GitLab Backup Best Practices

Advanced Technical Writing Group
3 min readDec 16, 2022

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GitLab is a platform for collaborative software development and an open-source code repository for major DevOps and DevSecOps projects. GitLab is a crucial tool for developers and project managers as it enables users to effectively manage repositories and complete project tasks.

In that case, GitLab offers a built-in backup feature that can produce an entire archive of the data in your installation. Let’s understand a few more things about the best backup practices of GitLab.

What Data Must a GitLab Backup Include?

Data created by users on your GitLab instance is exported using GitLab’s built-in backup function.

  • All of your on-disk Git repositories and the data in the GitLab database are included in this.
  • You can restore the backup to restore your projects, groups, users, issues, uploaded file attachments, and CI/CD task logs.
  • Additionally, the backup includes Docker images posted to the integrated container registry and GitLab Pages websites.

GitLab’s package registries cannot be used with packages which are added to them. If you need packages to be recoverable without a manual rebuild, you should arrange for your system to save packages to an external object storage provider.

Features That Make a Perfect Backup Plan

Working in a well-organized procedure is of great value. The backup procedure is subject to the same criticism. One should have the option to create several backups in order to

  • Avoid workflow interruptions
  • To satisfy audit, compliance, and security requirements in addition to restoring GitLab data.

Consequently, the following security concerns should be remembered:

  • In-flight and at-rest encryption using your own encryption key and AES encryption;
  • Adaptable, lasting, and limitless retention;
  • The capability of archiving unneeded, outdated repositories;
  • Keeping track of possibilities to observe how the GitLab backups are carried out (reports, email notifications, and more);
  • Protection from ransomware;
  • Technology for disaster recovery and numerous locations for restoration.

Although, for the perfection of your backup process, only the fundamental backup elements have been mentioned. It’s worth thinking about and developing alternative backup strategies that will incorporate advanced backup capabilities if you want to master your backup plan for your GitLab environment.

  1. Manual Process of GitLab Backup
  1. Automated Process of GitLab Backup

Conclusion

A backup is a critical part of your GitLab environment. It’s important to have backups that are resilient and can withstand any disaster. If you’re not sure about the best backup strategy, you can also talk to our expert about the best backup practices at https://metapercept.com

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Advanced Technical Writing Group
Advanced Technical Writing Group

Written by Advanced Technical Writing Group

Technical writer sharing skills in the field of API Documentation, Information Architecture, DITA-XML, DocBook, and Open Source based technical publishing.

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