I read somewhere a manifest file is needed to restore a backup. I have ran several backups lately but on the remote location where the zip.eas files are stored, I see none including manifest in it’s name.
I get an error regarding passphrase when trying to restore but I am so so so certain I type the right decryption passphrase that I am now confused as to why the restore won’t work.
I’m not aware of any manifest file, so long as you have the zip files you should be fine.
As for the encryption key, not much you can do there. Type the whole key out in a text editor so you can see it then copy and paste it. Try typing the password with CAPS lock on vs off, I’ve inverted many passwords without noticing. There is no reasonable way to get around the encryption (by design), if you can’t figure out the encryption key you’ll have to start a new backup set.
manifest files do exist in the backup, but they are embedded in the backup files (all backup files are zip files, so they are containing themselves files). So if you don’t have the decryption key, you can’t see them. You can use the included utility SharpAESCrypt.exe to test your encryption key on any backup file and if it matches you will see a manifest file in the resulting zip file.
Here is the content of one included in a dindex file:
Going with earlier questions for specifics, typically a GUI Restore needs no typing.
The password is part of that job, so is remembered (except for special situations).
Maybe you’re doing something else, but an explanation would help with guidance.
EDIT 2:
Agree with prior comments from others by the way. If you need GUI decryptor, try AES Crypt. Or try the mentioned program found in the Duplicati installation folder.
Sometimes command lines can be character sensitive. GUI tools typically are not.
Assuming something can decrypt the files, we can track down what else is wrong.
I don’t understand your EDIT remark about no typing needed? Does the password save the encryption key into a configuration or what do you mean by this?
I will look into AES Crypt to try if decrypting works, thanks for replying
You said that you have done backups already; it’s reasonable to assume you created a job to do that. The encryption key is saved in the job. If you select the job, you get the option to do a restore option right at the first line (besides ‘run now’ there is ‘Restore files…’) and if you select it you don’t need to enter again the encryption key.
This said, with Duplicati, the first thing to do after creating a job is to save the job as json and store the file in a safe location (outside the protected system, to be able to restore if the system crashes)
by default, nowhere. It’s created by the Configuration / export function, and you can save it anywhere on the file system. It’s up to the user to copy it in a secure location.
Export To File in web UI in browser uses download from browser, so you download where you like.
If you add an additional password to protect destination and encryption passwords, don’t lose that.
yes the passphrase is in Duplicati-server.sqlite. I think that under Windows it’s encrypted, it should be possible to read it nonetheless but I don’t have experience with that.
Under Linux the database is not protected and you can find the passphrase in the Option table:
select value from option where backupid=9 and name=‘passphrase’;
where 9 is the backup id (can be found in the table ‘backup’)
I’d guess that under Windows stopping Duplicati and replacing the database with the saved one, then restarting Duplicati, could work around the db encryption.
Unless you have lost your original data, a simpler option could be to start a fresh backup and this time do it better.
I found the passphrase, tested it and it worked. My girlfriend just had a heart attack as I literally screamed like I just won a million dollars.
I thought I had lost the data, which did not mean lost all of it because the real important stuff is backed up elsewhere too, but we would have lost some nice pics in high quality, we wouldn’t want to loose.
I have learnt a lot from this whole ordeal and I am SO HAPPY now.
I also should thank @ts678 for asking for more concrete information and helping me along as well.
You and @gpatel-fr are life savers, thanks so much!
(I only now start to realize how stressed out I actually was about this thing, and thus that I have to set this thing up more secure/robust for myself, this was too close of a call…)