Content and Content Version Archival - Adobe Recommended Approach?

[nirleshc2483892]

We have a requirement to keep site content archive for 7 years so looking for a solution as whats the good way to keep the site contents for 7 years and how to archive the version as well.

[Jitendra_S_Toma]

Hi,

I don't see any reason not to use packages (zip file). And it is upto the client where & how do they want to keep these zip files.

Packages are the only thing you keep the backup of your content.

Question is how frequently you would be taking backup of content? Monthly, weekly or every day?

[peterw13024062]

Even I am having same requirement for my project where need to keep backup for 4 years but

- if we keep content package zip file and suppose after 2 years we will update the component which we are calling on few pages, in this case old content package wont work.

- also we need to take a backup on daily basis so where we should keep these backup files. What is industry best practic and Adobe recommend way

- Also, how to keep backup of AEM version?

Really looking for a siolution from last 15 days but didnt find any recommend solution so far.

[smacdonald2008]

As Jitendra Singh tomar points out - packages are the only solution here. There is no AEM functionality that converts a package into an Archived package - like PDF offers for PDFA -- PDF/A - Wikipedia

[arunpatidar · Accepted solution]

Hi Peterw13024062,

If feasible, In this case you go for server backup, you can take backup of complete VM/Server or CRX installation directory addition to other scripts.

In case of DR you can restore server from server/VM backup.

Thanks
Arun

[peterw13024062]

Is there any way we can take a separate backup of only AEM Version file? Also are we storing AEM content and AEM versions at same location is repository or storage process is different For both of them?

[arunpatidar]

Hi,

All versions of content get stores in JCR repo at /jcr:system along with content.

Thanks

Arun

[Jörg_Hoh]

AEM is not an archival solution! Depending on the details of the requirement you have you should consider:

* creating a content package doesn't help you in the first place. You should be able to prove that a page looked in a certain way or had certain content on it. Can you do that with a simple content package? Typically no.

* You need to have a system which is able render the content. It needs to have the correct templates, correct components, JS and CSS etc. This will change with every  PROD deployment. But also your OSGI bundles might affect the rendering.

* If you think of backing up the complete instance after a deployment: Are you able to restore it? Does your OS in 2023 support to run a backed up AEM instance from 2018? Or the other way: Does AEM 6.4 support the Java version of 2023? I wouldn't think so.

* This results that you need to backup your complete VMs (including OS and Java) or at least have a recipe how to re-create them.

That's only for the rendering of a content package. But when you create that package? And how often? Do you create it on author or publish? Changing a page might affect other pages as well. And changing an asset will change all pages the asset is referenced from.

And so on ...

Then the process: All the above assumed that you were able to setup a new environment, load all your data and content into and re-create the rendered page. That's a very IT-heavy process, taking time and there's definitly risk. How often do you assume do you need this process? Once a year? Or more often? Do you test this procedure and check if it's working at all? How long is it about to take?

You see, that there's a bunch of questions to answer when you design such a process. When I was tasked with that requirement, we came up with a simpler solution. Whenever we activate a page or an asset, we determine which pages are affected from this change. And then we create a PDF of all the affected pages and drop it into an dedicated archiving solution.

This means, that we don't need to preserve backups and archives, and we don't need an restore process. Because the retrieval of such a PDF from the archive is something a business person can do on his own. Might be a bit more expensive from archiving costs, but the overall reduced complexity is worth it.

Jörg

[nirleshc2483892]

Thanks Jorg !! It's really helpful.
Also, would like to check if we integrate any third party PDF utility in AEM to convert HTML page to PDF , would that be possible and which one would you suggest.

[Jörg_Hoh]

There are PDF libraries out there and there is AEM Forms, which can also create PDF/A :-)

Jörg