update-v2     | Before Ubuntu 24  | 30 days
2024-10-11 | daily-prod        | Daily backup      | 7 days
2024-10-10 | pre-deploy-api    | Before API v3     | 14 days

Troubleshooting

Snapshot Creation Fails

Check:

  1. Disk space available
  2. Instance is running
  3. No other operations in progress
  4. Account limits not exceeded

Solution:

# Free up space
sudo apt clean
sudo journalctl --vacuum-time=7d
rm -rf /tmp/*

# Check disk
df -h

Restore Fails

Possible Causes:

  • Insufficient resources
  • Snapshot corrupted
  • Network issues

Solution:

  1. Try again
  2. Contact support
  3. Use different snapshot
  4. Check system logs

Slow Snapshot Creation

Factors:

  • Disk size
  • Data amount
  • Disk activity
  • Network speed

Optimization:

  • Stop services temporarily
  • Reduce disk I/O
  • Schedule during low-traffic
  • Clean disk before snapshot

Limitations

Size Limits

  • Maximum snapshot size: Based on disk size
  • Storage per account: Check account limits

Quantity Limits

  • Snapshots per instance: 50 (default)
  • Request increase if needed

Region Restrictions

  • Snapshots tied to region
  • Can restore to different region
  • Cross-region may take longer

Time Limits

  • Creation time: 2-10 minutes
  • Restore time: 5-15 minutes
  • Depends on size

Security Considerations

Data Protection

✅ Encrypted at Rest: All snapshots encrypted
✅ Access Control: Only account members can access
✅ Isolated Storage: Separate from instance storage
✅ Backup Redundancy: Multiple copies maintained

Sensitive Data

Before Snapshot:

  1. Review for sensitive data
  2. Remove temporary secrets
  3. Clear logs with sensitive info
  4. Document included credentials

After Restore:

  1. Rotate credentials
  2. Update API keys
  3. Change passwords
  4. Verify access controls

Next Steps

Need help with snapshots? Contact support through the dashboard.