Personal Backup Version 5.9
	© 2001 − 2018, Dr. J. Rathlev

  Restore data from backup

In the event that data has been lost and must be restored from a backup, the program offers two options:

• The internal Restore function
• The additional program PbRestore

The internal Restore function

Clicking the button in the tool bar on the left will open a dialog window in which you can select which files and from which directory you wish to restore and to which directory the files are to be copied. These settings can be saved as task (<filename>.rsj) for use at any time.

There is a list of the most recently-used Restore tasks held by the program. Clicking the button will immediately load one of these tasks.
Right-clicking the button will allow the list to be edited.

Select the location of the backed up files for Restore

When restoring files, you must consider how the data was backed up (see Backup destination):

• The backup directory is on a local storage medium or on a network drive
  Data can be restored from single files or from zip files:
  • Select the root directory if the data was saved as single files (even if compressed and/or encrypted).
  • Select the zip file in the root directory if the data was saved as one zip file per subdirectory. All zip files in the subdirectories of the same name will be included automatically.
  • Select a single zip file if all data was saved there.
• The backup directory is on an FTP server
  A direct restore is only possible if your data was saved as single files (even if compressed and/or encrypted). In all other cases you need to restore in two steps:
  1. First restore all required zip files including the directory structure to a temporary local folder. For this step you can use Personal Backup in Restore mode for single files or any FTP client such as FileZilla or Total Commander.
  2. Then restore the files from the local folder as described above.
  FTP settings for restore
  Clicking the button will open a dialog to configure the FTP server connection parameters (see here):
  
  After clicking the button, the program will connect to the FTP server and read the remote directory tree of the backup for the user to select a subdirectory.

Restore to

Files can be restored either to the original source directory or to any other location:

• Source directory: The source path will be derived from the pathname of the backup folder. A restore to source is only possible if you backed up the data with the option Drives separated, so that drive indicators(such as LwC, LwD, ...) are part of the backup directory path. In this case Lw? must be given as drive identifier. The question mark will be replaced with the respective drive letter, hence it is even possible to restore to source directories on different drives.
• Selected directory: In this case you must browse for the directory where the files are to be restored. Clicking the button will open a dialog where you can select the directory. In this mode, the restore function can be used to make copies of all backed-up files in their original directory structure at a different location, e.g. on another computer.

Uncompress gz/gze and zip files
If the backup was made into single compressed files, select the same mode as used during backup. So all files will automatically be unpacked on restore in the right way (default setting : gz/gze).
 

No decryption of enc files
Personal Backup adds the file extension enc for uncompressed encrypted files. These files are decrypted automatically on restore. If there are files from another application using this extension, the decryption will fail. You can prevent the program from decrypting such files by checking this option.
 

Restore empty directories
If this option is selected, even empty directories will be restored.
 

File filters

By using filename filters, filenames matching certain patterns may be included or excluded. Use the same rules as described for backup file filters (Standard file filter or Regular expressions).
 

Take security copies into account

This option is disabled by default and should be activated only if Security copies were created during backup.
Use this option to define how these security copies shall be taken into account during restore. The settings for prefixes and suffixes must be set in the dialog (see screenshot on the right) as used during backup to identify these directories and files. If they are to be excluded, do not mark the checkboxes (default setting).
If you want to restore the state to that of a former date, first specify this date under File age - All before ... (see below). Then, select by ticking the appropriate check boxes which security copies are to be taken into account for restore. Do not forget to specify where the security copies were created on backup (e.g. in a separate directory). The preview then will show in each case the most recent security copy matching to the selected time slot. The restore will move the files automatically to their correct location.

• Security copies created during backup
  The option Directory prefix is only required if the security copies were moved to a separate directory. If these copies are to be considered during restore, it is necessary to specify which directory option was used during backup.
  The option Filename suffix must be selected if the security copies were not moved to a separate directory, but created by renaming. You must select the same settings as used on backup. If placeholders were used on backup, clicking the appropriate button will insert the filter pattern needed to exclude these files. If a number of prior versions have been saved, use the upper right button to insert the counter placeholder (“#” character, e.g. bak-#).
  Should several statements be required, these can be separated by semicolons (e.g. bak;bak-#).
• Security copies created during synchronization
  The option Directory prefix must be specified to use the same settings as used for the security copies on synchronization during backup. This applies both to directories that had to be deleted during synchronization and to the optional selectable directory used to move files to be deleted. If security copies are to be be considered during restore, additionally you have to specify which directory option was used during backup.
  The option Filename suffix is only required if the security copies were not moved to a separate directory, but created by renaming.
  If placeholders were used during backup, clicking the appropriate button will insert the filter pattern needed to exclude these files.

