Backups and restore
AlertDesk backs up your data by itself each night, and before every update. A backup holds everything: accounts, trades, letters as received, broker files, the journal and your settings.
Steps
- Nothing to set up: each night after 2 AM, while AlertDesk is open, it backs up and checks the backup (opens it and counts what's in it). If the computer was off, it backs up the next time it's opened.
- To keep a copy somewhere else too, in Settings → Data & backups give a second location: a folder on an external drive, or in iCloud Drive, OneDrive or Dropbox. Every backup is copied there and checked. (AlertDesk's own data folder can't be in a synced folder; backups can.)
- How many are kept: the last 7 daily and 4 weekly backups, by default. Change it in the same place.
- To restore: Settings → Data & backups, press Restore… beside a backup, look at what it holds, and press Restore this backup. Your data from before is set aside, not deleted, and Undo the restore puts it back (once).
- To take everything elsewhere: Export everything gives plain CSV files any spreadsheet opens.
- To test a clean install without reinstalling the app: Settings → Data & backups → Start over… (or the small link on the setup's first page). It does what Delete all my data does -- asks twice, offers a final backup -- and also removes the mailbox's app password from your keychain and the setup's progress, then opens the setup as a brand-new install would.
What you should see
- Settings → Data & backups lists the backups kept, newest first, each "checked".
- Health's Backups card: the latest backup and when it was made.
If it doesn't work
- Health says a backup couldn't be checked (red): the disk may be full, or the backup folder can't be written. Free some space and press Back up now.
- "The second location didn't take the latest copy": the drive isn't plugged in, or the folder moved. Plug it in; the next night's backup copies again.
- Restoring a backup made by a newer AlertDesk is refused: install that version first.