New Backup Schedule

We've implemented regularly scheduled backups to prevent the need to rebuild the server in the event of a catastrophic incident. Unfortunately, we can't prevent downtime during these backups, due to limited resources (no redundancy) and the need for servers to be down during critical times to prevent database and file corruption. The backup schedule is as follows:

• On the first of each month, a backup will occur at 6:00 AM EDT. If this falls on the weekend, the backup will be postponed to the following Monday.
• On the fifteenth of each month, a backup will occur at 8:00 AM EDT. If this falls on the weekend, the backup will be postponed to the following Monday.

These times were negotiated by a group of staff members from around the globe in an effort to a) backup during times that affect the fewest number of people and b) keep the server up as long as reasonably possible. We do reserve the right to change these backup times as necessary in accordance with the global distribution of players.

Backups take a while due to the ever-increasing amount of data we use and the nature of our hardware. Currently, the entire backup cycle takes approximately six hours. It executes in two phases:

1. All servers go down and critical databases are backed up. Then, servers are brought back online.
2. Game servers go down one at a time and are backed up (with the hopes of always having at least one server online at all time). Non-critical databases are also backed up.

This means that, about halfway through the backup cycles, you should be able to log on if everything goes according to plan, as long as you're vigilant with regard to the servers that are down for rolling backups at that time.

We know that backups are a painful process, and it can be improved upon depending on the funding that our community receives. However, it is a necessary process to avoid starting from scratch in the event that a rollback becomes necessary.