File age

You can specify whether you want to restore only files newer or older than a given fixed or relative date.

• Relative to actual date: newer or older than the specified number of days, weeks, months or years
• Fixed date: newer or older as or exact thew given date

Restore of

Creation time
If this option is selected, the creation time of the files will also be restored.
 

Alternate data streams
If this option is checked, any alternate data streams saved with the files (see here), will be restored.
 

Document summaries
If this option is checked, the document summaries, possibly saved with the files (see here), will be restored.
 

File permissions
In NTFS file systems and network shares, an access control list (ACL) that specifies the permissions for each user is associated with each file and directory. If this option is set, also the permissions of files and directories will be restored (see here). For this to happen, it is necessary that ACLs are supported by both source and destination.
 

Junctions
If this option is set, the information about junctions saved during backup (see here) will be analyzed to recreate the junctions in the destination directory of the restore. Depending on the restore settings, the contents of the directories, to which the junctions point, must possibly be restored separately.
Important note: To restore junctions, administrator rights are required.
 

Mail delivery after restore

Similar to the option for backups, a mail with status information and optionally a log file can be sent after performing a restore task. The settings are the same as for backup.
 

Overwrite

Here you can specify whether existing files are always to be overwritten, or only when they are older than those from your backup, or never.
 

Settings for time comparison

Comparing the timestamps of files is problematic when using different file systems. Adjust the settings to be system-independent.
 

Password

Here you can optionally specify a fixed password to be used for decryption of files. In this case the user will not be prompted to enter it during restore. So a restore may be performed in background without user interaction.
The icon on the button changes to show whether a fixed password was specified or the password has to be queried on restore.
 

Log settings

Clicking the button will open a dialog to adjust the log settings for restore.
Click then button to view the current log.
 

Start restore

Clicking the button will start the restore. Before restoring any files, the program will create and display a list of all files that match the filter conditions. If the selection is not to your liking, you can cancel the restore at this point and adjust your settings. It is also possible to select or deselect files or directories individually by tagging the checkboxes.

Right-clicking a file will open a local menu that allows its contents to be viewed or compared with the source (if available). The selections required for the external viewer and comparison program can be made by clicking the button:

• View file: If no special viewer such Lister.exe (see Total Commander package) was selected, the Windows default file type settings will be used to start the associated program. Compressed or encrypted files will be processed beforehand.
• Compare file: You can use the open source program WinMerge for comparing files. Compressed or encrypted files will be processed before loading.

After this, all selected files will be restored. Any necessary unpacking and decryption will occur automatically. If required, a password must be entered by the user only once. If you wish, you can save the password with the restore task (more ..) to avoid any interaction during restore

Loading and saving restore tasks

Clicking the or button will save a configured restore task with all settings to disk. To load and reuse such a saved task, click the button.

A saved restore task can also be started from the command line. This makes it possible to use the Windows Task Scheduler to restore files at specific times, or to restore a directory (for example automatically on logon) by adding a shortcut to the Windows start menu (see All Programs ⇒ Startup):
PersBackup /restore <rest-task>

Automatic Restore using Windows Task Scheduler

You can configure a Windows scheduled task to carry out an automatic Restore by clicking the button. The configuration procedure is the same as described for backups.

The additional program PbRestore

The program can be started via the Windows Start Menu or in Personal Backup by selecting Main menu - Tools - External Restore program in two different modes of operation:.

• Restore files - Restore data saved as separate files
• Restore from zip archive - Restore data saved in zip archives

You can copy this supplementary program onto a USB stick to restore files in emergency without installing Personal Backup in its entirety.

