Recovery options after unintended Restore Tree operation in AEM as a Cloud Service
Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS) may lose or roll back pages after an unintended Restore Tree operation, particularly when recent backups or comprehensive page versions aren’t available. To resolve the issue, assess available recovery options and, if necessary, recover the affected content from a cloned Author environment created from a backup taken before the incident.
Description description
Environment
Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS)
Issue/Symptoms
- An unintended Restore Tree operation can cause the loss or rollback of many pages under a specific content path.
- Recent backups or comprehensive page versions may not be available.
- Standard recovery tools may not fully restore the previous state.
- Preview pages may also become unavailable, requiring investigation to determine whether content is missing or a path/URL mapping issue exists.
Resolution resolution
Follow the steps below to resolve the issue:
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Pause all authoring and publishing activities for the affected site to prevent further changes. This includes publishing, page moves, renames, deletions, rollouts, and bulk content operations.
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Assess the available recovery options:
- If recent Package Manager backups or comprehensive page versions exist, use them to restore the affected content.
- If these options aren’t available, proceed to the next steps.
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Contact Adobe Support and provide details about the incident, including the affected content path and the approximate time of the Restore Tree operation. Request the provisioning of a cloned Author environment from a backup taken before the incident.
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After the clone is available and accessible, use AEM’s Package Manager in the cloned environment to create content packages for the affected paths.
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Download the content packages from the clone.
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Upload and install the extracted content packages into the Production Author environment using Package Manager.
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If the cloned environment doesn’t include custom application code, ensure that all required code packages are deployed to the clone before extracting content to avoid rendering issues.
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Verify that the restored pages appear as expected in the Production Author environment.
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For unavailable preview pages, investigate whether the issue is caused by missing content or path/URL mapping:
- Use the Page Content API to verify content presence.
- Review AEM logs for errors related to page rendering or mapping.
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Document all recovery actions and communicate the scope and limitations of the recovery to stakeholders. For example, we have restored the affected content from a cloned environment. Some pages may require additional verification or manual adjustment. Please review and report any remaining issues.
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Avoid requesting a full point-in-time restore unless absolutely necessary because it reverts the entire environment and may affect unrelated sites and content.