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Database Backup & Restore Guide

This guide covers database backup and restoration procedures for MultiWA Gateway.

PostgreSQL Backup​

Method 1: Using Docker Compose​

# Backup
docker compose exec postgres pg_dump -U multiwa multiwa_gateway > backup_$(date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S).sql

# Restore
cat backup_20260202_120000.sql | docker compose exec -T postgres psql -U multiwa multiwa_gateway

Method 2: Using pg_dump Directly​

# Full backup with compression
pg_dump -h localhost -U multiwa -d multiwa_gateway -F c -f backup.dump

# Restore
pg_restore -h localhost -U multiwa -d multiwa_gateway backup.dump

Method 3: Automated Daily Backup Script​

Create /scripts/backup.sh:

#!/bin/bash
BACKUP_DIR="/backups"
DATE=$(date +%Y%m%d_%H%M%S)
FILENAME="multiwa_backup_${DATE}.sql.gz"

# Create backup
docker compose exec -T postgres pg_dump -U multiwa multiwa_gateway | gzip > "${BACKUP_DIR}/${FILENAME}"

# Keep only last 7 days
find ${BACKUP_DIR} -name "multiwa_backup_*.sql.gz" -mtime +7 -delete

echo "Backup completed: ${FILENAME}"

Add to crontab for daily backup at 2 AM:

0 2 * * * /path/to/scripts/backup.sh >> /var/log/multiwa-backup.log 2>&1

Redis Backup​

Redis data is used for caching and job queues. For persistent data:

# Trigger RDB snapshot
docker compose exec redis redis-cli BGSAVE

# Copy dump file
docker compose cp redis:/data/dump.rdb ./redis_backup.rdb

Session Data Backup​

WhatsApp session data is stored in /data/sessions:

# Backup sessions
tar -czf sessions_backup.tar.gz -C /data sessions/

# Restore sessions
tar -xzf sessions_backup.tar.gz -C /data

Full Backup Strategy​

For production, implement a 3-2-1 backup strategy:

  • 3 copies of data
  • 2 different storage media
  • 1 offsite backup
  • pgBackRest - PostgreSQL backup with incremental support
  • Restic - Encrypted backups to cloud storage (S3, MinIO)
  • Velero - Kubernetes-native backup (for K8s deployments)

Disaster Recovery​

  1. Stop services: docker compose down
  2. Restore PostgreSQL: Use pg_restore or psql
  3. Restore Redis RDB: Copy dump.rdb to Redis data volume
  4. Restore sessions: Extract session backup to sessions directory
  5. Start services: docker compose up -d
  6. Verify: Check logs and test connectivity