Restore data from backup into separate files

The program offers three options to restore data backed up into separate files:

• Restore selected files
• Restore all files from a selected directory and all its subdirectories
• Restore data from an alternating schedule

In all three cases compressed and/or encrypted files will be unpacked and/or decrypted automatically. The destination directory must be selected manually. In addition you can select, whether files already existing in the destination directory shall be overwritten or not. If only older files shall be overwritten, you can adjust the settings for time comparison (see here). Optionally you can disable the overwriting of write-protected files.
By clicking the tool button at the lower right of the file list you can adjust whether you wish to associate gz, gze and enc files with PbRestore as the default application in Windows. Click the most right button to switch to zip mode.

Restore selected files

First, on the left select the directory or zip archive, containing the files to be restored. On the file list at right you can select the desired file(s) using the mouse in the normal way. Clicking the Restore button will initiate the copying of files into the specified destination.
Double-clicking a file or the Preview button at the lower right will start the application associated in Windows with this file (e.g. an image viewer for jpg file). gz files will automatically unpacked, on encrypted files (enc or gze) or on encrypted zip archives the user will be prompted to apply the password to start the decryption automatically.
Optionally you can disable the unpacking of gz/gze files.

Restore all files from a selected directory

First, on the left select the directory or zip archive, containing the files to be restored. All files from this directory and its subdirectories (if any) or in the archive will be copied to the destination directory. The directory structure will be retained.
Optionally you can disable the unpacking of gz/gze and zip files.

Restore from a schedule

If your files were saved using an alternating schedule (Full backup in conjunction with incremental/differential backups) the files will be distributed to several directories (e.g. BD01F, BD02I, BD03I,..). When restoring it is necessary to retrieve the most recent versions.
The user must specify the following items:

• Date: The latest version of each file relative to this date will be restored.
• Scan only matching subdirectories: Specify a filter pattern for the subdirectories to be scanned (e.g. BD* for the example above). You can use * and ? as placeholders.
• Only for this drive identifier: If the backup used the mode Separate directories for drives, you must specify the identifier of the drive containing the files to be restored, e.g. LwE for files that were originally on drive E. If the backup was made without separate directories for drives, this field should be left empty.
  After clicking the Start button the selected directories will be scanned to find the latest file versions. After confirmation, all files will automatically be copied to the destination directory.

Optionally you can disable the unpacking of gz/gze and zip files.

Restore files from zip archives

If the backup was placed into one zip archive or into zip archives per subdirectory, the files can be unpacked using any popular file archiver such as WinZip or 7zip. This applies even to archives with encrypted data.
But if, in addition, also the filenames were encrypted (available since version 5.9.4), a full recovery of backed-up data is no longer possible using one of these programs (see here). The file data itself will be decrypted correctly, but the filenames cannot be recovered. In this case the use of PbRestore is required. The program will decrypt all directory names and filenames on reading the zip archive and will rebuild the original directory structure.
Depending on the settings during backup, the following options are available:

• Single zip archive: The directory structure found in the selected zip archive and all files of the selected subdirectory are displayed.
• Zip archives per subdirectory: Select the desired zip archive in the root directory. All zip files in the subdirectories of the same name will be included automatically. The directory structure and all files of the selected subdirectory are displayed.

Initially, all files are selected. By clicking the checkboxes to the left of the directories and filenames, they can be alternatively excluded or included. Using one of the two buttons above the file list, all files can be deselected or selected.
In addition you can select whether files already existing in the destination directory shall be overwritten or not. If only older files shall be overwritten, you can adjust the settings for time comparison (see here). Optionally you can disable the overwriting of write-protected files. After selecting a destination directory, start the restore by clicking the associated button.
Click the button to the upper right of the file list to switch to single file mode.

Command line options:

To control the operation mode of PbRestore, use the following command line options:

none

The program will start in Restore files mode and will offer selection of single files (see above)

/dir

The program will start in Restore files mode and will offer selection of entire directories (see above)

/path:[Directory]

The program will start in Restore files mode and directly select the given Directory

/zip

The program will start in Restore files from zip archives mode (see above)

[Filename] or [File list]

If Filename is a zip archive, it will be opened to restore selected files. In all other cases (either one file or a list of files) the Restore files mode will open and the specified files will be selected for restore.