I should have known better!!
When I became the webmaster for the ISB Student’s Blog, the first thing I did was install the WordPress DB Backup plugin. I also tested it then, and it worked. So I assumed all was fine.
Anyway, last month our hosting ran out due to non-payment of fees, and the email alerts went out to people who are no more at ISB anymore. Since the account was not renewed the hosting was canceled. It was during the exam times in Term 4 and not many noticed.
I wasn’t too worried since I thought I had a backup and would be able to get the blog back up from it and running in no time. But lo and behold, the backup plugin did not work anymore and the scheduled backup did not work. Now we face a daunting USD 150 in renewing and restoring the old setup 🙁
Learnings from the incident:
- Take regular manual backups, and do not depend on plugins for that.
- When using a hosting account, ensure that the registration is done via a mailing list which includes people responsible for maintaining the hosting, and the blog, and update it every time people leave.