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Getting Started

Welcome to Laravel Easy Backups! This guide will walk you through the installation and how to perform your first database backup in just a few minutes.

Installation

First, install the package via Composer:

composer require aaix/laravel-easy-backups

The package's service provider will be automatically registered. Next, you can optionally publish the configuration file if you want to customize paths and defaults. The default settings work out-of-the-box for most applications.

php artisan vendor:publish --provider="Aaix\LaravelEasyBackups\EasyBackupsServiceProvider" --tag="config"

This will create a config/easy-backups.php file in your project.

Quickstart: The Interactive Wizard

The easiest way to use the package is via the included interactive wizard. It guides you through creating or restoring backups without needing to remember any flags or options.

Simply run:

php artisan easy-backups

The wizard will ask you whether you want to create a new backup or restore an existing one and guide you through the necessary steps (compression, target disk, database connection, etc.).

Direct CLI Usage

For quick one-liners, scripting, or CI/CD pipelines, you can use the specific Artisan commands directly without the interactive wizard.

To create a backup of your default database and store it only locally:

php artisan easy-backups:db:create --local

To create a compressed backup and upload it to your configured remote disk (default: backup):

php artisan easy-backups:db:create --compress

You can verify the created backup using the restore command:

php artisan easy-backups:db:restore

Advanced: Create your own backup command

While the included commands are great for quick tasks, you might want to create a custom command to handle complex retention policies, notifications, or specific file inclusions.

Start by creating a new command:

php artisan make:command Backup\\DailyBackupCommand

Then, use the fluent API to define your backup logic:

<?php

namespace App\Console\Commands\Backup;

use Illuminate\Console\Command;
use Aaix\LaravelEasyBackups\Facades\Backup;

class DailyBackupCommand extends Command
{
    protected $signature = 'app:backup:daily';
    protected $description = 'Create a daily backup';

    public function handle(): int
    {
        $this->info('Starting backup...');

        Backup::database('mysql')
             ->saveTo('backup') // Optional: defaults to config('easy-backups.defaults.database.remote_disk')
             ->compress()
             ->run();

        $this->info('Backup created successfully.');

        return self::SUCCESS;
    }
}

This is just the beginning. For more details on customization, handling files, and retention policies, check out the Creating Backups guide.