Are attachments always stored in Confluence XML Backups?

[Nick Reilingh]

I am trying to follow the database migration documentation, which indicates that an XML backup and restore should be used to move between two different database platforms. The documentation states that when the source instance’s attachments are greater than 500MB, the attachments directory should be copied over manually. My source instance has about 1.1 GB of attachments based on running `du -sh` on the attachments directory.

I am confused about what enforces this 500MB limit, because when I take an XML backup from my source instance, it is about 1.5GB in size, and if I unzip it myself it appears to include the entire attachments directory. Right now I am getting restore errors that I need to troubleshoot so I don’t know what will happen if a restore from this backup would complete, but what I’m seeing doesn’t appear to add up with the documentation so I want to make sure I’m not confused about this:

- Is there a way to suppress attachments from being included in the XML backup, or should this be happening already?
- Is the restore process going to restore attachments that are included in the backup, or is it going to ignore them or cut off after 500MB?
- Is the documentation on migrating a database correct, or are there missing steps or considerations given the above behaviors?

I am using confluence 5.10.3 (trying to migrate to a supported DB platform before upgrading).

[Alexis Robert · Accepted solution]

Hi @Nick Reilingh , 

I think the 500MB limit is here to prevent issues when trying to import the generated backup : usually, you should try to minimize the backup size because otherwise it takes a long time to import and can cause errors (timeouts for example).

What I would advise :

• uncheck "backup attachments" in your Confluence backup settings
• backup Confluence, and import the generated backup on your new instance/database
• manually copy (with scp for example) the attachment directory from your old server or folder to the new one. The attachment directory is in CONFLUENCE_HOME/data/attachments

Let me know if you have any questions, 

--Alexis

[Nick Reilingh]

Thanks for the help! For whatever reason I completely missed the "Backup Attachments" box in the backup settings, and wasn't looking at the "Backup & Restore" page either.