Best practices for content backup and recovery in AEM as a Cloud Service
This article outlines best practices for backing up and recovering content in Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS), including strategies to minimize data loss when content deletion is discovered after a delay.
Description description
Environment
Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS)
Issue/Symptoms
Content under /content or /content/dam is deleted, and the deletion is not reported until after the standard backup retention window. Environment-level restores are available with limited retention, but path-scoped or item-level restores from Adobe-managed backups are not supported.
Cause
AEMaaCS doesn’t support path-scoped or item-level restores from Adobe-managed backups, making it important to have regular content backup strategies and understand available recovery options.
Resolution resolution
To fix the issue, follow these steps:
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Use Cloud Manager’s self-service environment-level restore to recover content from a backup taken within the previous 24 hours or from a selected point within the previous seven days (excluding the last 24 hours). Note that a full environment restore will overwrite all content created or modified after the selected restore point.
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For selective recovery:
- If the deleted content was previously included in an AEM content package, reinstall the package using Package Manager. Review the package contents before installation to avoid overwriting unrelated content.
- For Sites pages, use the Page Versions or Restore Tree functionality to restore individual pages or hierarchies to a previous state, provided suitable versions exist. After restoration, validate page references, child pages, permissions, workflows, and publication status.
- For DAM assets, if the asset node still exists but was modified, use the asset’s Timeline to restore or revert to a previous version. If the asset or folder was deleted, re-upload the original files and restore metadata, tags, renditions, references, permissions, and publication status.
- If the content exists in another available environment, export and import the affected assets or content subtree using supported content transfer approaches.
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Implement supplemental content export processes:
- Establish a retention and approval process for deletion of high-value content.
- Require authors to archive or move content to an approved archive location before deletion.
- Maintain an inventory of critical paths and asset collections.
- Schedule periodic exports of business-critical content to an external repository using supported AEM APIs or content-transfer mechanisms. Treat these exports as supplemental recovery copies.
- Regularly test export and re-import processes in a non-production environment, validating references, metadata, tags, renditions, permissions, and publication status.
- Configure monitoring or workflow notifications for bulk deletions to ensure administrators are notified promptly.
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If content cannot be recovered by the above methods and is outside the Cloud Manager restore window, collect the following information: exact affected paths, content type (pages, assets, etc.), approximate deletion date/time, environment details, and business impact. This information will help determine if an environment-level restore is feasible.