Backups lets you download a full copy of your school’s records to keep somewhere safe. Super Admins also see two more panels: Storage, which watches disk space so the site never fills up and goes offline, and Move a school to its own site, for moving one school to its own separate èLyn site.
- Where System → Backups
- Who can use it Anyone whose role includes Backups can make a backup. The Storage and school-moving panels appear only for a Super Admin.
Make a backup
- Click Create SQL Backup. A progress bar shows how many records have been gathered. Large schools can take a few minutes; keep the page open.
- When it says Backup ready, click Download SQL Backup.
- Save the file somewhere safe away from the website, for example a USB drive or the school’s cloud storage.
The file holds every record for your school (students, staff, classes, fees, payments, exams and more) in a format a technical person can load back into a MySQL database.
Important: the backup contains personal details of students, parents and staff. Store it securely. The copy on the server is deleted once you download it, or after 24 hours.
Student photos and uploaded files (the school logo, learning resources) are not in the backup file, because they are files rather than records.
Storage (Super Admin)
If the hosting account runs out of disk space, the database stops and the whole site goes offline. The Storage panel helps you see it coming.
- The top figures show the size of the Database, Uploaded files, the Total and the daily Growth. A box says either Storage is within your limits or gives a Storage warning with the reasons.
- Largest tables and Largest upload folders show what is taking the space.
- Automatic cleanup runs daily and removes only old activity logs, send records and expired cache entries. It never touches students, fees, payments, grades, attendance, staff, payroll, messages or uploaded files.
Below that you can set how long to keep the activity log (180 days to start with; 0 keeps it forever), your hosting disk quota in MB (from your hosting control panel), when to warn, and who gets the warning email (blank sends it to the site admin email). You can also limit the size of student photo uploads; photos are shrunk automatically.
Click Save. Run cleanup now cleans up straight away and Re-measure refreshes the figures.
Tip: The warning email is sent at most once a day. If you get one, check your hosting control panel’s disk usage page too: old host backups, error logs and email can also fill the disk.
Move a school to its own site (Super Admin)
This moves one school’s complete data (records, user accounts with their passwords, and files) from this site to the school’s own èLyn installation. It is only offered for schools on an eligible plan, and your account must have two-factor sign-in turned on (see Settings). Each export, download and import asks for a fresh code from your authenticator app.
- On this site, find the school in the list and click Move to own site. Check the summary, choose what to include, then click Build migration package.
- When the package is ready, copy the Signing key and the Direct transfer code straight away. They are shown only once.
- On the new site, open Backups → Import a school package, paste the transfer code (or upload the downloaded package and type the signing key) and click Run dry run. This checks everything before anything is written.
- If the dry run passes, click Import now. When it finishes, it compares both sites and shows Imported and verified or lists any mismatches.
- Back on this site, click Mark as moved and enter the new address. Staff and parents are told to sign in at the new site, and the old copy becomes read-only.
If an import stops part-way, click Roll back this import to remove everything it added, then try again. Undo move makes the old copy writable again. Delete migrated data only becomes available after the waiting period you set.
Good to know
- The backup is a download only. There is no restore button in the app; restoring a SQL file is a job for your web host or a technical person.
- Make a backup regularly, for example at the end of every term and before big changes such as Promotion.
- A migration package expires after 24 hours and can be downloaded or transferred only once.