AccessNow Site Replica is a free WordPress plugin that backs up, clones and restores a whole site, even a large one on shared hosting that times out on ordinary backup plugins. Version 1.0.4 makes backing up a database full of large values much faster: long posts, page-builder layouts and big serialized options now travel many at a time instead of one by one.
Get 1.0.4 from its WordPress.org page, or in your site under Plugins → Add New Plugin, searching for “AccessNow Site Replica”. If you already have it, the update arrives through WordPress like any other: this is the first one to come that way, now that Site Replica is on WordPress.org. Site Replica Pro 1.2.4, with the same speed-up, is out too.
Large database values, many at a time
Site Replica copies a database in small pieces so that a strict host never sees one long request. Most rows are small and travel in batches. A value too large for a batch, such as a long post or a page builder’s layout, used to come in a request of its own, and on a slow host each of those requests could take seconds. A site with hundreds of them spent most of its backup waiting.
From 1.0.4 those values come many to a request, as many as fit in the request’s size limit, with several requests running at once. In our tests, a database with 322 large values among 48,000 rows took 4 seconds instead of 52. With a simulated slow host, adding 0.4 seconds to every request, it took 13 seconds instead of more than four and a half minutes. The restored data was identical byte for byte.
Both sites need 1.0.4 for the faster way. If either has an older version, they use the one-at-a-time way, so nothing breaks while you update.
Also in this release
- The progress panel’s “since the last update” no longer climbs while large values are being fetched. It used to look stuck when it wasn’t.
- Get support goes to the WordPress.org forum, and the Plugins screen has a Rate it link. The help articles are where they were.
- Pro installed beside the free plugin now takes over cleanly: the free copy steps aside instead of stopping the site, and deleting either copy keeps the backups and settings they share. Installing and activating Site Replica Pro has the steps.
For backing up a big site from start to finish, see Back up a large site.
Get it
Install or update the free plugin from WordPress.org, or download it from the Site Replica page. When you are ready to put a redesign live, Site Replica Pro sends it from your computer and keeps the orders and members that arrived while you worked.
