Backup & Restore

Protect your data and migrate between computers using the built-in backup tools.

The Backup & Restore feature helps you safeguard your important data, including profiles, history, and application settings. It also provides a simple way to move your data to a new computer.

Why is this important?

Your templates and PDF files are stored safely in your Workspace folder, which you can easily manage. However, your Application Database—which links everything together—is stored deep inside the system for stability.

This feature allows you to:

Recover from mistakes by reverting to a previous state.
Move your environment to a completely different computer without losing your configuration.

Automatic Backups

By default, PDF Mail Engine works to keep your data safe without any action from you.

Auto-Backup on Exit: Every time you close the application, a backup is automatically created.
Rotation: The system keeps the last 20 backups and automatically deletes older ones to save space.

You can customize these behaviors in the System view under Backup Settings.

How to Restore

If you need to revert your database to a previous state:

Open the Backup & Restore view from the main menu.
Locate the backup file you want to use (sorted by date).
Click the Restore icon on the right side of the row.
Confirm the warning message. The application will verify the file and restore your data immediately.

Data Overwrite

Restoring a backup will replace your current database settings and history with the data from the backup file.

Use Case: Moving to a New Computer

Since the database is hidden in a system folder, you cannot simply "copy and paste" it like a normal file. Use the Backup feature to make this easy.

Step 1: On Your Old Computer

Open the application and ensure a backup exists (or close the app to trigger an Auto-Backup).
Open your Workspace folder.
Navigate to the Backups folder.
Copy the latest .zip file (e.g., backup_20260124_....zip) to a USB drive or cloud storage.

Step 2: On Your New Computer

Install PDF Mail Engine.
Launch the app once to let it create the initial folders, then verify where your Workspace is located (check the System view).
Open that Workspace folder and find the Backups folder. (Create it if it doesn't exist).
Paste your .zip file into this folder.
Do not rename the file. The application looks for files starting with backup_.

Step 3: Restore

Go to the Backup & Restore view in the application on the new computer.
You should see your copied file in the list.
Click Restore.

Do Not Sync Simultaneously

While this method allows you to move data, do not use the application on multiple computers at the exact same time by syncing the database folder via cloud storage. This causes conflicts and may corrupt your data.

Configuration

You can change how backups work in the System settings.

Setting	Description
Unlimited Backups	If enabled, old backups are never deleted. Use with caution as this may fill up your disk.
Max Backup Count	The number of files to keep. Default is 20.
Auto-Backup on Exit	We recommend keeping this ON to ensure you always have a recent safety net.

Technical Details

For system administrators or advanced users:

Scope: Backups only contain the SQLite database (app_data.db). They do not include your .yaml templates or generated PDF files. You must back those up separately.
Location: [Workspace Root]/Backups/
Format: Standard ZIP archive containing the .db file.
Integrity: The application runs a PRAGMA integrity_check before applying any restore operation to prevent corruption.